Metamorphosis and Other Stories

Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis and Other Stories is translated from the German with an introduction by Michael Hofmann in Penguin Modern Classics. This collection of new translations brings together the small proportion of Kafka's works that he thought worthy of publication. It includes 'Metamorphosis', his most famous work, an exploration of horrific transformation and alienation; 'Meditation', a collection of his earlier studies; 'The Judgement', written in a single night of frenzied creativity; 'The Stoker', the first chapter of a novel set in America; and a fascinating occasional piece, 'The Aeroplanes at Brescia', Kafka's eyewitness account of an air display in 1909. Together, these stories reveal the breadth of Kafka's literary vision and the imaginative depth of his thought. Franz Kafka (1883-1924) was a Czech-born German-speaking insurance clerk who despised his job, preferring to spend his time writing. Nevertheless, Kafka published little during his lifetime, [...]and ordered his closest friend to burn the mass of unpublished manuscripts, now familiar to us as some of the most influential novels and short stories of the twentieth century, after his death. Kafka's novels, all published posthumously, include The Trial , The Castle , and Amerika . If you enjoyed Metamorphosis and Other Stories , you might like Kafka's The Trial , also available in Penguin Modern Classics 'What Dante and Shakespeare were for the ages, Kafka is for ours ... His relevance is absolutely unbroken' George Steiner 'One of the few great and perfect works of poetic imagination written during the twentieth century' Elias Canetti on 'Metamorphosis' Review aI think of a Kafka story as a perfect work of literary art, as approachable as it is strange, and as strange as it is approachable.a aMichael Hofmann From the Inside Flap In Metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa, a travelling salesman by trade, awakens one morning to find his body has mutated into that of a repulsive bug. Outwardly a monstrous insect, only his thought processes remain human. As his family grow accustomed to supporting themselves without his once essential income, Gregors suffering becomes ever more pronounced. He witnesses the corruption of their former dependence on him. Obliged to work to keep themselves and admit lodgers to their home, the Samsa family generates a disgust and a contempt for the creature that has supported them for so long, imprisoning Gregor in the stasis of an unused box room. His sister, Grete, to whom he was once so close, now wants to be rid of him, his fathers new industry leaves him no time to remember the transformed son he used to terrorise, and his loving mother now neglects him. Metamorphosis is Kafkas most famous short story, a work where, in the words of Vladimir Nabokov, contrast and unity, style and matter, manner and plot are most perfectly integrated. This is a heart-rending dystopia in which love itself becomes alienated and repugnant. This volume also includes a number of other short stories by Kafkas, all newly translated. Library : Fantasy Formats : EPUB ISBN : 9780141188126