In ‘The Metamorphosis’, Gregor’s transformation is not merely a tragedy. It explores how it reveals human alienation and the contradictions within family relationships within the capitalist system.
Franz Kafka: A Brief Introduction
Franz Kafka was born in 1883 in Prague, then the capital of Bohemia within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as the eldest son of a middle-class Jewish family.
He attended a German-language elementary school in Prague’s Old Town at his parents’ insistence. Though he wished to study German literature, he could not defy his family’s expectations and instead studied law in Prague. In 1905, he began writing his first work, ‘Description of a Struggle,’ and published eight prose pieces in 1908. That same year, he began working as a lawyer at the ‘Workers’ Accident Insurance Institute for the Kingdom of Bohemia’ in Prague, a position he held until his retirement in 1922. In 1912, he began writing ‘The Metamorphosis’, the work that made him famous, and from 1914, he devoted himself to writing ‘The Trial’. During World War I, exempted from conscription at his workplace’s request, he continued writing novels and published ‘The Metamorphosis’ in 1915. In 1917, he published ‘A Report to an Academy’ in an Austrian morning newspaper. In 1918, the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved, giving birth to the Czechoslovak Republic. Kafka, who had shown symptoms of tuberculosis since 1917, spent four months convalescing in Seles, north of Prague.
After obtaining extended leave from work until his eventual retirement due to illness, Kafka began writing his final novel, The Castle, in 1922. He completed it that same year and handed it over to Milena Jesenská, a Czech-born journalist. He died at the age of forty on June 3, 1924, at the Hoffmann Sanatorium and was buried on June 11 at the New Jewish Cemetery in Prague.
The Metamorphosis Reading Log
Reading The Metamorphosis, I couldn’t help but reflect on the bondage of freedom and the organic nature of human alienation. We live in a liberal democratic society where all opportunities are supposedly equally given to individuals, yet we are constantly deceived by the sweet illusion of ‘capitalism’ and bound by it. Capitalism, rooted in liberal democracy, prevents us from enjoying true freedom. It whispers that if we don’t keep pace with capital’s speed, we will be left behind, forcing us into complete obedience. We find comfort in the pace and convenience of capital, yet pinpointing the source of the anxiety that suddenly strikes is difficult. That’s how deeply we’ve been steeped in the logic, speed, and convenience of capital, even forgetting the will to overturn it.
In capitalist society, the relationship between money and humans is an intimate one that arises in the pursuit of happiness. Yet, the nature of this relationship, born from the pursuit of true happiness, is contradictory. The power required to maintain happiness arises from thorough calculation. The Metamorphosis speaks to this power. We call this power ‘capital,’ and since this word came into being, money has naturally taken root within human relationships. The process of producing capital is called labor, and the active stance of having to labor to obtain capital takes on the form of bondage. In modern society, money is no longer a mere temptation; it has become an indispensable necessity for sustaining even the most basic livelihood. We now live in an era where even water and air cannot be freely consumed. We inhabit a society that constrains us for the sake of small pleasures. Yet the nature of the capital returned for labor is now different from before.
In the past industrial society, if one person produced one good, someone with a machine could produce ten. In the modern era, it has transformed into a more dramatic society: while the person who built the machine earns ten, the person who designed the machine earns a thousand. In this changed society, the individual’s existence has become more precarious, and amidst overflowing abundance and information, people are being standardized according to the logic of capital.
Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, depicting Gregor Samsa’s descent into non-economic value within this capitalist logic, prompts reflection on capitalism. Gregor, enduring a difficult daily life as a traveling salesman out of duty to his family, wakes one morning transformed into a bug. He believes it’s a hallucination caused by exhaustion, but it is reality, not a dream. Outside the door, his family and the manager urge him to go to work. Gregor agonizes over their demands, but when he finally opens the locked door, everyone is horrified and sees him as a bug. As time passes, Gregor becomes a burden to his family, a repulsive monster.
Gregor tries to give up his humanity and accept life as a bug, yet he still holds affection for his family and strives to maintain their relationship. However, when he can no longer work, his father becomes a bank guard, his mother takes up sewing for pay, and his sister becomes a shop assistant. Watching his role being replaced, Gregor reflects on his past role as the family breadwinner. His family becomes busy with their livelihoods, and while Gregor tries to adapt to his life as a bug, his family’s coldness towards him grows increasingly severe.
Gregor’s sister removes the furniture from his room and moves junk into it to prepare for a lodger. In the process, Gregor gets caught in a picture frame, and his mother faints upon seeing him. Enraged, his father throws an apple, leaving a wound on Gregor’s back. After this, Gregor loses his appetite and grows increasingly weak. In his anxiety and loneliness, he ultimately dies. His family, upon his death, remarks, “Now we can thank God,” and goes for a walk in the suburbs.
Like Gregor before he became an insect, we too strive tirelessly to meet our parents’ expectations and become proper citizens of society. My own life lately has been no different. Ironically, it is our own actions and ways of thinking that thoroughly support that logic. Gregor, too, transforms into an insect without becoming a being transcending reality. Because we cannot present ideas or logic to oppose capitalism, we are utterly ignored within society and regarded as worthless beings. It pains me that Gregor’s tragedy resonates so deeply with my own situation.
Even though individuals possess different values and forms, we are trapped in a reality where we cannot raise our voices and must conform. Capitalism’s victory has led to socialism’s disappearance, yet utopia, existing only as a theory, demonstrates its impossibility. Capitalism is a violent yet irreplaceable, captivating system. Through Gregor, who failed to transcend reality, Franz Kafka acknowledged the brutal violence of capitalism while also recognizing there is no alternative logic to replace it. Of course, I too possess no logic to replace capitalism. Yet the logic of capital carries many flaws.
The logic pursued for material abundance, which began so humans could live humanely, is now causing humans suffering. Within this violent logic, powerless humans merely conform, competing to seize capital and demanding ever-faster speeds. Yet underlying this, material abundance stems from a logic maximizing capital’s efficiency. Within this dangerous yet captivating logic, do we possess the will to change it? And does another logic exist to replace it?
Realizing a social system that addresses individual existence and reduces wealth inequality is difficult. If we champion the value of equality, individual existence becomes obscured, much like in socialism. Conversely, if we emphasize individual existence, it necessitates the overthrow of existing political and economic systems. Realizing both values simultaneously is exceedingly difficult. Moreover, while we critique the logic of capital, we remain deeply immersed in dazzling media and material comforts. What, then, should we do in the face of capital’s violence?
