A review by dyingotters
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

challenging dark funny mysterious fast-paced

4.75

In the first half of the book, I kept making the joke in my head that this is the kind of random shit that me as an autistic person would think of and get seriously anxious about. In the second half of the book I understood that my "joke" was not just a joke - I understood the story as an able-bodied man suddenly becoming disabled one day, he was no longer productive the way he used to be, he no longer served his employer or his family the same way he used to. He went from a hard-working man to a disgusting creature in other people's eyes and the only thing he could do was to be locked in a room, isolated. The humour from the absurdist plot fades out when you understand that this is not far from the reality that many disabled people (though it could apply to many others - immigrants, people in poverty, etc.) live in. It is not absurd that many people become shut-ins from the sheer pressure that you must always be the standard kind of person for society, or no matter how upstanding you used to be - you will become mere garbage to be disposed of.