The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka in case anyone was wondering.
this post was submitted on 16 Mar 2025
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thank you, it seemed eerily familiar
Your jobs a joke, you're broke, and now you are a bug!
Maybe you are a feature.
Feels like you're stuck in an exoskeletoooon.
He is Franz Kafka. Franz Kafka!
TIL there is a cover song and director's cut of this sweet Rock Opera.
It's SO sad what happened to him. Imagine having a colostomy because you couldn't stop doing drugs. Or drowning.
I'd argue it didn't happen to him, but he did it to himself. A sad way to go, for sure, but he was well aware of him doing it.
While technically true, it feels kinda blamey and thought-terminating. I prefer to view addiction as a medical condition because it puts the focus on treatment and prevention rather than who did wrong.
I do agree with that, but you can't say there wasn't awareness on his side.
While I follow some of your argument I cannot entirely absolve the self in matters of addiction. It is a medical condition, but I wouldn't call alcoholics who drive under the influence and kill a person not responsible for their actions., therefore drowning in a drug induced stupor has a function of responsibility in it.
I do see where you're coming from!
At some point, I radically rejected the concept of blame for extreme cases — all the way from drunk driving to murder. I think it's necessary to prevent these people who are acting irrationally from hurting others, but it just feels like a waste of my emotional energy to assign blame to someone who's behaving in a way I can't comprehend.
For context, someone in my family was killed when I was a kid. I still feel anger at the perpetrator, but I can't even pretend to understand what would go through their head to make them act the way they did. My conclusion was just that they're basically an alien to me — a broken person who can't be trusted and has to be locked up. But did they commit a sin?
After writing this, I realize it's the same sentiment as "Larry Ellison is a lawnmower."
Do not fall into the trap of anthropomorphizing Larry Ellison. You need to think of Larry Ellison the way you think of a lawnmower. You don’t anthropomorphize your lawnmower, the lawnmower just mows the lawn - you stick your hand in there and it’ll chop it off, the end. You don’t think "oh, the lawnmower hates me" – lawnmower doesn’t give a shit about you, lawnmower can’t hate you. Don’t anthropomorphize the lawnmower. Don’t fall into that trap about Oracle.
I can see how that makes coping easier. And follow your agreement for a bit.
The grasmower argument doesn't gel with me, though. I can't release human agency that easily. I mean one doesn't have to anthropomorphize a human being, as they are -well- a human being.
But on the ethical side of this much debate is possible. It hangs on the free will/ determination side of debate, not really one end all answer.
clap-clap-clap-clap
You're job's a joke, you're broke
Democracy's DOA
Stuck in your bunk, you're sunk Can't turn up the right waaaay
I feel like I should read at least one book by Kafka. Any recommendations?
I did an entire semester on him, and maybe I'm just a philistine but for my money there was very little difference between Before the Law (a short story of ~650 words) and any of his longer works. So if you've read that and The Metamorphosis you know basically all you need to know about his writing.
There are other interesting stories for sure (I'd recommend In the Penal Colony and The Trial as Bones also mentioned), but the themes are very much the same throughout-- which I suppose is why the work Kafkaesque exists.
Cool! I felt like I just read a weird version of Samurai Jack. I’ll have to check out more of his work.
Apparently The Trial is his masterpiece.
That one on the image. Metamorphosis is a fun short book that you show you what Kafka is about.
On the other hand, The Trial is a long, heavy book that will make you feel like you have gone crazy. Personally, I can't stand this one. (Though, it's because it's very good on what it intends to do.)
none if you like happiness
Sometimes staring into the abyss lets me surpass my panic and find a certain peace that motivates me.
For example after reading “Before The Law” I thought to myself “I wonder what the man’s life would’ve been like if he chose not to seek entrance into the law, but instead lived by his own principles. It could’ve been a whole different story.”
Metamorphosis is the go-to Kafka book. I personally find The Trial the most "kafkian" of his novels, and I love it, but Amerika has a special place in my heart as what defines his literature is trying to find a way out, like a little seedling.
I just finished rereading this. The ending is so depressing.