The deformation record was written in 19 12 and published in 19 15. The novel is divided into three parts, marked with one, two and three. This text extracts half of the original novel.
In the first part, I wrote that Gregor found himself a "huge beetle", panicked and depressed. Father was furious when he found out and drove him back to the bedroom.
In the second part, Gregor changed, forming the habit of beetle life, but retaining human consciousness. He has lost his job and is still concerned about how to pay off his father's debts and send his sister to the Conservatory of Music. However, a month later, he became a burden to the whole family. Father, mother and sister changed their attitudes towards him.
The third part, in order to survive, the family had to work to earn money and could not bear the burden of Gregor. My sister finally offered to take my brother away. Greg was hungry, sick and desperate. "He misses his family with deep affection." "Then his head fell to the floor and his last breath came out of his nostrils." He died. Father, mother and sister started a new life of self-reliance.
The development of the plot is carried out by two clues:
Gregory: Become a beetle-become a burden-and die of despair.
Family members: panic, sympathy-gradually hate-"get him out of here"
Grigor cared about his family and missed his loved ones from beginning to end, but his loved ones finally abandoned him and decided to go for an outing.
The author describes this contrast of human feelings and reveals the alienation of social life at that time, which caused the weakness of family ties and the distortion of human nature. The theme of Metamorphosis is strongly critical.
Different readers will have different experiences and understandings of the theme of Kafka's literary works from different angles. Some people think that the theme of Metamorphosis is to show that people can't do anything about their own destiny, and people will be desperate if they lose themselves. Some people think that Gregor turned into a beetle, which is not conducive to people and died on its own; The family goes back to work and moves towards a new life; Existence is reasonable, and the law of life is ruthless.
Three Characters and Psychological Description
The hero Greg is a nobody. Father went bankrupt, mother got sick, and sister went to school. The heavy family burden and father's debt made gregor breathless. In order to pay off his father's debts and improve his family life, he worked hard. In the company, he was angry with his boss and expected to resign after paying off his father's debts. It can be said that he is a dutiful son of his parents, a good brother of his sister and a good employee of the company. Becoming a beetle, his health is getting worse and worse. He is also worried that he can't pay off his father's debts and is still attached to his family. Even to please his father, he struggled to climb back to his bedroom. Such a kind, honest and responsible person was finally abandoned by his relatives. Grieg's tragedy is sad and has rich social connotations.
This novel depicts the character Gregor through psychological description. Greg's past life, thoughts, feelings and personality characteristics after he became a beetle are all expressed through psychological description.
The novel uses a lot of pen and ink to write the sad and painful inner world of Grigor after deformation. Although Greg has become a beetle, his psychology has always maintained a human state. His panic and depression when he suddenly found himself a big beetle, his anxiety and remorse when considering his family's economic situation, and his despair and pain after being rejected by his relatives all showed a kind, honest and responsible little man's desire for understanding and acceptance. It's just that this desire is finally replaced by complete despair, and what permeates the characters' minds is endless loneliness, indifference and sadness. It should be said that the main line of Metamorphosis is the psychological-emotional flow process after Gregory becomes a beetle, and the inner feelings and psychological activities of the protagonist after becoming a beetle are the main body of the novel. The novel uses inner monologues, memories, associations and fantasies to express the psychological activities of the characters. He constantly recalls and associates past and future events, and from time to time he has fantasies and hallucinations because of fear, anxiety, pain and despair. In his free association, time and space are often reversed, logic is confused, and thinking jumps. , has certain characteristics of stream of consciousness.
Greg's psychological changes after becoming a beetle are roughly like this.
1? Greg suddenly found himself a big beetle.
He was both scared and depressed. He recalled his past life, resented his "tiring work" and worked hard to pay off his father's debts. He obviously wants to get up and catch the bus to go to work. His father found him a big beetle, showed a vicious look and drove him back to the bedroom. He humbly begged to go back to the house as soon as possible, lest his father get angry. He endured humiliation and never forgot to obey his father.
2? Anxiety and self-blame about the family's economic situation.
Greg is unemployed at home, living like a beetle, and can only crawl around. But he is anxious about the financial situation at home and wants to realize his "dream" for his sister. He thought that his father was old, his mother was ill and his sister was only 17 years old. As soon as he heard that all his family went out to work to earn money, he was "ashamed and sad" He was "depressed by regret and sadness", "finally, in despair, he felt that the whole room began to revolve around him, so he fell in the middle of the big table".
