Metamorphosis - Paper

Exiling someone is an important decision to make because of the effects that it can withhold on the person whether it being a positive effect or negative effect. Edward Said, a Palestinian American literary theorist and cultural critic, quoted “Exile is strangely compelling to think about but terrible to experience. It is the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted” explaining that exile can turn into a negative effect. There can also be a positive side effect to being exiled “exile can become a potent, even enriching experience”. In the Metamorphosis, Gregor experiences a form of exile not in the way of not being able to go to his country but to his family and people.
Franz Kafka wrote the metamorphosis that had a normal man named Gregor wake up one day and realize that he had been morphed or transformed into a sort of bug. Kafka describes even in the beginning of the story the setting of Gregor’s room that only has a bed, blanket, and table. It shows how Gregor in a way was exiled from the world by only have an empty basic room which can show a negative effect on him because of his lack of creativity to fix his room. Because of his transformation into the bug, which exiled him from humanity, gave him an effect of feeling hopeless about life for example “unfortunately there was little confident cheer to be had from a glance at the morning mist….”
After the family figuring out about his transformation into a bug, they had exiled him not because of what he did but because they were afraid. They had locked him in his room and being exiled and locked in the room made him feel almost as if he was unwanted or even unbearable to look at “door were opened just a tiny crack and quickly closed again……Gregor waited in vain……keys were stuck in the locks on the outside.” His emotions were running wild with him being exiled in his room “partly in a state of worry and murky hopes.” After being away from the human world he refers the world as “featureless wasteland…..indistinguishable.” Even though Kafka wrote the story as Gregor feeling exiled, he showed how the way he was treated was affecting him in a very negative way but was still able to incorporate a positive effect from the whole experience of feeling exiled. After figuring out that he was transformed and even though he was scared he still tried to embrace it “Gregor that it might be far more reasonable to leave him in peace at the moment”, gave him a sense to recollect himself. Before being exiled he was working as a salesman to help out his parents who had apparently a debt, but after being exiled he felt a sense of pride for helping his parents “he felt a great pride that he had been able to provide such a life.”
Another positive effect that came out to him being exiled would have to be him and his sister having a stronger closer relationship. He saw how much his sister had cared for him by even though he looked like a monstrous bug she still saw her brother inside of the being and took care of him. For example in the scene of when Gregor is already locked up in his room, his sister still came in even though freaked out she still gave him food to eat and water to drink. This made Gregor feel better and not be so influenced by the situation at hand “so that Gregor would now know that he could make himself as comfortable as he wished.” Since his parents had put no effort into contributing, her sister took the role of being a parent. Not only did it affect him and his sister but as well as his father. It created a positive effect where even though the father was going through a tough time he still was able to bring something good out of it by stop drinking “sister often asked his father whether he wanted a beer…..his father said a resounding “No”…”
Kafka was very unique in the way that he wrote the Metamorphosis and showed his talent. You could say that he tried to prove Edward Said’s comments on how “exile can be terrible to experience and it can sometimes be an enriching experience.” We can also take from this stories example that it just doesn’t affect one person but it can also affect the people around the person in this case, Gregor’s father and sister. We can pull out many meanings from the story and Gregor’s experience but we see more of how alienating someone can become a positive or negative action but will no matter what have some sort of effect.