The narrator becomes repulsed by Bartleby and decides that he must be suffering from some type of mental problem. The less the narrator knows about Bartleby the worse things seem to be for him. He wants to make sense of things. He wants it all to make sense. The conflict arises from his inability to do so. The narrator is simply being human in his desire to control and understand things but Kafka is demonstrating how we cannot always know everything and how we must be at peace with that, lest we become insane. It is also important to point out that some things are simply not meant to be known or completely understood. Kafka does not attempt to explain everything in this story because we often face situations that will never be truly understood. Marquez demonstrates conflict and how it makes for interesting fiction by allowing the readers to embark upon a journey with the narrator of the story. We also see conflict with Angela's situation. She is being forced to do something she does not want to do and she is must keep a terrible secret in the meantime. She struggles before the marriage and even prays for the "strength to kill myself"(Marquez 193). She almost confesses the truth to her mother but backs out when her friends convince her to keep quiet. Angela marries with the "illusion" that she is pure. Angela tells the narrator about her misfortune "without shame in order to cover up the other misfortune, the real one, that was burning in her insides' (229). Santiago is another character that brings conflict to this story. The narrator is certain that he died "without understanding his death" (236). The story is also important because the narrator attempts at all costs to discover truth about what actually happened. The result, however, demonstrates how incredibly futile it seems to attempt to...

Perspective becomes important as we realize everyone has one and they rarely coincide with each other in regard to something as simple as weather. We also learn that truth is subjective and while thirty people may all witness the same event, they will recall it differently.
These authors use conflict to emphasize human nature. Each of these stories and characters are different but they share the notion that conflict exists and we all deal with it in different ways. Sometimes it takes conflict to open our eyes to the truth of the lives we are living and, if we are lucky enough, the conflict teaches us to live even better lives. Conflict might teach us to learn to accept the things we cannot change, as this will save many headaches and arguments that occur over a lack of understanding. Conflict also teaches us that we are all different. Waking up as a bug may sound extraordinary but working a thankless job supporting a thankless family does not. Just as separate people recalling events that occurred on the same day differently. Life is made of a series of conflicts and while some may say this is a negative attitude, it is actually very accurate because if we understand that, we can learn to live with it instead of trying to fight it or change it. If we accept that conflict exists, we can learn to find peace in it.

Works Cited

Kafka, Franz. "The Metamorphosis." The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction R.V. Cassill, ed.

New York W.W. Norton and Company. 1981.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "Chronicle of a Death Foretold." Collected Novellas. New York:

Harper Perennial. 1990.

Melville, Herman. "Bartleby the Scrivener." The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction. New York:

W.W. Norton and Company. 1981.