Annemary’s answer to “Can someone tell me the reasons why this book is named The Metamorphosis? What are the reasons behi…” > Likes and Comments
21 likes · Like
This can't be true. Ovid's "Metamorphoses" (plural) has nothing to do with the Kafka's story; its title comes from the recurring motif of transformation running through the epic poem: Ovid wanted to write the history of the world starting from the creation of the cosmos to what was his present, and along the way people and things kept changing or being changed, so he made it the central focus of his epic in a wonderful insight. But that was a classical Latin text, and had nothing to do with Kafka's writing. Kafka didn't name this story "The Metamorphosis", he named it "Die Verwandlung", which does not translate perfectly into "The Metamorphosis" in English. In English, 'metamorphosis' can mean a scientific change, like from a caterpillar into a butterfly, but 'verwandlung' has no such connotations. Kafka, I can promise you, did not give the book this title with the aim of it being translated into an English word that would have connotations with Ovid.
This is false. Ovid's work has absolutely nothing to do with this.
Please you guys, tell this to my past self and the literature professor who told me this 6 years ago when I made this comment.
back to top
date
newest »
newest »
message 1:
by
Emmet
(new)
May 14, 2017 05:49AM
This can't be true. Ovid's "Metamorphoses" (plural) has nothing to do with the Kafka's story; its title comes from the recurring motif of transformation running through the epic poem: Ovid wanted to write the history of the world starting from the creation of the cosmos to what was his present, and along the way people and things kept changing or being changed, so he made it the central focus of his epic in a wonderful insight. But that was a classical Latin text, and had nothing to do with Kafka's writing. Kafka didn't name this story "The Metamorphosis", he named it "Die Verwandlung", which does not translate perfectly into "The Metamorphosis" in English. In English, 'metamorphosis' can mean a scientific change, like from a caterpillar into a butterfly, but 'verwandlung' has no such connotations. Kafka, I can promise you, did not give the book this title with the aim of it being translated into an English word that would have connotations with Ovid.
reply
|
flag
This is false. Ovid's work has absolutely nothing to do with this.
Please you guys, tell this to my past self and the literature professor who told me this 6 years ago when I made this comment.
