On the Borders of Humanity and Animality: Commentary on Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis

Franz Kafka was one of the classical modern authors who gave strikingly prominent roles to animal figures in his works. This paper focuses on The Metamorphosis, one of the most famous and most controversially interpreted of the writer's narratives. The paper seeks to answer whether Gregor's transformation into an insect takes place in actuality and, if so, whether this creature can be identified with a specific animal species. The analysis infers that Gregor retains his human traits throughout the novella and that the specific human-animal creature that emerges is a fictional creature not reducible to reality and not identifiable without contradiction with any real animal. The paper argues that Gregor's actual role on the borders of human and animal existence can only be satisfactorily explained through the constructive principles of the work and by the insight of the acceptance of death and the withdrawal from life.

Keywords: Franz Kafka, animal figures, metamorphosis, zoopoetics