1. Modernity and Modernism & Kafka’s Metamorphosis

2. Pop up Quiz

3. Modernization
New means of transportation, such as the steamship, the railroad, the automobile, and the airplane.
Other technologies, such as the telegraph and the telephone.
People were living in large cities, and the world population more than tripled.
New means of transportation, such as the steamship, the railroad, the automobile, and the airplane, allowed people in the industrialized West to cover vast distances quickly. Other technologies, such as the telegraph and the telephone, allowed them to communicate instantaneously. People were living in large cities, and the world population more than tripled. These transformations can be characterized as modernization.
The image shows workmen leaving Platt’s Works, Oldham (1900).

4. World War I
World War I took place mainly in Europe; it was the most mechanized war to date and killed fifteen million people. Only after the United States joined the war in 1917 were the Allies (France, Britain, Italy) able to repel Germany from the Western Front (in Belgium and France). In the East, Germany and Austria-Hungary drove into Russian territory, which led to the establishment of a Communist dictatorship under Lenin.
The image is a stereo view showing UK soldiers at Cambrai, in trenches with a tank in the background. The caption reads “Down in a Shell Crater, We Fought Like Kilkenny Cats.”

5. World War I World War I took place mainly in Europe
It was the most mechanized war to date
It killed fifteen million people.
After the United States joined the war in 1917 the Allies (France, Britain, Italy) repelled Germany from the Western Front (in Belgium and France).
In the East, Germany and Austria-Hungary drove into Russian territory, which led to the establishment of a Communist dictatorship under Lenin.
World War I took place mainly in Europe; it was the most mechanized war to date and killed fifteen million people. Only after the United States joined the war in 1917 were the Allies (France, Britain, Italy) able to repel Germany from the Western Front (in Belgium and France). In the East, Germany and Austria-Hungary drove into Russian territory, which led to the establishment of a Communist dictatorship under Lenin.
The image is a stereo view showing UK soldiers at Cambrai, in trenches with a tank in the background. The caption reads “Down in a Shell Crater, We Fought Like Kilkenny Cats.”

6. Communist Russia
Russia’s near-defeat contributed to the Revolution of 1917, with Lenin establishing a Communist “dictatorship of the proletariat.” During the succeeding decades, forced collectivization of agriculture and enterprise (which led to widespread famine), as well as purges of people considered enemies of the Communist Party, caused tens of millions of deaths, both in Russia and in other former territories of the Russian Empire, such as the Ukraine.
The photograph shows Lenin speaking to the army in Moskow (1920). The caption reads: “Trotski, who was also present at this famous picture, has been removed from this photograph, which happened often in the Soviet Union.”
Russia’s near-defeat contributed to the Revolution of 1917, with Lenin establishing a Communist “dictatorship of the proletariat.”

7. Nazis
Nazism arose as a National Socialist Movement and came to power under Adolf Hitler in 1933
The Nazis’ agenda included national rearmament and authoritarian politics held together by the glue of anti-Semitism.
Nazism arose as a National Socialist Movement and came to power under Adolf Hitler in 1933; the Nazis’ agenda included national rearmament and authoritarian politics held together by the glue of anti-Semitism.
The photograph shows Hitler (October 1938).The caption reads: “Standing in a Mercedes, Hitler drives through the crowd in Cheb, part of the German-populated Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia, which was annexed to Nazi Germany due to the Munich Agreement. “Held by the German Federal Archive.

8. The Final Solution
Starting in 1941, Hitler authorized the Final Solution, aimed at destroying the Jewish people, exterminating six million Jews and several million Poles, Gypsies, homosexuals, and political enemies of the Nazis.
The left image is a photograph of the mass grave at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. The caption reads: “Photographed by a British soldier after the camp’s liberation in April Dr. Fritz Klein, a German doctor at the camp, can be seen in the foreground standing amongst the corpses. The Small Arms Range is visible in the background.” Held by the United Kingdom Armed Forces; Imperial War Museum id# BU The right image shows starved prisoners at a concentration camp in Ebensee, Austria. The caption states that the camp was reputedly used for “scientific” experiments. Housed in the National Archives of Records and Administration, College Park.
Starting in 1941, Hitler authorized the Final Solution, aimed at destroying the Jewish people, exterminating six million Jews and several million Poles, Gypsies, homosexuals, and political enemies of the Nazis.

