Franz Kafka: The Metamorphosis and other Stories

The Metamorphosis and Other Stories by Franz Kafka

Just to be sure:
"The Metamorphosis" "The Judgment," "In the Penal Colony," "A Country Doctor" and "A Report to an Academy." are the storeis in this book? I just checked out a complete short stories collection from the library. (je suis broke)

I'll be totally honest, I had this on hold at the library and I haven't gotten it in yet. There must be someone out there who has it though and can answer PG.

I'm smacking my forhead..I forgot! Just ordered it a few minutes ago.

I think we mentioned this before. There are different editions of Metamorphosis, unfortunately, which contain different stories along with the title story. Commonly it's packaged along with the other stories that Kafka published in his lifetime, and that's the structure of the new Penguin Modern Classics edition which comes out in the UK this month:

Well I have this book and have read it once. It's a good read... interesting... and there are some poignant parts. The main character's personality is very endearing - the way he carries on despite it all.
It's saddening how his family gradually alienate him... although pleasing that they are able to flourish on their own - leaving the reader with a strange juxtaposition of emotions.

All in all - very worth a read - and I'm sure full of meaning beyond my comprehension. Also - its very short - so doesn't take up much of your precious time!

I'm making my way through a collection of Kafka stories in a leisurely pace - almost by default, since I decided to read him in German (seeing as how people always complain that he loses a lot in translation).

And it's an experience. I've read these stories before, but it was years ago, and one thing that didn't really strike me was Kafka's language; dry, descriptive, but always correct and rarely emotional. I definitely think you can draw parallels between Kafka and Lovecraft in theme (they were contemporaries, they both wrote about a world where the very fabric of reality seems unreliable at best and evil at worst, both seemed highly sceptic of the modern world and its advances, both were quite pessimistic about their abilities to get out of this world alive, so to speak) but where Lovecraft's monsters cause his anti-heroes to go insane and babble in long sentences containing a multitude of adjectives (most of which are about how they are unable to describe their horror, just trust us, it's HORRIFIC) Kafka is bone-dry. It's prose worthy of an insurance clerk; he tells us exactly what's happening, often in words with slight double meanings, but completely objective: Gregor Samsa turns into a vermin, accept it. No one is really surprised - horrified, yes, inconvenienced, yes, but not surprised. No one tries to solve the problem. They are characters adrift in a Wrong world, and Kafka never gives us any hints on how we're supposed to read it. Hell, even comes in the middle of a block of text, blink-and-you'll-miss-it.

He, like, creeps me out, dude.

Geeze I've not participate in a BOTM here in a long while but I've got this book on my shelf and this is just the excuse I was looking for.....

Looking forward to your reviews.

Kafka's objective rendition of the supernatural was a big influence on Gabriel García Márquez' development of 'magical realism', treating miracles, supernatural beings, strange events as everyday happenings. But whereas Márquez is sensuous and meandering (which I like), Kafka is colourless and minimalist.

I begun reading this last night, by chance, having forgotten it was this month's BOTM, so shall look forward to discussing it.

My edition is different, but will read Metamorphosis at least. Hopefully not too off topic, but Heteronym, I would enjoy reading your analysis of The Aspern Papers on the James thread at some point. I'm not in a reading rut, but possibly another slump where I can't seem to finish anything in a timely manner. Tooo much time in front of the CPU tube. Maybe some Kafka and Henry James will bring a spark back to things. Hrmph.

I found the opening line of Metamorphosis to be so amazing that the rest of the story paled into insignificance. I'd agree with Heteronym though, that Kafka's is minimalist, I think that worked very well - we're being told this absolutely absurd/strange tale, but it's told in such a way that it sounds almost normal, and 'no big deal'. I guess it's the approach that raises questions of interpretation - Did Gregor really metamorphosise into that or was it just a comment on society?

OK, so I finished my copy last night.

Spontaneous thoughts, in addition to the ones above:

It really was nice to revisit Kafka after a few years of more advanced reading than I had the first time I tried him. Kafka's style is so enigmatic - dry yet bizarre enough to demand some sort of interpretation - that the reader almost needs to bring something of his own to the table to get something out rather than "wow, that's a creepy bug that guy turns into" or "Sucks to be Josef K".

Kafka can read both like deadly serious - the classic outsider description in The Hunger Artist ("I starve because I could never find anything that satisfies me" paraphrased), the existentialist leanings, the feeling of being trapped in something beyond your control. (Hell, if The Metamorphosis came out today, it would probably be interpreted as being about someone who is suffering from clinical depression.) It's almost impossible not to bring whatever you know about Kafka himself into it, too; Kafka had to work a job he hated to support his family - hello Gregor Samsa. Or hell, bring his religious background into In The Penal Colony or Before The Law.

At the same time, he can be really funny. Suddenly I remember why I didn't feel like I was laughing out loud at Kafka last year when I read two short story collections he was obviously a major inspiration for - Lethem&Scholtz's Kafka Americana and Shalom Auslander's Beware Of God (both highly recommended); that element of very bleak humour is there in the original too.

However, it doesn't always pay off. While I'm immensely grateful to Max Brod for saving The Metamorphosis, In The Penal Colony and (if not quite as enthusiastically, they're good but not masterpieces) A Report to an Academy and A Hunger Artist, some of the short stories here probably wouldn't have made it into a collection compiled by Kafka himself. Some (Eleven Sons, for instance) seem hardly more than writing exercises, and the attempt to write gothic horror in A Country Doctor is almost laughable.

But still, it whetted my appetite and I'm going to pick up some more of his stuff. Preferably in the original German; lovely turns of phrase which are deceptively simple.

I find it odd that neither Gregor or his family questioned why he became a bug, nor did anyone think to wonder how to restore him. Considering Gregor was the family breadwinner, and the dire straits his condition reduced them to, I'd think they'd want to get some help to transform him back to a human being.

I finished Metamorphosis and Other Stories last night. I would have been just as happy if the Other Stories were left out of the book..Metamorphosis was strange of course, but it was interesting and seemed to have a point. The other stories seemed more like sketches from his notebook that only got published because of who wrote them. They just didn't hold my interest whatsoever.

Two things, abe:

1) they weren't published in Kafka's life.

2) they really are sketches, most of them anyway, left incomplete by an insecure writer who hardly ever finished anything he wrote.

That's why I can't stand Kafka: most of his work is unpolished; and I think most of his work just rest on the reputation of a few truly good works.