Biographical PrefaceIntroduction Note on the TextNote on the TranslationSelect BibliographyA Chronology of Franz KafkaMEDITATIONTHE JUDGEMENTTHE METAMORPHOSISIN THE PENAL COLONYLETTER TO HIS FATHERExplanatory Notes
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As Gregor Samsa woke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed into some kind of monstrous vermin.* He lay on his hard, armour-like back, and if he lifted his head a little, he could see his curved brown abdomen, divided by arch-shaped ridges, and domed so high that the bedspread, on the brink of slipping off, could hardly stay put. His many legs, miserably thin in comparison with his size otherwise, flickered helplessly before his eyes.‘What has happened to me?’ he thought. It was not a dream. His room, a proper, human being’s room, rather too small, lay peacefully between its four familiar walls. Above the table, on which his collection of textile samples was spread — Samsa was a commercial traveller — there hung the picture he had recently cut out from an illustrated magazine and mounted in a pretty gilded frame. It showed a lady* posed sitting erect, attired in a fur hat and fur boa, and raising a heavy fur muff, which swallowed her arm right up to the elbow, towards the viewer. Gregor’s gaze then turned towards the window, and the murky weather — one could hear the raindrops striking the windowsill—made him quite melancholy. ‘What if I went on sleeping for a while and forgot all these idiocies,’ he thought, but that was quite impossible, as he was used to sleeping on his right side and in his present state he was unable to get himself into this position. However energetically he flung himself onto his right side, whenever he did so he would rock onto his back again. He must have tried a hundred times, shutting his eyes so that he didn’t have to see his jittery legs, and he only gave over when he began to feel a slight ache in his side, something he had never felt before.‘Oh Lord!’ he thought. ‘What a strenuous calling I’ve chosen! Day in, day out on the move. The stresses of making deals are far greater than they are in the actual business at home. And on top of that, I’m burdened with the misery of travelling; there’s the worry about train connections, the poor, irregular meals, human contact that is always changing, never lasting, never approaching warmth. To hell with it all!’ He felt a slight itching high on his abdomen. He pushed himself slowly on his back towards the bedpost so that he could lift his head more easily; he found the itching spot, which was covered with lots of little white dots* he had no idea how to interpret. He tried to probe the spot with one of his legs, but drew back at once, for the moment he touched it he was swept by cold shivers.He slid back into his previous position. ‘Getting up so early’, he thought, makes you quite dull-witted. A man must have his sleep. Other travellers live like ladies of the harem. For instance, when I go back to the boarding-house to send off the orders I’ve booked, these gents are only just having their breakfast. I should try that on with my boss — I’d be sacked on the spot. In any case, who knows if that wouldn’t be good for me. If it wasn’t that I’ve held back on account of my parents, I’d have given in my notice long ago. I’d have gone to the boss and told him what I thought outright, with real feeling. It would make him fall off his desk.* He’s got a peculiar way of perching on his desk and talking down to an employee from on high — who then, what’s more, has to come right up close to him on account of his deafness. Well, I haven’t entirely given up that hope; once I’ve got the money together to pay off my parents’ debt to him — that ought to take five or six years — I will do so, no two ways about it. Then the great break will be made. But for the present I have to get up, for my train leaves at five.’And he looked across at his alarm-clock, which was ticking on the chest. ‘Father in heaven!’ he thought. It was half-past six, and the hands were moving steadily forwards. It was even later than half-past six; it was already approaching a quarter to seven. Was it that the alarm-clock hadn’t rung? From the bed it was clear to see that it had been properly set for four o’clock, so it had certainly rung. Yes, but was it possible to sleep peacefully on through this furniture-shattering alarm? Well, he hadn’t slept peacefully, though all the more deeply for that, it seemed. But what was he to do now? The next train went at seven; to catch that, he would have to hurry at a frantic speed, and his collection of samples wasn’t packed yet, and he certainly didn’t feel particularly fresh and lively himself. And even if he managed to catch the train, he couldn’t escape a dressing-down from the boss, for the attendant from work had been waiting at the five-o’clock train, and had long ago informed the boss that Gregor had missed it.He was the boss’s creature, stupid and spineless.