9. Great Depression
Beginning on October 24, 1929, the stock market crash heralded the Great Depression. Within a few years, a third of American workers were unemployed; hunger and joblessness spread throughout the industrialized world. Franklin Roosevelt was able to reverse the worst effects of the Depression in the United States with the New Deal, which included public works spending and the introduction of Social Security.
The image shows people waiting for relief checks during the Great Depression in Calipatria, California (March 1937).

10. Great Depression
Beginning on October 24, 1929, the stock market crash heralded the Great Depression.
Within a few years, a third of American workers were unemployed; hunger and joblessness spread throughout the industrialized world.
Franklin Roosevelt was able to reverse the worst effects of the Depression in the United States with the New Deal, which included public works spending and the introduction of Social Security.
Beginning on October 24, 1929, the stock market crash heralded the Great Depression. Within a few years, a third of American workers were unemployed; hunger and joblessness spread throughout the industrialized world. Franklin Roosevelt was able to reverse the worst effects of the Depression in the United States with the New Deal, which included public works spending and the introduction of Social Security.
The image shows people waiting for relief checks during the Great Depression in Calipatria, California (March 1937).

11. World War II
World War II began after Hitler’s military force invaded Poland in Germany allied itself with Fascist Italy and authoritarian Japan, which had earlier conquered Korea and occupied China. The United States entered the war after the surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
World War II began after Hitler’s military force invaded Poland in Germany allied itself with Fascist Italy and authoritarian Japan, which had earlier conquered Korea and occupied China. The United States entered the war after the surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941).
The photograph shows a wide view of the destruction at Pearl Harbor. The caption reads: “Panorama view of Pearl Harbor, during the Japanese raid on 7 December 1941, with anti-aircraft shell bursts overhead.” The photograph looks southwesterly from the hills behind the harbor. Large columns of smoke in the lower right center is from the burning USS Arizona. Smoke further to the left is from the destroyers Shaw, Cassin, and Downes, in dry dock at the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard. Official US Navy photograph (1941).

12. Modernism Linked political crises with the crisis of representation.
break with literary conventions including plots, verse forms, narrative techniques, and the boundaries of genre
Charles Darwin - the animal nature of human existence is explored
Karl Marx - the struggle between social classes is the main drive of history
Friedrich Nietzsche - attacked a belief in God and the conviction that humans are fundamentally rational
Sigmund Freud - stress on the unconscious and power of sexual and destructive instincts
Writers had significant mobility, often studying or working away from their native residences.
A literary movement that linked political crises with the crisis of representation. These individuals broke away from conventions, including plots, verse forms, narrative techniques, and the boundaries of genre, and, reflecting a “crisis of reason,” they challenged the ability of human reason to understand the world. This was largely based on nineteenth-century philosophy by Charles Darwin (through natural selection, the animal nature of human existence is explored), Karl Marx (the struggle between social classes is the main drive of history), Friedrich Nietzsche (who attacked a belief in God and the conviction that humans are fundamentally rational), and Sigmund Freud (stress on the unconscious and power of sexual and destructive instincts). Writers had significant mobility, often studying or working away from their native residences.

13. Scientific Advances
Scientists found that the natural world does not necessarily function in the way it appears to. Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity and other discoveries, such as radioactivity, X-rays, and quantum theory, presented counterintuitive understanding of the physical universe that conflicted with classical Netwonian physics and even common sense.
The image is a photograph of Einstein with Robert Oppenheimer (“father of the atomic bomb”) at the Institute for Advanced Study. Courtesy of the US Government Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
Scientists found that the natural world does not necessarily function in the way it appears to. Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity and other discoveries, such as radioactivity, X-rays, and quantum theory, presented counterintuitive understanding of the physical universe that conflicted with classical Netwonian physics and even common sense.

14. Novelists
The great modern novelists, including Conrad, Proust, Joyce, and Woolf wrote realistic works in the manner of Flaubert or Tolstoy.
However, they shifted toward interiority and focused on the limited perspective of an individual, often idiosyncratic character.
The great modern novelists, including Conrad, Proust, Joyce, and Woolf wrote realistic works in the manner of Flaubert or Tolstoy. They did not, however, balance their attention between the outside world and the inner world of their characters, instead shifting toward interiority and focus on the limited perspective of an individual, often idiosyncratic character.
Photograph of Virginia Woolf (1902) by George Charles Beresford.

