第一章
一天早上，格勒果．撒摩札從不愉快的夢中醒來，發現自己變成了一隻醜陋的大蟲。他硬如鐵甲的背躺在床上，把頭稍稍抬起來，就看到褐色圓拱的肚皮，分成一節節硬梆梆的弓形肌肉，高突的肚子使蓋在上面的棉被無法固定，感覺就快滑下去了。
與偌大的身軀相比，一對又一對的腳特別顯得細小可憐，在他眼前無力地揮動。
我是怎麼了？他想。這不是夢。
他的房間雖嫌小了些，但還是人住的房間，靜置在四面熟悉的牆壁之間。桌上擱著布料樣品，攤開沒有包好—撒摩札是布料推銷員—桌前的牆上掛著一幅畫，那是他最近從圖畫雜誌上剪下來的，裝在金黃色的相框裡，畫裡是一個婦人，頭戴毛皮帽子，圍著毛皮圍巾，端坐在椅子上，對著看畫的人舉起遮住她整條手臂的暖手筒。
接著，格勒果的眼睛轉向窗口，天空陰沉沉的，傳來雨滴打在窗檯上的聲音，這使他覺得憂鬱極了。他心想，乾脆再多睡一會兒，把這檔無聊事全部忘掉，可是他睡不著，因為他習慣往右邊側躺，而在目前的情況下，他根本沒有辦法翻身，不論多麼用力往右邊翻，都還是會恢復仰臥的姿勢。
他至少試了一百次了，眼睛閉著，不想看到自己那些扭動掙扎的腳，但最後還是斷了這個念頭，因為他的腹側開始感到從未有過的隱痛。
天啊，他心想，我選了多麼累人的工作啊！每天在路上奔波，成交壓力比在總部辦公來得大多了，再加上旅途的勞頓，要擔心車班的銜接、住宿，而且三餐不定，不時要與人來往，卻從來都無法深交。所有事情都滾開！他覺得肚皮有點癢，就躺著把身體慢慢拖向床頭，這樣子要把頭抬起來會比較容易。他找到了發癢的地方，那裡圍繞著許多白色的小斑點，他不知道那些斑點是怎麼回事，想要用一隻腳去搔那地方，但是馬上就縮回來了，因為只要一碰到，一陣寒顫感就會傳遍全身。
他又挪動身軀，恢復原來的姿勢。他心想，這麼早起床會使整個人都變笨。
人是需要睡眠的。別的推銷員過的生活猶如後宮的女人，比如說，我早上回旅館填寫剛接到的訂單時，那幫人才剛坐下來吃早餐。如果我這麼做，老闆知道了，一定會當場把我開除。不過，那對我未嘗不是件好事，誰知道呢？假如不是顧慮到父母，我早就不幹了。我會到老闆面前，一口氣說出對他的看法，讓他嚇得從桌子上跌下來！他那種作風也真古怪，高坐在桌子上對部屬說話，尤其是老闆有重聽，跟他講話必須靠他很近。但事情還是有希望的，只要我存夠錢還清父母欠老闆的債—也許再過五、六年—我一定會那樣做。到時候我會把握機會。可是，現在我得起床了，火車五點就要開了。
他看了看五斗櫃上滴答滴答響的鬧鐘。他想，老天爺，已經六點半了。指針還在安靜地往前走，甚至都過了半，快要指向四十五分了。鬧鐘沒有響嗎？從床上可以看到，鬧鐘確實設定在四點，想必是響過了。可是，他怎麼可能沒有聽到那震耳欲聾的鬧鈴而睡過頭了呢？不，他睡得並不安穩，但顯然睡得很熟。唉，現在怎麼辦呢？下一班火車是七點。
要搭上那班車，他必須趕緊出發。
可是樣品還沒有收拾好，心情也不怎麼暢快。就算他趕上了那班火車，也無法避免老闆的一頓責罵，因為公司的雜工會去等五點的火車，應該早就去跟老闆報告說他沒有出現。這個雜工是老闆的走狗，既窩囊又愚蠢。那麼，說他生病好了？可是這麼說觸霉頭，而且會令人起疑，畢竟他工作五年來，從來沒有生過病。老闆一定會親自帶著健保公司的醫生來找他，然後責怪他的父母，說他們的兒子偷懶，而且不管怎麼解釋，老闆也只會採信醫生的說詞。這個醫生認為，所有人都身心健全但怠惰職責，而照目前的情形來看，可以說醫生的這個想法是錯的嗎？除了久睡後遲遲未退去的睏意外，格勒果的身體很健康，他甚至食慾大開。
儘管他非常快速地思考這些，他卻還不能下定決心離開床舖。鬧鐘走到六點四十五分時，床頭邊的門傳來輕輕的敲門聲。
「格勒果，」有道聲音說，是他的母親。「六點四十五分了，你不是要趕火車嗎？」
好溫柔的聲音！格勒果聽到自己回應的聲音時嚇了一跳，那無疑是他的聲音，的確是，但是夾雜著糾纏不清的唧唧顫聲，好像一股暗流，在話裡面反射縈繞，使得他說的話只在剛開始的瞬間聽得清楚，後面的聲音便被破壞掉，所以不能確定對方是否聽得清楚。
CHAPTER I
One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug. He lay on his armour-hard back and saw, as he lifted his head up a little, his brown, arched abdomen divided up into rigid bow-like sections. From this height the blanket, just about ready to slide off completely, could hardly stay in place.
