Kafka Research Paper(Theme, Synthesis, and Refutation)

Choose a theme from The Metamorphosis that interests you. Trace the development of that theme throughout the novella. Then—this is the synthesis part of the essay— by connecting your discussion of this theme to one of the secondary sources (the Nabokov lecture, Kafka’s “Letter to His Father,” or any of the other sources listed below), come up with an argument about what you think Kafka means to say about Gregor Samsa and, as a consequence, human life in general. Once you’ve made your argument (with evidence, of course, from the text and at least one of the secondary sources), anticipate an objection to your argument and refute it. The paper is made up of three parts: thematic analysis, synthesis with a secondary source, and a refutation.

Use a minimum of three quotes (well-introduced!), two from the novella and one from your secondary source
Use MLA citations—a Works Cited page as well as in-text citations

Secondary Sources
In addition to the lecture by Nabokov (handout), Kafka’s letter to his father (in The Sons), and an essay called “The Myth of Sisyphus” by Albert Camus, the French-Algerian existentialist writer who won the Nobel Prize in 1957, you may use any of these sources for your paper: Mark Anderson’s introduction to The Sons, Kafka’s story “The Judgment” (also in The Sons), and a very short—difficult but rewarding—essay about humor in Kafka by David Foster Wallace called “Laughing with Kafka.” If anything else occurs to you, let me know.

Here’s the link to the David Foster Wallace essay (really a lecture): http://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/HarpersMagazine-1998-07-0059612.pdf. If you’re interested in using this but have difficulty reading it, let me know. I’d be happy to help you figure it out.