Franz Kafka

The Change (bilingual German-English) Franz Kafka

"The Change" (a.k.a. "The Metamorphosis", orig. "Die Verwandlung") is one of Kafka's most famous stories. Gregor Samsa, its main character finds himself changed into a large bug one morning. As he and his family try to come to grips with this fact, their normal life falls apart. In contrast to Gregor, his family is able to adapt to the changes and find positive outcomes. Kafka wrote this "little story" within less than a month in 1912 but was unable to get it published until 1915. It is the longest work that Kafka himself considered complete. The present translation attempts to transport Kafka's poetically plain language into modern usage, avoiding latinate terminology that would lend the text pretensions that the original simply does not have. Most obviously, this is the case in the title - the connotations of "metamorphosis" are simply not present in the German word "Verwandlung". Furthermore, while most other translations pride themselves in mirroring Kafka's syntax as closely as possible, sentence structure and length here focus more on English readability. This "translator edition" offers the original German text side by side with the new translation. Learners of the language can use it to improve their reading skills, students of literature can read the original and have a translation at hand for reference, and people interested in translation can evaluate strategies and choices.