An imaginary panel of experts debate the meaning of Gregor’s
transformation:
Expert #1: Gregor
is angry, frustrated, bitter, helpless, trapped in his family’s downwardly
degenerating dependence on his bread-winning capacity. Unconsciously he seeks
to escape the unreasonable burdens placed upon him, although he can never allow
this desire to reach his consciousness. The psychic symbolism is clear—his
transformation from human to insect is the physical manifestation of a
repressed psychological desire, a form of unconscious wish-fulfillment.
Expert #2: No, you
pseudo-intellectual, pretentious, Freudian wannabe, as usual you miss the point
entirely. Gregor has been an insect in human form for years. Don’t you see the
disgusting groveling, the overwhelming feelings of worthlessness, the cringing,
abject, vermin-like posture he has adopted toward both father and employer, the
two most potent authority figures in his life? His body is merely catching up
to the true state of his identity.
Expert #3: Alas,
my sad, misguided friends, I’m afraid you fail to grasp the heart and soul of
the matter (and not for the first time I might add). By repeatedly emphasizing
the difference between the way Gregor thinks and feels—his internal, human
existence—and the way others see him, Kafka forces us to feel what it is to be
completely alienated by external circumstances from one’s essential humanity.
In this way he not only comments on the fundamental dehumanization of all of
twentieth-century existence, he foreshadows the terrors of such historical
developments as the Holocaust, the World Wars, and the genocides that have
plagued the world for the last century.
Expert #4: Losers!
You just can’t get the picture, can you? The guy’s family hates him, despite
all he’s done for them, and they project their image of Gregor so strongly onto
him that after a while he has no choice but to fulfill their expectations of
him. It’s not that complicated a story, but you guys just can’t get that, can
you? It’s the lack of love, understanding, and acceptance that turns him into a
big bug.
