Gregor Samsa Character Analysis in The Metamorphosis
Gregor is a thoughtful and compassionate person. However, he lives a life he does not enjoy. Gregor hates his job. He thinks, “Oh God, what a strenuous career it is that I’ve chosen! (…) there’s the course of travelling, worries about making train connections, bad and irregular food, contact with different people all the time so that you can never get to know anyone or become friendly with them.”
Franz Kafka is a German novelist who wrote “The Metamorphosis.” In the story, he uses a third person point of view narrative. The novel uses absurdum, which exaggerates and dramatize the absurdity of modern life. The protagonist, Gregor Samsa, a traveling salesman, struggles with an external factor of transforming into an insect like creature. The transformation was not under his control and now struggles with a new identity.
In The Metamorphosis, Grete Samsa is Gregor’s beloved sister, who takes responsibility to look after him. She does it with attention at the beginning by trying to understand what food he likes and cleaning his room. However, as the story progresses, Grete transforms into a young woman and stops caring for Gregor. To support the family, she has to start working. The readers learn what kind of job Grete has; she now works as a salesgirl. A hard reality of life makes Grete Samsa grow bitter towards Gregor. Eventually, she stops coming to his room, stops caring if he eats, and stops calling her brother by name. At the end of the novella, she demands they get rid of him.
Gregor Samsa Character Analysis
Kafka portrayed Gregor to be a symbol of all mankind for those who felt alienated. Alienation means “the state or experience of being isolated from a group”. Gregor felt alone and isolated even before becoming a bug. He had to go to a job he hated and not be able to enjoy his life because he had to work hard and pay off his parent’s debt. His parents ignored him and didn’t show any love towards him, they used him.
In the beginning, Grete is the only person who is not entirely repulsed by Gregor’s new appearance. She is also the only family member who interacts with him after the transformation. Mainly because of how close they used to be in the past. The family of Gregor Samsa views her as an authority in everything that concerns him. These new responsibilities make her position in the family more prominent. However, she enjoys being in charge more than she wishes well-being for her brother. For this reason, she does not allow her mother to help with taking care of Gregor.
is a vital symbol in the novel for the brother-sister relationship. At first, Grete brings her brother a fresh meal which he used to love, but Gregor cannot eat that anymore. So, she starts bringing him rotten food. Later, she loses motivation and empathy, starts neglecting the responsibility of feeding him. Towards the end of the novel, Grete completely gives up on bringing Gregor meals, showing her open loathing towards him. It could illustrate their gradually fading emotional connection. The worse the food, the worse the relationship.
An important detail in Grete’s description is her love for music. Gregor confesses that he was saving money to send her to Conservatory to study it. Only Gregor understands her passion for music, and even in his insect form, he feels the beauty of it. By rejecting Gregor, Grete rejects the only person who truly cares for her and her dreams. It demonstrates how her new adult life is.
Gregor Samsa Character Analysis | Free Essay Example for Students
However, his family never realizes these sacrifices and takes Gregor for granted, ultimately leading to his painful demise. Gregors perpetual devotion to his harsh family represents the unconditional love one feels for their own flesh and blood no matter how wicked they may be. The family's reaction to Gregor’s transformation into a bug demonstrates their lack of compassion for
Gregor Samsa, a young man, works as a traveling salesman
Grete is the only other character whose name is mentioned in the novella besides Gregor. She also the person that changes the most in the book. First, Grete starts acting differently towards Gregor. Second, she transforms into an adult with hopes of getting married. Grete is undergoing her metamorphosis from a young girl to a woman. It affects her personality and attitude towards her brother.
Gregor Samsa: Character Analysis
He can't help his actions. What readers should understand is that Gregor woke up as a cockroach and could not communicate like a human, walk like a human, he didn't eat what a human ate, and he had the characteristics and actions of a cockroach. In one example, what happens is Gregor thinks he is talking to his family but he realizes they can't understand him. Also, he eats garbage, hides from people, and avoids light and open areas. This experience shows that Gregor had no choice but to be isolated because the cockroach lifestyle came to him naturally along with his physical form.
The Metamorphosis Characters: Grete Samsa, Gregor ..
That’s when the novel of the story is begins to flip. Before when Gregor was a monstrous vermin “he felt very proud that he had been able to provide such an nice apartment for his parents and his sister. But what now if all the peace, the comfort, the contentment was to come to a horrible end”(Kafka 21). At this point he feels worthless on how he cannot provide for his family any more. So now the table is turning on Grete, instead of Gregor having to work while Grete stays home, Grete has no choice but to work while Greogor stays…
Gregor Character Analysis Essay
This highlights his true character, being a selfless person instead of the stereotype, being this big mean buff Russian man. The theme of alienation and the use of fantastical elements to convey ordinary events also appear in "The Metamorphosis". The magical realism is portrayed when one day Gregor wakes up and is turned into a cockroach. The magical element is the transformation of Gregor, the main character, this highlights the withdrawal of social interaction and alienation. “The unknown nourishment he yearned