"Vladimir Nabokov, teaching his students how to read Kafka, pointed out to them that the insect into which Gregor Samsa is transformed is in fact a winged beetle, an insect that carries its wings under its armored back, and that if Gregor had only discovered that, he would have been able to escape. And then Nabokov added: 'Many a Dick and a Jane grow up like Gregor, unaware that they too have wings and can fly."