I have always felt that The Metamorphosis abounds with humiliating passages. In the light of Nietzsche’s observation that “it is a part of a more refined humanity to have reverence ‘for the mask’ and not to practice psychology and inquisitiveness in the wrong place,”[1] the explicit technique of the earnest insect, Gregor Samsa, cannot but tease a kind of uncomfortable empathy from the reader, himself acquainted with the all too human and real difficulties of the writer, together with something akin to resentment that stems precisely from the fact that this sentiment is self-incriminating. Put differently, Nietzsche’s observation applies to oneself and to autobiographic exercises as much as to the others.

A couple of passages will suffice to illustrate the inquisitiveness which pushes beyond what may be called comfort, from the point of view of an earnest and pedantic reader:

But when at last his head was fortunately right in front of the doorway, it appeared that his body was too broad simply to get through the opening. His father, of course, in his present mood was far from thinking of such a thing as opening the other half of the door, to let Gregor have enough space. He had merely the fixed idea of driving Gregor back into his room as quickly as possible. He would never have suffered Gregor to make the circumstantial preparations for standing up on end and perhaps slipping his way through the door. Maybe he was now making more noise than ever to urge Gregor forward, as if no obstacle impeded him; to Gregor, anyhow, the noise in his rear sounded no longer like the voice of one single father; this was really no joke, and Gregor thrust himself—come what might—into the doorway. One side of his body rose up, he was tilted at an angle in the doorway, his flank was quite bruised, horrid blotches stained the white door, soon he was stuck fast, and, left to himself, could not have moved at all, his legs on one side fluttered trembling in the air, those on the other were crushed painfully to the floor—when from behind his father gave him a strong push which was literally a deliverance and he flew far into the room, bleeding freely. The door was slammed behind him with the stick, and then at last there was silence.[2]

The subtle cynicism of “bleeding freely,” or of “the voice of one single father,” is rather pale in comparison with the “circumstantial preparations for standing up on end,” which appears prima facie as a question of mere technique. The pathetic invades the whole text precisely via the technical detail which at first seems harmless and purely descriptive. Kafka the poet appears as Kafka the expert. The mathematics of everyday life, however shallow and dry, becomes the main vehicle of the pathetic. In this context I feel compelled to quote yet another passage:

But Gregor could not risk standing up to him, aware as he had been from the very first day of his new life that his father believed only the severest measures suitable for dealing with him. And so he ran before his father, stopping when he stopped and scuttling forward again when his father made any kind of move. In this way they circled the room several times without anything decisive happening, indeed the whole operation did not even look like a pursuit because it was carried out so slowly. And so Gregor did not leave the floor, for he feared that his father might take as a piece of peculiar wickedness any excursion of his over the walls or the ceiling. All the same, he could not stay this course much longer, for while his father took one step he had to carry out a whole series of movements. He was already beginning to feel breathless, just as in his former life his lungs had not been very dependable. As he was staggering along, trying to concentrate his energy on running, hardly keeping his eyes open; in his dazed state never even thinking of any other escape than simply going forward; and having almost forgotten that the walls were free to him, which in this room were well provided with finely carved pieces of furniture full of knobs and crevices—suddenly something lightly swung landed close behind him and rolled before him. It was an apple…[3]

The new competence of the insect is recognized by Gregor as a “piece of peculiar wickedness,” and suppressed in the most dramatic moment of the story. Although the walls and the ceiling were free to him, in addition to being “well provided” with the paraphernalia attractive to a crawling insect, Gregor exercised all the tactfulness he could muster. Here again, the technical aspect of his endeavors to atone for his new appearance and his new skills and joys provokes the enlightened reader to react to the indiscretions, and to dabble into practicing psychology in the wrong place in his own right. Like Gregor, the reader is forced to “carry out a whole series of movements.” The marginal calculus of pleasure and pain penetrates from below and commands extraordinary attention.

Thus, the following bibliographic note on The Metamorphosis from an appendix, itself exquisite in terms of the sophisticated technique of punctuation, comes as a relief, for it becomes almost obvious that Kafka himself was aware of the discomfort he must have caused his most devoted readers:

Diaries, January 19, 1914: “Great antipathy to ‘Metamorphosis.’ Unreadable ending. Imperfect almost to its very marrow.” Gustav Janouch suggested that Samsa, the hero of the story, sounds like a cryptogram for Kafka. “Kafka interrupted me. ‘It is not a cryptogram. Samsa is not merely Kafka and nothing else [Samsa ist nicht restlos Kafka]. The Metamorphosis is not a confession, although it is—in a certain sense—an indiscretion’.” (Conversations with Kafka, p. 35)[4]

And indeed, to the extent that The Metamorphosis is an indiscretion, the cryptogram is applicable elsewhere. The reader’s awkward and thoughtful maneuvers around and under the kitchen table, while the soup ladle is securely lodged between the outstretched feet of a guest, and while the guest is explaining something of great interest to yet another guest across the table, etc., suddenly come to the fore and promote a degree of self-understanding that is at times hardly bearable. Even the very consciousness of the abominable complication then becomes an indiscretion, or perhaps another step toward self-indulgence. Very soon Nietzsche’s warning turns into a lure without ever fading, and the reader becomes gradually aware of a new and somewhat repulsive aspiration to become a writer. Nietzsche thus contributes to the transgression, which would be much less likely had there been no premonition of the boundary. Parenthetically, we know that Kafka read Spinoza, Darwin, and Nietzsche sometime in 1899-1900[5] as well as that he wrote The Metamorphosis in November 1912.[6]

Footnotes

1. Nietzsche, F., Beyond Good and Evil, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1973, p. 190.

2. Kafka, F., The Complete Stories, New York: Schocken Books, 1976, pp. 104-105.

3. Op. cit., pp. 121-122.

4. Op. cit., p. 469.

5. Op. cit., p. 475.

6. Op. cit., p. 477.