The work deals both with the question of the ethical limits and dangers of scientific research (as in the film "The Fly"), the philosophical and sociological consequences of a transformation (as in Kafka's "The Metamorphosis"), and not least with the question of what actually distinguishes us humans from insects.

"Little Fly Thy summers play, My thoughtless hand Has brush'd away. Am not I A fly like thee? Or art not thou A man like me? For I dance And drink & sing: Till some blind hand Shall brush my wing. If thought is life And strength & breath: And the want Of thought is death; Then am I A happy fly, If I live, Or if I die."

• William Blake (1794)