The Metamorphosis and "Samsa In Love"

I absolutely loved reading The Metamorphosis and "Samsa In Love" together. I had never read The Metamorphosis before and was actually very surprised by it. It was not at all what I expected it would be and the ending caught me completely off guard. To be honest- I thought there would be a little more introspection about humanity and what Gregor's transformation meant from his own point of view. But I suppose the genius lies in the family's reaction to his metamorphosis. He continually tried to show them that he was still consciously Gregor by keeping away from them and trying to be conscientious of his sister's space, but still they chose to believe that there was nothing left of Gregor in the insect's body. One of the reasons I loved "Samsa in Love" was that it acknowledged the humanity and consciousness of all beings. In Kafka's story, Gregor is a conscious being as a human AND an insect. In Murakami's story he is an insect that has a consciousness as a person and it seems that he has had a consciousness as an insect as well before his metamorphosis. There are new dimensions to what he does and does not understand but he isn't shocked by conscious thought. It was a really interesting comparitive look at consciousness in Kafka's work.