Introduction and notes by Archer , W. G.

Probably best for the Kafka completist, and only a couple stories stand out: Metamorphosis, Before the Law, A Report To An Academy, and In the Penal Colony.

Metamorphosis is transcendent and his best short story. It strikes the same themes that are present in The Trial: a deep sense of anxiety, a fear that nobody understands you, and likewise you will never understand the world. A sense that all you see is a veneer and the cogs and machinery underneath will forever be inscrutable.

His story A Report To An Academy is from the perspective of an ape at a zoo that learns how to "ape" humans, i.e. he begins to understand our behaviors and pass as human. Interestingly, this might be seen as a foil to Gregor Samsa in the Metamorphosis. In one story, the animal is cut off from humanity and killed. In another, he adapts successfully and succeeds.… (mehr)