15. Asia
Asian writers embraced Communist or Socialist politics and a related style of politically engaged fiction. Their works—as in Ryunosuke, Jun’ichiro, Fusako and Man-sik, often blend modern techniques with old folklore or cultural practices of earlier Japan to make a political statement.
Asian writers embraced Communist or Socialist politics and a related style of politically engaged fiction. Their works—as in Ryunosuke, Jun’ichiro, Fusako and Man-sik, often blend modern techniques with old folklore or cultural practices of earlier Japan to make a political statement.
The photograph shows Akutagawa Ryunosuke, taken in the 1920s.

16. Negritude
During the 1930s, a group of African and Caribbean intellectuals, led by Léopold Senghor and Aimé Césaire, met in Paris (where they were pursuing higher education) and formed the Negritude movement, which celebrated the culture of Africa and the African Diaspora to provide leadership for decolonized states.

17. Test Your Knowledge
Which event had arguably the greatest impact on the early twentieth century?
the Russian Revolution of 1917
the Great Depression
the Second World War
the First World War
Answer: D
Section: Modernity and Conflict in World History, 1900–1945
Feedback: While each of these events was world changing, nothing compared to the destabilizing impact of the First World War. Death and destruction on that scale had previously been unknown—even unimaginable—for most people.
While each of these events was world changing, nothing compared to the destabilizing impact of the First World War. Death and destruction on that scale had previously been unknown—even unimaginable—for most people.

18. Test Your Knowledge
Modernist artists depended primarily on which of the following?
Reason
Experimentation
Science
tradition
Literature across the globe responded to world-changing events (world wars, revolutions, financial collapse) with an unprecedented wave of artistic experimentation, as though the previous modes and forms of art were simply no longer able to capture, recreate, or express the shocking realities of the modern world.
Answer: B
Section: Modernism in World Literature
Feedback: Literature across the globe responded to world-changing events (world wars, revolutions, financial collapse) with an unprecedented wave of artistic experimentation, as though the previous modes and forms of art were simply no longer able to capture, recreate, or express the shocking realities of the modern world.

19. Test Your Knowledge
Fiction that includes references to itself is called: __________ .
Metafiction
Hyperfiction
stream of consciousness fiction
experiential fiction
Answer: A
Section: Modernism in World Literature
Feedback: A distinguishing characteristic of much modern art (though this continued to be true for some postmodern works as well) is the degree to which it made explicit reference to itself as a work of art. This is called metafiction when it occurs in writing. A story or novel, for example, might address the reader as he or she is in the act of reading. Thus the very act of consuming art (whether reading, listening, or watching) becomes part of the art being consumed. (This technique is also known as self-referentiality.)
A story or novel, for example, might address the reader as he or she is in the act of reading. Thus the very act of consuming art (whether reading, listening, or watching) becomes part of the art being consumed. (This technique is also known as self-referentiality.)

20. Franz Kafka (1883–1924) Jewish heritage Prague father–son relationship
Freud - recognized the oedipal tension in aspects of his family life.
He worked as a civil servant for an insurance company
He was engaged three times, twice to the same woman, and broke off all three. He had a difficult relationship with his father, a self-made man who could not take his son’s writing seriously. Having learned about Freud’s theories from friends, he recognized the oedipal tension in aspects of his family life. Though he succeeded as a law student, Kafka never practiced. He worked as a civil servant for an insurance company, a stifling job that his father often mocked. He was engaged multiple times but never married. And, famously, Kafka asked his literary executor Max Brod to destroy his writings after his death. Because of his dejected temperament, scholars have often linked Kafka to the likewise impotent Gregor.
The image is a photograph of Franz Kafka, 1906.

21. Kafkaesque
The term “Kafkaesque” has become a commonly used idiom to describe situations like the nightmarish, oppressive, and frustrating ones found in Kafka’s fiction.
The term “Kafkaesque” has become a commonly used idiom to describe situations like the nightmarish, oppressive, and frustrating ones found in Kafka’s fiction. Though Gregor’s transformation itself and the ensuing inability to communicate or eat are certainly vexing, Gregor’s sharper and longer ingrained frustration is with his authority figures, a trait that harkens back to Kafka himself. In his forty-five-page letter to his father, Kafka explains his fear of the authoritative Hermann Kafka directly. He writes, “Even years afterward I suffered from the tormenting fancy that the huge man, my father, the ultimate authority, would come almost for no reason at all and take me out of bed in the night and carry me out onto the pavlatche (balcony), and that consequently I meant absolutely nothing as far as he was concerned.”

