Die Verwandlung.
Franz Kafka · The Metamorphosis
Kafka's complete, unabridged Die Verwandlung with a strictly literal English gloss beneath every line — read one of the great works of modern literature in the German Kafka wrote.
198 pages · Paperback & Kindle · Intermediate
— the famous opening of Die Verwandlung
The complete novella.
All three parts, unabridged, each closing with a linguistic and literary epilogue.
Gregor Samsa wakes from restless dreams to find himself transformed — and for a language learner, there is no better doorway into literary German than the precise, patient prose Kafka used to tell it. This volume contains the complete, unabridged text of Die Verwandlung, exactly as Kafka placed every word, with only the pre-1996 spellings (daß) gently modernised (dass).
The glosses are strictly literal, preserving the original German word order to expose the raw mechanics of the sentence — the long compounds, the embedded clauses, the delayed verbs that define Kafka's style. Each of the three parts closes with an epilogue on the language and the literature, so you come away with both the vocabulary and the reading of a masterpiece.
- 01Part OneGregor wakes transformed — and is late for the train
- 02Part TwoThe household adapts; his sister becomes his reluctant caretaker
- 03Part ThreeLodgers move in, and the sound of a violin draws Gregor out
- 04EpiloguesLinguistic context and literary perspective after every part
Why this edition.
Kafka's exact words
Every word stands where Kafka placed it — only archaic ß-spellings are modernised — so you read the actual text, not a simplification.
See German think
Strictly literal glosses preserve the German word order, teaching you embedded clauses, compound nouns and delayed verbs by exposure instead of rulebooks.
A memory bridge
Where possible the glosses use English words that share roots with the German, making new vocabulary easier to keep.
More than a text
Epilogues after each part unpack the household vocabulary, the registers of polite speech under pressure, and Kafka's signature syntax.
— the complete first sentence of Die Verwandlung
The details.
- Series
- The German Reader
- Language pair
- German–English interlinear
- Format
- Paperback & Kindle
- Print length
- 198 pages
- Source text
- Die Verwandlung (1915), unabridged, spelling modernised
- Level
- Intermediate (B1–B2)
- Published
- May 2026
- ASIN
- B0H15WNDKG
More in German.
Every edition is glossed by hand, word by word, and printed on demand by Amazon.
Read Die Verwandlung with every word translated beneath the original.
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