Skip to main content

What is the main point or purpose of The Man Who Turned Into a Stick, by Kobo Abe?

Kobo Abe wrote The Man Who Turned into a Stick as part of a series of plays intended to serve as a commentary on the nature of dehumanization.


Exploitation and dehumanization are central themes in the play based on Abe's short works. Abe uses this story to explore the idea of one group exploiting another due to perceived differences between them. The play also focuses heavily on the theme of alienation or the separation and isolation of the individual within modern society. The story follows a man who physically resembles a stick and whose only meaning in life seems to be serving as a pawn for others. This character faces both internal and external punishments due to his passive nature. Over time, in a transformation similar to that of the main character in The Metamorphosis, he actually turns into a stick.


After the newly transformed stick falls from the roof of a department store, two other characters in the story are tasked with transporting it to Hell. In Hell, it is revealed that there is no shortage of human beings who have been turned into sticks due to societal pressures. Through this unusual, symbolic work, Abe criticizes the tendency within society to use people as objects. By transforming human characters into literal objects, the author presents a dramatic metaphor for the gradual transformation of people into tools to be used by the masses. Throughout the course of the play, it is made clear that the subtle objectification that occurs in reality is just as dangerous as the surreal transformation that occurs in the work.


Although the play is short, The Man Who Turned into a Stick delivers a powerful message. There are many layers of meaning to the play that critics continue to discuss to this day. At the conclusion of the play, one of the characters remarks accusatorily that the members of the audience resemble sticks as well. The central point of the story is that no one is exempt from objectification. In a world that sees humans as objects to be used for material gain, anyone could be dehumanized next.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more