The Author's Internal Distress Present in The Metamorphosis Christina Harrison

Franz Kafka's novella The Metamorphosis is as a disturbing look at the absurdity of life-and is literature at its most unsettling and most introspective. Throughout much of his life, Kafka suffered from insecurity and internal torment. An overweening, aggressive father with highly unattainable expectations exacerbated Kafka's feelings of self-loathing and misery. In examining The Metamorphosis, much inspiration for the actual text seems to have come from the dysfunctional relationship between Kafka and his father.

A preliminary and rather obvious parallel between Kafka and Gregor Samsa seems to lie in the very name of the protagonist. Indeed, much speculation has arisen regarding the possibility that Samsa is a crude cryptogram for the name Kafka. Each word consists of five letters, and the letters of both names occupy corresponding positions in the two titles. Although Kafka denied that this congruence was intentional, and even went further to deny any connection between his experiences and Samsa's, the text of The Metamorphosis exhibits certain similarities that are too blatant to be ignored.

If The Metamorphosis is truly an allegory for the life of Franz Kafka, then it is a profoundly meditative journey into the...