Quest Journals Journal of Research in Humanities and Social Science Volume 7 ~ Issue 4 (2019)pp.:39-41 ISSN(Online):2321-9467 www.questjournals.org Research Paper
Kafka and the Metamorphosis of the Human Body Arnab Das (M. A. in English and Comparative Literature, Pondicherry University) ABSTRACT:This paper endeavours to portray through the novella, The Metamorphosis (1915), Kafka’s complex understanding of the issues regarding body, its implications and disabilities, and the vehement political battle for supremacy, of which it is the prime site. It also links the idea of disability with capitalism and its consequent, modernism, of which Kafka is a chief exponent. Gregor Samsa’s metamorphosis into a vermin, this paper argues, has multiple unavoidable repercussions which has been posed in terms of body as well as mind, and the ever-widening chasm between the two, which pushes Gregor to his ultimate predicament. KEYWORDS: Kafka, Metamorphosis, body, sexuality, capitalism, modernism, Received 10 April 2019; Accepted 29 April, 2019 © the Author(S) 2019. Published With Open Access At www.Questjournals.Org
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INTRODUCTION
―One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug‖(TM, p. 1) —the beginning of Kafka‘s most popular story The Metamorphosis is characteristically puzzling by its seemingly illogical construction. Gregor Samsa‘s metamorphosis into a vermin at once triggers certain questions that cannot be very easily answered. Gregor‘s body transforms but mentally Gregor remains a human: is therefore ‗himself‘ synonymous with only body or also his mind? What does it mean for a man to transformed overnight into an insect? Which aspects does this transformation refer to of the lives of Gregor and his family? And, can this transformation be posed as an existential question which is put through the body of Gregor Samsa? Moments after Gregor‘s awareness of his transformation, however, he wishes to dismiss it as a mere bad feeling: ―Why don‘t I keep sleeping for a little while longer and forget all this foolishness.‖ (TM, pp. 3-4) Nevertheless, he is unable to sleep again for his body has transformed inexplicably to provide him any comfort with familiar human feelings. His thought now begins to wander—he thinks about his job: ―Oh God‖ he thought, ―what a demanding job I‘ve chosen! Day in, day out on the road. The stresses of trade are much…, temporary and constantly changing human relationships which never come from the heart. To hell with it all!.‖(TM, p. 4) Some forty years later, one of Kafka‘s greatest admirers, Albert Camus writes of the Sisyphean struggle of innumerable Gregors almost in similar terms. He says in ‗The Myth of Sisyphus‘: ―It happens that the stage-sets collapse. Rising, tram, four hours in the office or factory, meals, tram, four hours of work, meal, sleep and Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, according to the same rhythm—this path is easily followed most of the time. But one day the ‗why‘ arises and everything begins in that weariness tinged with amazement.‖ (Camus, p. 4) Gregor poses this question through his bodily transformation—he becomes the ‗why‘. Gregor‘s loneliness, which is the attribute of his travelling job, is reiterated when he feels ‗a slight itching on the top of his abdomen‘(TM, p. 4), the spot which he finds ―was entirely covered with small white spots (he did not know what to make of them).‘ This, along with the framed picture of a woman covered in fur that hangs in his room shows the absence of normal sexuality in Gregor‘s life, unlike the other salesman, those ―who live like harem women.‖ (TM, p. 4) Gregor instead worries about his being late for his train. At this point comes the first instance of the many self-reproaches that Gregor is to offer himself throughout the story: ―He was the boss‘s minion, without backbone or intelligence.‖ (TM, p. 6) This also provides us with a view on the oppressive nature of Gregor‘s job—it creates a deep chasm between his body and his mind, through which Gregor falls to his metamorphosis. In the meantime Gregor‘s mother calls in—the moment of Gregor‘s first connection with the world of his metamorphosed body also initiates his alienation from his job, family and at the end his very identity. The rest of the story unfolds this alienation in a grey, grim, characteristically nightmarish way. At this stage we only Corresponding Author: Arnab Das
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