The Metamorphosis

Brianna Minis
Mrs. Shivers
World Literature
18 December 2012 The authors, Elie Wiesel and Franz Kafka, wrote the stories Night and “The Metamorphosis” to portray the themes of alienation and dehumanization by using symbols; the authors purpose is to inform the readers of how much harm alienation and dehumanization can cause one person or a group of people. Not only do Wiesel and Kafka inform the readers of the harm but, both of them use creative symbols throughout each story to actually capture what message they are trying to send out. In the book, Night, Elie talks about how the Jews were alienated and dehumanized but that is not the only point he is trying to get across. Elie talks about the yellow star saying, “Three days later, a new decree: every Jew had to wear the yellow star.” That quotation is representing alienation because while the Jews were still living in the normal communities they had to wear this yellow star showing everyone who was a Jew and who was not a Jew. The quote “Those whose numbers had been noted were standing apart, abandoned by the whole world,” shows the selection of people who were “un-fit” to work, represents alienation by forcing all the other humans stare at the ones who were about to die. Towards the beginning of the book Elie talks about the crematorium and a quote from that section is, “Over there, that’s where they will take you. Over there will be your grave you will be burned. Burned into a cinder. Turned into ashes.” This specific quotation represent dehumanization and how is because by taking someone’s life that was innocent and have never done one wrong thing in their life is cruel and hateful.
Franz Kafka uses many creative symbols in his short story “The Metamorphosis.” One of the first ones I recognized in the story was, “Constantly sees new faces, no relationships that last or get more intimate,” which shows alienation. I recognized this quotation first is because by the main character, Gregor, he is showing us that throughout his life, he does the same routine every day and no matter how well he does at the task at hand his relationships between his family and his boss seem to just drift father apart. Dehumanization is represented by Gregor acting like a drone in the revolution of industry. When Gregor’s father throws the apple at him and pushes Gregor back into the room so no one sees him, which represents alienation. It represents alienation because his father is ashamed of Gregor and all Gregor’s family did was rely on him to pay off debt and put money in their bank account. He felt as if he was pushed around and that no one really cared about what he did or how he did it.
Through reading these stories, the author’s wrote each story for specific reasons. Together though, each one wrote that one story to prove to people how much harm can come from both alienation and dehumanization. Whether it is with a religious group or just one person who has a lot of tasks at hand. No person or a group of people should have to go through such harm whether it is making a person feel like he or she doesn’t matter or whether it is a group of people who get dehumanized because someone hates that group of people.