Virtual gathering

Join in the Smart Museum of Art’s virtual book club! 

The Smart Reads series continues in September with The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka. We invite you to read along with us and engage in a thought-provoking conversation with host Dorian H. Nash. 

FREE. To help build a community of participants, capacity is limited and advanced registration is required.

ABOUT THE BOOK

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

'When Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin.' With this startling, bizarre, yet surprisingly funny first sentence, Kafka begins his masterpiece, The Metamorphosis. It is the story of a young man who, transformed overnight into a giant beetlelike insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. A harrowing—though absurdly comic—meditation on human feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and isolation, The Metamorphosis has taken its place as one of the most widely read and influential works of twentieth-century fiction.

2023 SMART READS SCHEDULE

January 25, 6–7:30 pm
The Theater and its Double by Antonin Artaud

February 22, 6–7:30 pm
Women, Race, and Class by Angela Davis

March 29, 6–7:30 pm
Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall

April 26, 6–7:30 pm
Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo

May 31, 6–7:30 pm
Minor Feelings by Cathy Park Hong 

June 28, 6–7:30 pm
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin

July 26, 6–7:30 pm
The Hidden Messages in Water by Masaru Emoto

August 30, 6–7:30 pm
We Do This 'Til We Free Us by Mariame Kaba 

September 27, 6–7:30 pm
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sánchez 

October 25, 6–7:30 pm
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

November 29, 6–7:30 pm
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

December 6, 6–7:30 pm
Year in books recap and reflection