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As I read Metamorphosis, and watched the performance of it at the Joyce Theater, I sympathized with Gregor greatly. One emotion that specifically struck me was his uncontrollable loneliness. As a cockroach, locked up in a room, unable to speak to anybody, there’s no question that he felt lonesome at all times. He had no choice but to keep his own company and all his thoughts to himself. It’s been psychologically proven that loneliness can lead to depression, and by the end of Gregor’s life, I feel he was definitely depressed.
Throughout the novella and the ballet, I tried to imagine myself in Gregor’s shoes (or legs, since cockroaches don’t wear shoes). The feeling of being completely alone, even surrounded by others, is such a horrible thought for me. For this reason, I chose to depict this idea because it is such a difficult thing to deal with – considering you’re alone. I think physically seeing a lonely person aids in your sympathy for them. It’s one thing to read about Gregor being alone, but being able to visualize that in the ballet – or through pictures – really makes you pity the poor guy. My classmates did a great job in portraying loneliness in their own ways, so it made my job in choosing pictures very easy. These particular pictures can help someone reading Metamorphosis understand the way Gregor was feeling, because the people (and dog) in my mini-exhibition most likely feel similar to the way he felt.
Credit:
Jake Greenberg, Evan Charles Augustin, Michael Mamiye, Nicholas Arniotes, Samantha Chiu
First off, I enjoy the little joke about the cockroach shoes. Although I do agree with you that Gregor is lonely, I would also say that he is a victim of neglect. What I find interesting about your photos, is that most of them lack a face. I’m not sure if this was unintentional but I do feel it adds to this feeling of neglect. Society pretends to not notice these people and thus make them faceless. Overall, I really enjoyed this post.
I really like that you chose loneliness as your theme, because it’s something that not only do we share as humans, but we share this feeling with Gregor too. I think people forget that a major cause of unhappiness is loneliness and we overlook that even though it’s an inevitable issue at times. So I totally agree with your point on Gregor’s loneliness leading to the depression that caused him to die. Without his family he had no one and he was totally helpless. That’s why we surround ourselves with people, so that we don’t have to live our lives alone. Great job on the pictures connecting to the theme, I thought it was well done!
Loneliness was definitely a prominent theme in Kafka’s work. I believe that loneliness was the ultimate cause of Gregor’s demise. The picture of the shadow in particular spoke to me. Gregor became a shadow of a man. All that remained was the idea that he once was apart of the family, now his human self is simply a thing of the past. Shadows fade, as did Gregor’s humanity, while his loneliness increased. Gregor was lonely physically as well as enduring mental isolation.