CROSS-CULTURAL DIALOGUE: THE INTERTEXTUALITY BETWEEN IZUMI KUROSAWA'S “NOT FIT FOR HUMANITY” AND FRANZ KAFKA'S “THE METAMORPHOSIS”

Abstract

This article raises the research question: In the novel Not Fit for Humanity (2018), what intertextual strategies did Izumi Kurosawa use to rewrite Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis (1915), and what significance does that rewriting have in the context of contemporary Japanese culture and literature? The study aims to clarify how Kurosawa uses diegetic transposition and pragmatic transpositions to recreate a new work, thereby reflecting a current social phenomenon: Hikikomori (Social Withdrawal). The study is conducted based on the combination of Genette’s intertextual theory, narratology, and sociology of literature. The results show that Not Fit for Humanity  rewrites Kafka’s metamorphosis motif to translate it from an existential tragedy into a form of social reflection: the collapse of the individual in the context of family, technology, and social pressure in modern Japan. From there, the study concludes that this rewriting is an act of cross-cultural literary dialogue, and at the same time contributes to expanding the intertextual approach as a strategy to reconstruct artistic discourse in the contemporary world literary space.