His numerous legs, pitifully thin in comparison to the rest of his circumference, flickered helplessly before his eyes.
“What's happened to me,” he thought. It was no dream. His room, a proper room for a human being, only somewhat too small, lay quietly between the four wellknown walls. Above the table, on which an unpacked collection of sample cloth goods was spread out (Samsa was a traveling salesman) hung the picture which he had cut out of an illustrated magazine a little while ago and set in a pretty gilt frame. It was a picture of a woman with a fur hat and a fur boa. She sat erect there, lifting up in the direction of the viewer a solid fur muff into which her entire forearm disappeared.
Gregor's glance then turned to the window. The dreary weather (the rain drops were falling audibly down on the metal window ledge) made him quite melancholy. “Why don't I keep sleeping for a little while longer and forget all this foolishness,” he thought. But this was entirely impractical, for he was used to sleeping on his right side, and in his present state he couldn't get himself into this position. No matter how hard he threw himself onto his right side, he always rolled again onto his back. He must have tried it a hundred times, closing his eyes, so that he would not have to see the wriggling legs, and gave up only when he began to feel a light, dull pain in his side which he had never felt before.
“O God,” he thought, “what a demanding job I've chosen! Day in, day out on the road. The stresses of trade are much greater than the work going on at head office, and, in addition to that, I have to deal with the problems of traveling, the worries about train connections, irregular bad food, temporary and constantly changing human relationships which never come from the heart. To hell with it all!” He felt a slight itching on the top of his abdomen. He slowly pushed himself on his back closer to the bed post so that he could lift his head more easily, found the itchy part, which was entirely covered with small white spots (he did not know what to make of them), and wanted to feel the place with a leg. But he retracted it immediately, for the contact felt like a cold shower all over him.
He slid back again into his earlier position. “This getting up early,” he thought, “makes a man quite idiotic. A man must have his sleep. Other traveling salesmen live like harem women. For instance, when I come back to the inn during the course of the morning to write up the necessary orders, these gentlemen are just sitting down to breakfast. If I were to try that with my boss, I'd be thrown out on the spot. Still, who knows whether that mightn't be really good for me. If I didn't hold back for my parents' sake, I would've quit ages ago. I would've gone to the boss and told him just what I think from the bottom of my heart. He would've fallen right off his desk! How weird it is to sit up at the desk and talk down to the employee from way up there. The boss has trouble hearing, so the employee has to step up quite close to him. Anyway, I haven't completely given up that hope yet. Once I've got together the money to pay off the parents' debt to him—that should take another five or six years—I'll do it for sure. Then I'll make the big break. In any case, right now I have to get up. My train leaves at five o'clock.
And he looked over at the alarm clock ticking away by the chest of drawers. “Good God,” he thought. It was half past six, and the hands were going quietly on. It was past the half hour, already nearly quarter to. Could the alarm have failed to ring? One saw from the bed that it was properly set for four o'clock. Certainly it had rung. Yes, but was it possible to sleep through this noise that made the furniture shake? Now, it's true he'd not slept quietly, but evidently he'd slept all the more deeply. Still, what should he do now? The next train left at seven o'clock.
To catch that one, he would have to go in a mad rush. The sample collection wasn't packed up yet, and he really didn't feel particularly fresh and active. And even if he caught the train, there was no avoiding a blow up with the boss, because the firm's errand boy would've waited for the five o'clock train and reported the news of his absence long ago. He was the boss's minion, without backbone or intelligence. Well then, what if he reported in sick? But that would be extremely embarrassing and suspicious, because during his five years' service Gregor hadn't been sick even once. The boss would certainly come with the doctor from
the health insurance company and would reproach his parents for their lazy son and cut short all objections with the insurance doctor's comments; for him everyone was completely healthy but really lazy about work. And besides, would the doctor in this case be totally wrong? Apart from a really excessive drowsiness after the long sleep, Gregor in fact felt quite well and even had a really strong appetite.
As he was thinking all this over in the greatest haste, without being able to make the decision to get out of bed (the alarm clock was indicating exactly quarter to seven) there was a cautious knock on the door by the head of the bed.
“Gregor,” a voice called (it was his mother!) “it's quarter to seven. Don't you want to be on your way?”
The soft voice! Gregor was startled when he heard his voice answering. It was clearly and unmistakably his earlier voice, but in it was intermingled, as if from below, an irrepressibly painful squeaking which left the words positively distinct only in the first moment and distorted them in the reverberation, so that one didn't know if one had heard correctly.
2024專利防護中