22. Bug and Grotesque
The one-dimensionality of the other characters, the detailed description of the apartment’s architecture, and the straightforward language, for all their clarity, create an emotional undercurrent of disorientation and imprisonment.
The one-dimensionality of the other characters, the detailed description of the apartment’s architecture, and the straightforward language, for all their clarity, create an emotional undercurrent of disorientation and imprisonment. The bug itself, for example, is always described but never identified. Kafka uses vague terms to describe it—like “bug” or “vermin”—and even disallowed his publisher from including an illustration of it on the cover. The emotional underpinning of grotesqueness, then, depends on the reader’s own idea of grotesqueness, whether cockroach or beetle. In this way, he combines the Impressionistic traits of Modernism with his Expressionism.
The image is a front cover illustration for The Metamorphosis.

23. Bug and Grotesque
The emotional underpinning of grotesqueness, then, depends on the reader’s own idea of grotesqueness, whether cockroach or beetle. “When Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from troubled dreams, he found himself changed into a monstrous cockroach in his bed” (p. 210).
The one-dimensionality of the other characters, the detailed description of the apartment’s architecture, and the straightforward language, for all their clarity, create an emotional undercurrent of disorientation and imprisonment. The bug itself, for example, is always described but never identified. Kafka uses vague terms to describe it—like “bug” or “vermin”—and even disallowed his publisher from including an illustration of it on the cover. The emotional underpinning of grotesqueness, then, depends on the reader’s own idea of grotesqueness, whether cockroach or beetle. In this way, he combines the Impressionistic traits of Modernism with his Expressionism.
The image is a front cover illustration for The Metamorphosis.

24. “Unaccidental Accident”
“‘Oh my Lord!’ He thought. ‘If only I didn’t have to follow such an exhausting profession! On the road, day in, day out. The work is so much more strenuous than it would be in head office, and then there’s the additional ordeal of traveling, worries about train connections, the irregular, bad meals, new people all the time, no continuity, no affection. Devil take it!’” (p. 211).
Using Freud’s writing on accidents, scholars like Walter H. Sokel argue that Gregor’s transformation is an unaccidental accident. In other words, Gregor’s extreme frustration with his job as a travelling salesman led to his transformation, an unconsciously made excuse to shirk his responsibilities. Kafka was familiar with Freud’s works and alludes to him in his diaries before writing The Metamorphosis. In the face of an absurd and meaningless world of work, Gregor, a free agent, transforms himself into his authentic self. Gregor’s doomed fate lay in the rejection of his decision that finally situated him in his rightful place.

25. Codependency
“And it felt like a confirmation of their new dreams and their fond intentions when, as they reached their destination, their daughter was the first to get up, and stretched her nubile young body” (p. 241).
Compare these closing lines to the opening lines—how did Gregor’s transformation into a cockroach with “numerous legs, pathetically frail by contrast to the rest of him” that “waved feebly before his eyes” (p. 210) compare to his sister’s stretching of her “nubile young body”?
Students will often blame Gregor’s family for his suffering, but the professor might present this question: Had Gregor developed a codependent relationship with his family, such that they could not progress in their lives as long as they maintained a dysfunctional dependence upon him? Was Gregor’s death sad but necessary? Ask students to compare these closing lines to the opening lines—how did Gregor’s transformation into a cockroach with “numerous legs, pathetically frail by contrast to the rest of him” that “waved feebly before his eyes” (p. 210) compare to his sister’s stretching of her “nubile young body”?

26. Codependency
Had Gregor developed a codependent relationship with his family, such that they could not progress in their lives as long as they maintained a dysfunctional dependence upon him? Was Gregor’s death sad but necessary?

27. Discussion Questions
The word “metamorphosis” connotes a process or at least the moment of change, but Kafka’s story does not portray that moment. Gregor simply wakes up as the bug. How would the story change if Kafka had showed the audience the process of transformation? Why didn’t he show the metamorphosis?
The preferred translation of the title to The Metamorphosis forces readers to compare Gregor with the metamorphosed mortals in Ovid’s Metamorphosis. This comparison with a collection of stories about capricious gods and their whimsical metamorphosing only highlights the lack of origin in Gregor’s transformation. The lack of a “transformer” and psychoanalytical readings can overlap in Existentialism. In the face of an absurd and meaningless world of work, Gregor, a free agent, transforms himself into his authentic self. Gregor’s doomed fate lay in his rejecting his decision that finally situated him in his rightful place.