Different yet Similar

Post date: Aug 9, 2013 1:36:46 AM

Two different stories The Metamorphosis (Kafka) and The death of Ivan Ilych (Tolstoy) are so similar that a common summary can be written. Something like –

“Ivan Ilych and Gregory Samsa in irreversibly increasing pain, with no control/idea of their situation and how it happened or how it will be in future, alienated, feeling as an object of disgrace to their loved ones, with inability to communicate themselves, feeling as an outsider in their very own homes, understood that their families want and must get rid of them... realizing that their existence is repulsive and a burden on their loved ones – They died.”

Underlying thoughts and feelings must be somewhat true as it was written independently by two different people in different spaces and times… similar to the discovery of calculus by Newton and Leibniz.

..but why it has to be so painful and sad Kafka/Tolstoy uncle?