Kafka’s The Metamorphosis looks like a strange story at first: a man wakes up one day and finds himself turned into an insect. But this unusual event is only the surface.
Underneath, Kafka is quietly talking about something very real: what happens to a person when society stops seeing their worth.
Gregor Samsa is a hardworking man who supports his family. His life is dull, repetitive, and exhausting, but he does his duty without complaint. The moment he can no longer earn money — the moment he becomes “a burden” — everything changes. His family’s love becomes weaker. Their patience becomes thinner. They start to avoid him, and eventually they want him gone. It is painful because Gregor has done nothing wrong. He is the same person inside, but the outside world now sees him differently. His value drops the moment he is not “useful.”
Kafka is showing how society often treats people like machines. When you are productive, you are celebrated. When you cannot produce, you become invisible, or worse, unwanted. This happens to people who fall sick, lose their jobs, grow old, or simply fail to meet expectations. The world rarely asks, “What do you feel?” It only asks, “What do you give?”
Another idea in the story is alienation — the feeling of being disconnected from everyone around you. Gregor was actually lonely even before his transformation. His whole life was about paying bills, rushing to work, and supporting others. He never had time for himself. Kafka uses the insect body as a symbol of how Gregor already felt inside: unwanted, ignored, and trapped. The transformation only made visible what was hidden all along.
There is also a quiet sadness in how the family slowly adapts to life without him. At first, they are shocked. Later, they become annoyed. Finally, they move on.
Kafka suggests that modern life is so demanding and self-centered that even close relationships can fade when they become inconvenient. People forget, adjust, and continue living, sometimes without guilt. Gregor’s death is not treated as a tragedy but as a relief — a moment that allows the family to breathe again.
So what was Kafka trying to tell us?
That human value cannot be measured only by usefulness. That people often suffer silently under responsibilities that no one else sees. That loneliness does not always come from being alone, but from not being understood. And that society can be gentle on the surface but cruel in its expectations.
The Metamorphosis is not a story about an insect. It is a story about how easily a person can lose their place in the world, and how deeply people long to be accepted for who they are, not for what they produce.
Subhro.blog 