If these stories are "art," what makes them a creative activity both for the reader and the writer? Choose a story and discuss its creative aspects and what is available for interpretation.

In my mind, the way Fanz Kafka crafted THE METAMORPHOSIS is almost like a transfomation for the reader as well as the main character Gregor. He transports us from the very first page into the body of a vermin, and then he gives us insight as to what life would be like to be a bug. For example, "He found himself transformed into an enormous insect. He lay on a back as hard as armor and saw, when he rasied he head slightly, a jutting brown underbelly dicided into arching segments." The beauty of this first paragraph is that the reader is immediately hooked, and this thought of becoming a bug provokes the reader to continue reading. At this point I was so intrigued with the thought of waking up a bug, I couldn't help but put myself in Gregor's place.

From then on the reader is caught in the downward spiral of Gregor's pathetic life because of the images Kafka paints for us. He literally tells the story from the perspective of an insignifcant insect, and puts us in the body of something so vile that not even it's own family could love it. His father pelts him with apples after frightening his mother after being hit Gregor, "felt as if he were nailed to the spot and lay sprawled upon the ground, in complete distraction of all of his senses." Here his father gives him the treatment any other person would a bug in their home, by throwing some blunt object at the varmit. But the difference here is the fact that Gregor was once the human son of the man throwing the apple. With images of a father trying to hurt a son Kafka illustrates the sheer repulsiveness of Gregor's appearance to the family.

In the end, Gregor ends up realizing that his family is better off without him, and he loses the will to live. The maid then proceeds to refer to him in this way, "Look everyone, it's kicked the bucket; it's lying there dead as a doornail." Even in death his once human form is disgraced, leaving the reader to ulimately reflect on the only real interpretation I drew from this novel. If I were to one day suddenly transform into a Cockroach, would my family still be able to love such a disgusting thing? Truthfully, I don't know if I could love my mother if she suddenly became a common household pest, could you?