The incident that happened with Gregor Zamza is described, perhaps, in one phrase of the story. One morning, waking up after a restless sleep, the hero suddenly discovered that he had turned into a huge scary insect ...
Actually, after this incredible transformation, nothing special happens anymore. The behavior of the characters is prosaic, routine and extremely reliable, and attention is focused on household trifles, which for the hero grow into excruciating problems.
Gregor Zamza was an ordinary young man living in a big city. All his efforts and cares were subordinated to the family, where he was the only son and therefore experienced an increased sense of responsibility for the well-being of loved ones.
His father went bankrupt and for the most part sat at home, looking at newspapers. Mother suffered from asthma attacks, and she spent long hours in a chair by the window. Gregor also had a younger sister, Greta, whom he loved very much. Greta played the violin well, and Gregor's cherished dream — after he managed to cover his father’s debts — was to help her enter the conservatory, where she could study music professionally. After serving in the army, Gregor got a job in one trading company and pretty soon was promoted from a small employee to a traveling salesman. He worked with great zeal, although the place was ungrateful. We had to spend most of the time on business trips, get up at dawn and with a heavy bag full of cloth samples, go on a train. The owner of the company was stingy, but Gregor was disciplined, diligent and hardworking. Moreover, he never complained. Sometimes he was more lucky, sometimes less. One way or another, his earnings were enough to rent a spacious apartment for the family, where he occupied a separate room.
In this room he once woke up in the form of a giant disgusting centipede. Asleep, he looked around the familiar walls, saw a portrait of a woman in a fur hat, which he had recently cut out of an illustrated magazine and inserted into a gilded frame, looked at the window, heard raindrops knocking on the window sill, and closed his eyes again. It would be nice to have some more sleep and forget all that nonsense, he thought. He was used to sleeping on his right side, but now he was disturbed by a huge convex stomach, and after hundreds of unsuccessful attempts to roll over, Gregor left this occupation. He realized in cold horror that everything was happening in reality. But even more horrified was the fact that the alarm clock showed already half-past six, while Gregor set it at four in the morning. Did he not hear the bell and missed the train? These thoughts drove him into despair. At this time, a mother gently knocked on the door, who was worried if he would be late. Mother's voice was, as always, affectionate, and Gregor was frightened when he heard the response sounds of his own voice, to which a strange painful squeak was mixed.
Further, the nightmare continued. People were already knocking on his room from different angles - both his father and sister were worried whether he was healthy. He was begged to open the door, but he stubbornly did not open the lock. After incredible work, he managed to hang over the edge of the bed. At this time, a bell rang in the hallway. The manager of the company came to find out what happened. From a terrible excitement, Gregor rushed with all his might and fell on the carpet. The sound of the fall was heard in the living room. Now, the administrator joined the calls of relatives. And Gregor thought it wiser to explain to the strict boss that he would certainly correct and catch up.He began excitedly blurting out the door, that he only had a slight malaise, that he still had time for the eight-hour train, and finally began to beg not to fire him because of an involuntary absenteeism and spare his parents. At the same time, he was able, leaning on a slippery chest, to straighten up to his full height, overcoming pain in the body.
There was silence outside the door. From his monologue, no one understood a word. Then the manager quietly said: "It was the voice of an animal." Sister with a servant in tears rushed after the locksmith. However, Gregor himself managed to turn the key in the lock, clutching it with strong jaws. And so he appeared before the eyes of the crowding at the door, leaning against its door.
He continued to convince the manager that everything would soon fall into place. For the first time, he dared to pour out his feelings about the hard work and powerlessness of the position of a traveling salesman whom anyone could offend. The reaction to his appearance was deafening. Mother silently collapsed to the floor. Father in dismay shook his fist. The manager turned and, looking back over his shoulder, began to slowly move away. This silent scene lasted several seconds. Finally, the mother jumped to her feet and screamed wildly. She leaned on the table and knocked over a coffee pot with hot coffee. The manager immediately rushed to the stairs. Gregor set off after him, awkwardly seeding his legs. He certainly had to keep the guest. However, his father blocked his path, who began to push his son back, while making some hissing sounds. He nudged Gregor with his stick. With great difficulty, wounding one side of the door, Gregor squeezed back into his room, and the door immediately shut behind him.
