Have you ever watched a movie the first time and you didn’t really understand the theme, then you watch it for the second time and the whole story makes alot more sense. That is the power of perspective. In the novella “Metamorphosis” the whole story is told through a third person-limited perspective. This is such an important factor when it comes to readers understanding because if the story wasn’t in this point of view then the reader wouldn’t understand the thoughts and feelings of Gregor and know what all the other characters are doing throughout the novella. In this novella the third person-limited point of view is important to better understand the thoughts, feelings, emotions, and impact on other people of Gregor: our protagonist. 

Gregor and his Mental Health

Gregor was the main character in the Metamorphosis, he is the character that turns into a human-sized cockroach. The reason the author made the point of view third person limited is because he wanted the reader to understand Gregors thoughts and feelings but also would know what the family is doing while not being with Gregor. Gregor is a very unique character when it comes to his mental life, he has an all time low self esteem for himself, and put everyone before him and he has no self respect for himself. So once he was turned into a cochroach his whole life changed, physically and more mentally. When the metamorphosis occured he didn’t really have a big reaction, everyone just went on with there lives. Right when he changed his first instinct mentally was to worry about providing for his family. He believed that if he couldn’t work to make money for his parents that he was useless in his family. His family actually was doing better when he was a cockroach. To show that Gregor was better off after he died the story states “ They decided to spend the day resting and going for a stroll; they had not only deserved such a respite from work, but absolutely needed it” (Kafka 138) I think that hurt him even more mentally knowing after the fact that he was working everyday to the point that work was his only personal trait in life and then his family didn’t suffer at all when he coulnd’t work anymore. Since he didn’t have to work anymore he spent most of his time climbing the walls and he eventually starts becoming healthier mentally and he actually starts to prefer being a cockroach. 

Gregor and relationship with his family

Gregor didn’t really have very close relationships with anyone in his family. With the perspective being third person-limited we know what the parents and the sister does the whole time throughout the story. This is crucial because if it was a first person perspective of Gregors life then then the members of his family would only being part of the novella only a fraction of the time. Gregors dad was always very hard on Gregor, he never really gave him compliments and after Gregor became a cockroach his dad only did harm to Gregor. His dad would get mad at him and start thowing items at him aggressively. His father once threw an apple at Gregor and it got stuck in his back and Samsa died suffering from the apple. His dad couldn’t care less about him dying. His mother was alot more caring than his father. She didn’t really show her love for him around is father. Once he turned into a cockrach she started to show her affection towards him by not wanting to give up on him and not wanting to take his room apart. She knew that there was nothing she could do about him being the way he was and she felt bad for him. The relationship that he had with his younger sister Greta was a little different from his parents. He deeply admired his sister. His future goal while working as a human was to send his sister off to violin school because she was amazing at playin the violin. She was the one to bring him rotten foods and took care of him when he first became a cockroach. After a while she kind of stop attending to his care and she stopped caring for him then he passed away. 

Overall analysis 

The Novella “Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka is a unique but also meaningful story. Little things like the point of view that the story is written in can have a huge impact on the understanding of the story.  With Novella being told in third person-limited, the reader can understand a lot more about the story from an outsider’s perspective with knowing Gregor's thoughts, emotions, and actions, while also knowing what the rest of family is doing at the same time. Gregor had no social life and the only reason he even wanted to be alive was to make money for his family. He didn’t care about himself and he thought that everyone in his family was way better than him and he didn’t mean anything. Then, once a metamorphosis occured to Gregor in the middle of the night, his whole life changed, but his family’s life didn’t. Eventually he liked being a cockroach; he was happier mentally and actually found some joy in life.  On the other hand, his family was actually better off without him and didn’t suffer much from losing Gregor. 

Work Citied 

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Translated by Naturn N. Glalzer. Stocken Publications. 1971.