Analysis of Kafka's "Metamorphosis."

it was deveolped as an ad campaign for Orkin.

<the camera zooms in.....deadpan delivery>

"We need a bigger Roach Hotel..."

gregor took the bait?

Oy!!!!

Suicide, I think. Being chased around with a broomstick is depressing...

sofia, to be a bit more cereal I think you will find Kafka's "The Penal Colony" to be the most coherent both philosophically and as literature.

Thank you. We had planned to go to the liberry tomorrow. I shall report back when I'm done.

Read also "A Hunger Artist," and compare that to what David Blaine is doing in London.

Ah, this is one of my favorite stories.

A production was done by the BBC a few years ago. If I recall correctly, I think Gregor was played by Mikhail Baryshnikov (hmm, it's early, I could be dreaming this)?

The first part is really most of the story but the last 2 parts have something to say, too. It's interesting that Gregor is whacked with apples near the end. Says something about the roach in the Garden of Eden, eh?

Also, Kafka had a horrible relationship with his father. Nearly everything he ever wrote is grounded in that.

I didn't know somebody attempted to produce it. I hope I can find it somewhere. Like to see how they did it!

I have the impression Kafka had a bit of a social phobia, as well. Possibly felt like an 'alien'. I guess this led me to believe Metamorphosis was sort of autobiographical. Course, I guess he's been critiqued to death... I just hadn't read it in school, or discussed it. He seems to have been a very cool, unique, tortured guy.

He was definitely different. There haven't been a lot of attempts to stage his stuff. Orson Welles did a movie version of The Trial, which you'd think might've had a chance (hey, it's Orson Welles, and while he was still fairly young and extremely ambitious!) but it flopped. The Metamorphosis staging is weird (of course). They don't use a costume for Gregor but he does go around on all fours.

Amerika probably could be produced; it's not as surreal. And there's also In the Penal Colony, which might be possibly now, given CGI effects, but it would be brutal and probably get an R rating for extremely graphic violence.

Ah, Tim Roth played Gregor: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093530/

And here's the Trial, with Anthony Perkins: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057427/

Here's a link to all of Kafka's stuff, either made for TV or film: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0434525/
I had no idea In the Penal Colony actually was produced, and also The Castle (a very odd book, I wonder how they made it into anything that could possibly be staged) and Josephine and the Mouse Folk. Wacky.

Thank you so much, jes!

:-D My pleasure. He fascinates me; has since High School when I wrote a big research paper on The Father Figure in Kafka. I still have it, um, somewhere.

Franz was traumatized by a lot of things, including showering with his father when he was a little kid. Creepy stuff.

From Metamorphosis: The Musical

"I'm a cockroach, but a human
quit it with that broomin'
hey there daddy, I'm no baddy,
I just want your looovvve!
You get creepy, I get weepy,
so I must symbolize...."

That's fantastic, cav!

You get creepy, I get weepy,
so I must symbolize!!!

That's great stuff!