After this terrible first morning for Gregor came a diminished monotonous life in confinement, with which he slowly got used to. He gradually adapted to his ugly and clumsy body, to his thin legs, tentacles. He discovered that he could crawl along the walls and ceiling, and even liked to hang there for a long time. Staying in this terrible new guise, Gregor remained the same as he was - a loving son and brother, experiencing all family troubles and suffering from the fact that he brought so much grief to the lives of relatives. From his imprisonment, he silently overheard the conversations of his relatives. He was tormented by shame and despair, since now the family was without funds and the old father, sick mother and young sister should have been thinking about earning. With pain he felt the squeamish disgust that the closest people felt towards him. Mother and father for the first two weeks could not force themselves to enter his room. Only Greta, overcoming fear, came here to quickly get out or put a bowl of food. However, Gregor was less and less fit for ordinary food, and he often left the plates untouched, although he was tormented by hunger. He understood that his appearance was unbearable for his sister, and therefore tried to hide under the sofa behind the sheet when she came to clean.
Once his humiliating peace was disturbed, as the women decided to free his room from furniture. It was Greta's idea, which decided to give him more room to crawl. Then the mother first timidly entered her son's room. Gregor humbly hid on the floor behind a hanging sheet, in an uncomfortable position. The commotion made him feel very bad. He understood that he was deprived of a normal dwelling - they brought out a chest where he kept a jigsaw and other tools, a wardrobe with clothes, a desk, at which he would prepare lessons at his childhood. And, unable to stand it, he crawled out from under the sofa to protect his last wealth - a portrait of a woman in furs on the wall. Mother and Greta were breathing in the living room at that time. When they returned, Gregor hung on the wall, clutching the portrait with his paws. He decided that he would not allow him to be taken for anything in the world - he would rather cling to Greta's face. The sister who entered the room was not able to take her mother away.She “saw a huge brown spot on the colorful wallpaper, cried out before she realized that this was Gregor, shrill and piercing,” and collapsed exhausted on the sofa.
Gregor was overwhelmed with excitement. He quickly crawled out into the drawing room for his sister, who rushed to the medicine cabinet with drops, and stomped helplessly behind her, suffering from his guilt. At that time his father came - now he worked as a delivery man in a jar and wore a blue uniform with gold buttons. Greta explained that her mother was swooning, and Gregor "escaped." Father made a malevolent cry, grabbed a vase of apples and with hatred began to throw them at Gregor. The unfortunate rushed to the forefront, making many feverish movements. One of the apples hit him hard on the back, stuck in his body.
After the wound received, Gregor's health became worse. Gradually, his sister stopped cleaning him - everything was overgrown with cobwebs and gooey substance that was flowing out of her legs. Not guilty of anything, but repulsively rejected by his closest people, suffering from shame more than from hunger and wounds, he locked himself in miserable loneliness, going through his sleepless nights all his past uncomplicated life. In the evenings, the family gathered in the living room, where everyone drank tea or talked. Gregor, for them, was “it,” each time the family tightly closed the door of his room, trying not to recall his oppressive presence.
One evening he heard that his sister was playing the violin to three new residents - they were given rooms to them for the money. Drawn to music, Gregor dared to move a little further than usual. Because of the dust that lay everywhere in his room, he himself was covered in it all, “on his back and sides he carried with him strings, hair, leftover food; his indifference to everything was too great to lie down, as before, several times a day on his back and brush on the carpet. ” And this untidy monster glided across the sparkling floor of the living room. A shameful scandal erupted. Residents indignantly demanded money back. Mother fell into a fit of coughing. My sister concluded that you can’t continue to live like this, and my father confirmed that she was “a thousand times right.” Gregor struggled to crawl into his room again. From weakness, he was completely clumsy and suffocated. Caught in the familiar dusty darkness, he felt that he could not move at all. He almost did not feel pain, and still thought about his family with tenderness and love.
Early in the morning, a maid came and found that Gregor was completely still. Soon she joyfully informed the owners: “Look, it’s dead, now it’s very, very dead!”
Gregor's body was dry, flat and weightless. The maid raked his remains and threw out with the garbage. Everyone experienced undisguised relief. Mother, father and Greta for the first time in a long time allowed themselves a walk out of town. In a tram car full of warm sunshine, they animatedly discussed future views that were not so bad at all. At the same time, the parents, without saying a word, thought about how, despite all the vicissitudes, their daughter got prettier.