3? After being seriously injured, he was abandoned and despaired by his relatives, and his mentality went to peace.
An apple hit him on the back and he was badly hurt. Greg was finally rejected by his sister. My sister always said, "We must try to get rid of it". Gregory fondly recalled his family. He thinks he must leave here, and his opinion may be stronger than his sister's. "Gregory was unusually calm. He died in despair and peace. Facing the deformation, rejection and death of relatives, Greg was frightened, miserable and desperate, and finally died peacefully. From this point of view, he is still a sober and strong person.
Grieg's personality image focuses on two aspects: one is to earn money to support his family and show his honest, kind and responsible personality; The other is to fight for freedom, pay off his father's debts, pursue luck, freedom and independence, and finally pursue another kind of detachment-die in helplessness and peace.
Gregor and his family should love and help each other. However, relatives thought Greg could no longer support his family, regarded him as a burden and finally abandoned him. When Gregory died, his relatives did not feel sad, but went on an outing. In capitalist society, under the pressure of machine production and survival competition, people are alienated into non-human, and their nature is lost, even going to the opposite side. People can't accept the real world and the real world can't accommodate people. Greg became a beetle, which is also a symbol, symbolizing the alienation of people, humanity and interpersonal relationships. In the face of money and self-interest, the novel shows two kinds of alienation: Grieg's alienation, people become beetles, and their nature has changed, from earning money to paying off debts, striving for independence and freedom to being complacent about beetle's life; The relatives represented by my sister are alienated, the affection becomes hatred, and the kindness becomes cold. By expressing the alienation of human beings, the novel reflects the social essence of capitalist system destroying human nature.
Absurdity, Deformation and Realism: Four Artistic Techniques
This novel describes a real and absurd world. "Reality" is because the author describes the details of the protagonist's life before deformation and the realistic psychological state after deformation with objective and calm realism, which makes people feel that he has been in a real world. "Absurdity" is because the overall framework of the story is constructed by symbolic means. The framework of this story-the logical structure of man becoming a worm itself is not true, and it is only used to contain the living state of man in the philosophical sense, rather than a true imitation of external life. The author does not ask people to accept the objective fact that people have become insects, but to observe and understand their surreal mental state and deep psychological-emotional feelings and seek the absurd essence. Therefore, the transformation of human beings into beetles is a symbol of the distortion and alienation of human spiritual world, and a reflection of the gap between people and the resulting loneliness and despair.
Greg changed from a man to a big beetle overnight, and the plot was absurd. The development of the plot and his conflict with his family are even more absurd. Even some artistic details are absurd: an apple hit Gregor's nails, sank in and rotted on the beetle's back for more than a month.
In daily life, family apathy, affection, contradiction and humanity cannot be displayed. Grieg, the breadwinner, suddenly became a beetle, unemployed and a burden. This plot intensified the contradictions and conflicts, and personality and humanity were immediately revealed. Literature and art are fictional art, and writers boldly imagine and invent absurd plots to promote conflicts between characters and express their personalities. Mother's helplessness, father's rage and sister's refusal have torn the veil of superficial family affection in capitalist society, shown the selfishness, indifference and cruelty of interpersonal relationships, and revealed the social essence of "everyone is for himself, and God is for everyone" in capitalist society and the social essence of predatory and mercenary.
Why do absurd and deformed plots feel true and credible in readers' experience and association? This is because the author uses the methods of detail truth and psychological truth in the overall absurd plot. Writing about beetles conforms to their habits; Writing the thoughts and feelings of beetles conforms to Gregory's logic of words and deeds; Writing about the changes of relatives is also in line with social life. This absurd and deformed artistic conception, combined with realistic narrative methods, has a strong symbolic significance, making the works shocking and convincing.
In addition, Metamorphosis has its own unique narrative tone. In his works, Kafka's narrative tone is calm and almost indifferent. It was originally a sad and shocking story that people turned into beetles, but the author wrote it in a calm tone, without emotion or discussion, giving people a feeling of being used to it, which can't help but make people more alert: when horror turns into mediocrity, mediocrity becomes a more terrible fact. This inspires readers to think about the present situation of human existence and the problem of changing this situation.