Personal Transformation in Literature
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This study will examine the theme of personal transformation in four works of fiction, Frank Kafka's "The Metamorphosis," Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, and Stephen King's The Shining. The protagonists in all four works undergo dramatic and permanent transformations in their consciousnesses and lives. The common essence of these transformations is the alienation from the rest of the human race which each of these protagonists experiences. Three of the protagonists die unpleasant deaths in this alienated state, while the fourth--Gulliver--lives, but in a state of bitter estrangement from his fellow humans. The works to various degrees offer satirical portrayals of politics, as well as similar portrayals of non-political realms. The use of satire in each work serves to illustrate the growing division between the protagonist and other human beings. The attack on politics is a means of showing the corruption and madness of society in the view of three of the protagonists, while the fourth--Kafka's Gregor Samsa--maintains to the end his denial of his alienation and the evilness of those around him. Samsa experiences growing physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual isolation from his family and others and is unable to overcome that isolation. He dies in a state of complete alienation from other human beings, but he maintains to the end a remarkable blindness to the inhumanity of others around hi
. . .
kind of monsters one sees in the bug-form of Samsa and the monster of Mr. Hyde.
The political world of Stevenson's story is Victorian England:
London represented that division-within-essential-unity which is the very meaning of Jekyll and Hyde. As both geographic and symbolic center, London exemplified what Stevenson called . . . 'the great battlefield of mankind.' . . . As political and economic man, Hyde
. . . recalled to many the threatening forces which were beating upon the solid doors of their comfortable homes (Saposnik 89, 100).
Just as Samsa is repressed by the emerging modern world of mechanization and conformity, so is Jekyll repressed by Victorian standards of thought, feeling and behavior. Politics is seen in such a context as a group of forces at work in an individual's life which seek to quiet the voice of passion and unreason within in order to create a society as lawful and orderly as possible. Too strictly applied and enforced, however, such law and order, turns human passion into monsters.
In Samsa's case, politics is satirized by comparing his bug-form as a small problem which must not get in the way of work: "We men of business . . . very often simply have to ignore any slight indisposition, since
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
Jekyll Hyde, Oh God, Gregor Samsa--maintains, Gulliver's Travels, King Torrance, Voltaire's Candide, King's Shining, Torrance Officious, Dr Jekyll's, Gulliver King, jekyll hyde, gulliver's travels, political satire, robert louis, transformation jekyll, transformation protagonist, dr jekyll hyde, social political, politically correct, political economic, modern society, swift's gulliver's travels,
Approximate Word count = 2497
Approximate Pages = 10 (250 words per page)
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