* What if Gregor were to tell them he was sick? But that would be extremely embarrassing and suspicious, for in all the five years he had been inemployment Gregor hadn’t once been ill until now. His boss would certainly arrive with the doctor from the Health Insurance, remonstrate with Gregor’s parents for having a lazy son, and cut all their objections short by referring to the Insurance doctor, for whom, of course, there was only one kind of human being: healthy, but workshy. And anyway, in the present situation, would he be all that wrong? In fact, apart from feeling quite unnecessarily sleepy after such a long lie-in, Gregor felt perfectly well, and was even particularly hungry.As he was thinking all this over very quickly without being able to decide to get up — the alarm was just ringing a quarter to seven — there was a cautious knock on the door at the head of his bed, and a call: ‘Gregor!’ — it was his mother — ‘it’s a quarter to seven. Aren’t you going to leave?’ That gentle voice! Gregor was startled when he heard his own voice in reply; no doubt, it was unmistakably his previous voice, but merging into it as though from low down came an uncontrollable, painful squealing which allowed his words to remain articulate literally for only a moment, then stifled them so much as they died away that you couldn’t tell if you’d heard them properly. Gregor had intended to answer fully and explain everything, but in his present circumstances he confined himself to saying, ‘Yes, yes, thank you mother, I’m just getting up.’ Because of the heavy wooden door, no doubt the change in Gregor’s voice was not noticeable outside, for his mother was content with this explanation, and she shuffled away. However, this little conversation had made the other members of the family aware that Gregor, against expectation, was still at home, and his father was already knocking at one side door, faintly, but with his fist.* ‘Gregor, Gregor!’ he called, ‘what’s up?’ And after a little while, he admonished him again in a deeper voice: ‘Gregor! Gregor!’ From the door on the other side, though, his sister was wailing quietly: ‘Gregor, are you feeling unwell? Do you need anything?’ Gregor answered towards both sides: ‘I’m finished.’ And by taking the greatest care with his articulation and putting in long pauses between the separate words, he tried hard to rid his voice of anything that might strike them as out of the ordinary. His father even returned to his breakfast, but his sister whispered: ‘Gregor,,open the door, I beg you.’ But Gregor certainly had no intention of opening it; instead, he applauded the habit of caution he had adopted from his travels in locking all the doors at home overnight as well.He wanted first to get up quietly without any disturbance, get dressed, and above all have his breakfast, and only then put his mind to what next, for, as he understood perfectly well, he wouldn’t come to any sensible conclusion if he stayed in bed. He recalled that, perhaps through lying awkwardly, he had often felt some slight pain in bed, which, once he got up, turned out to be pure imagination. And he was curious to see how his present impressions would gradually fade away. He hadn’t the slightest doubt that the change in his voice was nothing but the herald of a really bad cold, an occupational disease for travellers.Throwing off the bedspread was quite simple; he needed only to puff himself up a little and it fell down of its own accord. But after that it got difficult, particularly because he was so uncommonly wide. He would have needed arms and hands to raise himself; but instead of those, he had only these many little legs, which were continually fluttering about, and which he could not control anyhow. If he tried to bend one of them, it was the first to stretch; and if he finally managed to get this leg to do what he wanted, all the others were flapping about meanwhile in the most intense and painful excitement, as if they had been let loose. ‘Just don’t stay uselessly in bed,’ Gregor said to himself.At first he tried to get out of bed with the lower part of his body, but this lower part, which in any case he hadn’t yet seen, nor could have any proper idea of, proved to be too sluggish; it was such slow going; and when finally, driven nearly crazy, he heaved himself forward regardless with all his might, he found he had chosen the wrong direction and bumped violently against the bottom bedpost; and the burning pain he felt told him that it was the lower part of his body that was perhaps the most sensitive. So he attempted to get his upper body out of the bed first, cautiously turning his head towards the edge. This worked easily enough, and in the end, despite its width and weight, the mass of his body slowly followed the way his head was turning. But when at last he held his head in the air outside the bed, he became afraid of moving any further forward in this way, for if he did finally let himself drop, it would need a sheer miracle for his head to remain unharmed. And right now was no time to lose consciousness, not at any price; he would sooner stay in bed.
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