When I was asked about my favorite short story, I had no answer to give. There was no short story that immediately came to mind that I absolutely loved. The only short story that I remember reading was The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka. I have read this story multiple times and find it to be so intriguing and disturbing. This story is unimaginable, which makes it that much more fun to wonder about if it were actually true or if it could actually happen. The story uses a relatable real world setting and makes it into a sci-fi fantastic world, which is one thing that I liked about the story. In this short story a young boy wakes up one morning and finds that he has transformed into a "gargantuan pest". The American public has interpreted "pest" to be a cockroach.
In my study of The Metamorphosis I found there to be multiple ways that we, as students, could explore the story. Sometimes we came to similar conclusions, but there were a lot of times that our individual reading brought about individual ideas about the story. All of the different ideas allowed for us to unpack this short story in a very fruitful and thought provoking way. Through our own ideas we were able to discuss literary techniques such as: extended metaphor, symbolism, tone, and euphemism.
I have not read the story in a couple years, but if I were to design an essay prompt I would ask students to critically analyze one moment in the story and to show the impact that this moment had on the entirety of the story. An example could be Gregor's relationship with his sister and how she feeds him.
Here is a link to the short story, The Metamorphosis.
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