Seminar paper from the year 2013 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,0, Free University of Berlin (John F. Kennedy Institute for North American Studies), course: Cormac McCarthy in Context, language: English, abstract: This paper constitutes an inquiry into the problems of empathizing with unsympathetic characters in novels, specifically in Cormac McCarthy's novel "Child of God". It is both textually focused and extending its reflections beyond the scope of the novel. The author questions the reasoning behind, and challenges for, an empathic reading of Cormac McCarthy's polarizing novel "Child of God", drawing on theories of empathy from several disciplinary perspectives. Literary definitions of empathy, as well as philosophical, sociological and psychological approaches to this phenomenon will be consulted to explore what makes reader identification with a challenging protagonist like Lester Ballard in "Child of God" possible.