Method in his Madness

The term kafkaesque is used to redefine the fine lines between reality and fantasy. His works borders on the absurd and the line is blurred when we talk about the real and surreal. In fact, where does reality start and imagination end. As any psychiatrist worth his hourly fee will tell you, it is all about what the mind perceives. A child can have an imaginary friend, and yet to that child she derives as much comfort and companionship from this friend than any real one. Then surely this friend is real in every sense of the word. Today we have many virtual friends that we never meet and yet we still value their friendship. So is this our modern day version of the imaginary friend. In the same way a donkey will chase a carrot on a stick. We know that carrot will never be reached and yet the hapless donkey is happy in his own world will continue to chase that carrot, as long as his mind perceives that his goal is attainable. Again a man dying of thirst in the desert will actually see what he wants to see, his mind plays tricks on him as he gathers up the sand to his mouth as he imagines the mirage of an oasis of sparkling water. But one man'.s absurdity is another man's normality and who are we to judge on what is normal or absurd. Who decides or sets the standard of normal, is it society, culture, religion or a combination of all these factors ?

In the movie, events border on the absurd and at times make no sense at all to the viewer, but what was the writers motive in doing this? Perhaps he wanted to send an underlying message and have the reader think outside of the box. The movie brings forth the question, "What indeed is absurd and what is normal?" The depiction of the castle and the outside world both utilized contrary color pallettes, that of color, and black and white. The castle scenes, which we viewed as absurd were depicted in color, while on the contrary, life outside the castle, normal to the viewers, was depicted in black and white. We perceive color as the norm, and in contrast black and white as an abnormal phenomenon, so the use of varying color choices retorts the question of what is normal and what is absurd. Perhaps, there is a method in the madness. After all there is a fine line between madness and genius......

In the short story Metamorphosis we are lead to believe without explanation or apology that a young man wakes up to become an insect. We balk at this idea at first until we delve deeper and realize the underlying theme that human behavior is fickle and is based on selfish motives as we see the real more shocking change is not the young man's but his family reaction and treatment towards him. Today, this idea of transformation is mirrored in modern day movies such as The Fly and Spiderman and the audience readily laps up these odd notions without question or even blinking an eye. Perhaps, Kafka was ahead of his times, as the absurd no longer seems absurd to us.