Gregor, having not eaten for weeks, is finally spared true suffering in this passage, dying a peaceful, thoughtful death.  The length of Gregor’s pain was extraordinary; after having sustained a wound from his father’s thrown apple for months and then having starved himself for a similar amount of time, Gregor’s unbearable life comes to a close.             

Here, in this climatic paragraph, there is a sharp change in Kafka’s syntax.  Whereas in the rest of the novella, Kafka utilizes a long, drawn-out prose, interspersed with several semi-colons and commas per sentence, Kafka decides to shorten his sentence length at the height of the story.  Primarily done to give the reader a sense of finality and end to Gregor’s long, troubled, hardship-filled last months, the short sentences also work to break up Kafka’s thoughts in ways that hadn’t been used previously.  Instead of stringing many verbs together, the reader is presented with four sentences in a row that begin with “He thought,” “His conviction,” “He remained,” and “He still saw.” This repetition focuses attention upon Gregor and produces a hazy quality to the usually detailed narrative. 

            The lack of complicated syntax choice emphasizes instead Kafka’s choice of diction in this passage.  Words like “pain,” “inflamed,” “deep emotion,” “love,” “conviction,” “firmer,” “remained,” and “consent” touch upon the depth of Gregor’s feeling and the humanness of his existence despite his cockroach-body.  Finally, Gregor’s thoughts are at peace; he stays still in a “state of empty and peaceful reflection,” worrying about no one, thinking about nothing and everything.  He is above it all, above worry, above pain.  In essence, he has become one with something greater- a stage that undoubtedly leads to Gregor’s death.  In this way, Gregor’s suffering has culminated into a spiritual achievement.  Also, interestingly, Gregor’s “last weak breath” “streams” out, quenching the “inflamed” pains of his past life and carrying Gregor to another life.  Gregor “sinks” down, a ship that is flooded and destroyed- in other words, a body that has been damaged, transformed into a disgusting creature, but finding another home at the depths of the sea (or in death).  Like a damaged boat still holding human life, Gregor too was all-too-human when he died.

            Another way to analyze this passage is through the lens of the Christian religion.  Gregor, the average man, suffers—his suffering is an example to the reader of the relative weakness of human relations and of the cruelty inherent in human nature.  Without love, without hope, Gregor lives, despised by all.  Yet, despite this ill treatment from others, Gregor finds he still holds “deep emotion” and even “love” for his family, who most obviously do not feel the same way about Gregor.  The apple, representing the first sin and disobedience, is imbedded into Gregor- a permanent reminder of human faults.  However, the only fault we can hold Gregor to is that he was changed into a cockroach.  Like Jesus, changed from a God to a man, Gregor becomes a low-life, a worthless, dirty creature. Spring’s arrival (and the “light” that Gregor sees) gives us hope for a better future with Gregor’s Jesus-like death, but here, there is a sharp contrast between the story of Jesus and Gregor’s fate.  Unlike Jesus, who saved mankind from their sins, Gregor dies uselessly and is spit upon.  A random bleep in history, Gregor is gone, having achieved nothing, having taught his family nothing, having brought them nothing but trouble and despair.