The Metamorphosis Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Gavriel Ben-Ephraim

Critical Essay by Gavriel Ben-Ephraim

SOURCE: "Making and Breaking Meaning: Deconstruction, Four-level Allegory and The Metamorphosis," in The Midwest Quarterly, Vol. XXXV, No. 4, Summer, 1994, pp. 450-67.

In the following essay, Ben-Ephraim probes the allegorical meanings of The Metamorphosis while acknowledging that the work "validates contradictory readings that cancel coherent interpretation."

From Quintilian to Angus Fletcher critics have noted allegory's doubled significance; "twice-told," but many times understood, allegory invariably means more than it says. To supplement meaning, allegory characteristically enfolds abstract significance in narrative images. These suggestions may be provided by presences in the text, verbal signals like the name of the protagonist in Everyman, a nominal allegory which designates significance in its very title, or by absences in the text, covered mysteries like the unknown face in "The Minister's Black Veil," a tale that is itself a mask over figurai meaning. Allegory's polysemous texture is created through addition and subtraction in a doubled...
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