The Metamorphosis

My initial reaction after reading Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis” was that it was rather strange and ridiculous. I was shocked by Gregor’s basically unemotional reaction to waking up one morning as an insect. He was more worried about not being able to sleep on his side and missing his train. I don’t know about you, but those would have been the least of my worries had I woken up as an insect this morning… It’s almost as if he recognizes his situation but is more concerned about the inconvenience of it than the horror of transforming into a giant insect.

As I continued to think about it though, I started wondering that maybe the author had a purpose for having Gregor react this way. Maybe his seemingly neutral reaction to being an enormous insect was meant to emphasize his obsession with his daily routine and job. It was almost as if his thoughts about getting to work and missing his train disabled him from thinking or worrying about anything else. His security was found in routine.

As was stated in the textbook, Kafka himself was plagued by insecurities, which tended to be the theme in many of his books. It seems very possible that he may have been using his stories as a way to communicate his own anxiety. Although the idea of a human transforming into an insect is absurd, along with the character's reaction to it, perhaps Kafka felt that he could relate to his character.

Pirandello--Act I

The beginning of the first act of Pirandello’s “Six Characters in Search of an Author” was a little slow and somewhat difficult to follow, but that changed when the family of six characters was introduced. They presented themselves as characters in a play, thrust into life, and in need of an author, hence the title of the play. They had an interesting story for the producer, and as I continued to read, I started seeing some correlations.

At one point, the Father says to the Producer, “We all have a world of private things inside ourselves and each one of us has his own private world. How can we understand each other if the words I use have the sense and the value that I expect them to have, but whoever is listening to me inevitably thinks that those same words have a different sense and value, because of the private world he has inside himself too. We think we understand each other: but we never do.”

Although this was just a line in a play, I feel that there is a lot of truth in this statement. It strongly reminded me of some of the discussions we’ve had thus far in class, especially about art. A lot of our discussions revolve around finding meaning in art, or whether there is any meaning at all. And even if we do form some idea of what the artist is trying to communicate, how can we be sure that our conclusion is accurate?

 

In the above quote, the character is talking about words, but I feel like his statement can be just as easily applied to the interpretation of art.  We can argue for hours about what an artist is implying through his or her art, but it is impossible for us to ever really know. We all look at art from a different perspective, depending on the “private world” we have inside ourselves. No matter how hard we try, we will never see into the private world of an artist, and therefore, we will never be able to form a completely accurate assessment of the art.

Now, I'm not saying that we should never search for meaning in art, poetry, music, etc. because that can potentially lead to some very interesting discussions, but I am saying that it's not something worth arguing over.