Ambiguity

Fantastic or Dreamlike Elements

Alienation/Isolation

“entirely covered with small white spots (he did not know what to make of them)” (138)

“he discovered that in bed he had been transformed into a monstrous, verminous bug” (137)

“something has fallen in there” (142)

“unbearable hissing” (151)

“the fresh food, by contrast, didn’t taste good to him” (154)

“people did not understand his words anymore” (145)

“some corrosive medicine or other” (163)

“ate almost in complete silence” (171)

“as if she was in the presence of a serious invalid or a total stranger” (153)

See sample chart above.

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It alienates Gregor further from his humanity. By calling Gregor an “it,” rather than a “he,” the family suggests implicitly that he is completely inhuman.

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Passages that remind the audience they are reading a story:
“in her customarily brief visit to Gregor…” (176)
“The way in which they all blew the smoke from the cigars out of their noses and mouths in particular led one to conclude that they were very irritated” (172)
“often he lay there” (157)
“it was no dream” (137)

These passages all have in common that they make observations from an omniscient perspective, rather than from the perspective of one of the characters.

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The how and why of the transformation is unimportant. It is more interesting to watch the fallout after the transformation takes place, observing the way it affects the relationships between the characters. If Kafka provided a reason for the transformation, it would distract from this.

See sample answer below.

Gregor hasn’t done anything to deserve his fate; that’s arguably the point of the story. People who are outcast from society are often outcast for similar reasons to Gregor: they might look frightening, or ugly, or eat strange food, or speak in a language no one can understand. These outcasts do not deserve to be treated universally horribly, but often, they are, and for no reason other than being strange in one way or another. Gregor deserved his fate no more than they do.