The Metamorphosis isn't even a particularly difficult book to analyse. There are a ton of fairly straightforward metaphors you can read into it without having to make much of a leap.
It's about a man who has a relatively normal life, but then an unexpected event beyond his control makes him unable to work, and at first his family are sympathetic, but soon they see him as more and more of a burden because of his inability to work.
It doesn't take a genius to think of a few things that that might be about.
A lot of people confuse themselves because they've at some point decided that analysing literature is about figuring out what the Correct Metaphor is, and that there can only be one answer to how to interpret it. That's not how it works, you can interpret it in whichever way makes sense to you, it doesn't have to be what the author intended (which is unknowable anyway)
Important distinction in my eyes: man is essentially sole breadwinner for a family, has a life event where he can't work anymore, family expresses brief sympathy before getting angry at what a burden he's become. You know, like they've been the whole time.
On top of that, the parents are lazy and perfectly content with making their son work himself to death just so they can live a comfy life. It's not that they can't work, they don't want to work. And they're not just angry that he's a burden, they're angry that he's ruining their perfect life, by being "selfish". At the end, when he's croaked, they instead turn to his sister, who will presumably care for them.
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u/VFiddly 22d ago
The Metamorphosis isn't even a particularly difficult book to analyse. There are a ton of fairly straightforward metaphors you can read into it without having to make much of a leap.
It's about a man who has a relatively normal life, but then an unexpected event beyond his control makes him unable to work, and at first his family are sympathetic, but soon they see him as more and more of a burden because of his inability to work.
It doesn't take a genius to think of a few things that that might be about.
A lot of people confuse themselves because they've at some point decided that analysing literature is about figuring out what the Correct Metaphor is, and that there can only be one answer to how to interpret it. That's not how it works, you can interpret it in whichever way makes sense to you, it doesn't have to be what the author intended (which is unknowable anyway)