MIDDLE SCORE

	A controversial character, based on his actions toward and treatment 
of his transformed son in Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis, is Mr. Samsa.  
Gregor's father reacts rashly and perhaps too cruelly after discovering that 
his son is a beetlelike insect one day.  Repelled at the very sight of him, Mr. 
Samsa forces Gregor to stay locked, under the bed, in his room, and won't 
have anything to do with him.  Gregor's father could easily be seen as a villain 
for what he does without closer examination.
	Gregor's eventual death from loneliness and malnutrition probably 
could have been averted had his family not turned their backs on him.  Mr. 
Samsa is an easy target of blame, since he's the one who injured Gregor and 
rejected him the most frequently and severely.  But one needs to put himself 
in the place of Mr. Samsa before determining that he immorally abandoned his 
son.  How many people would simply accept it if one day their son was a 
beetle (a giant one)?  It is a normal human reaction to be sickened at the 
sight of it.  Very few, if any, people would continue life as if nothing had 
happened.  Although the reader doesn't really gain a great understanding of 
Mr. Samsa's character from the text, Kafka does tell us that he's a 
hardworking father who does the best he can for his family under very 
difficult financial circumstances.  Especially when Gregor can't work 
anymore, the financial burden is almost unbearable.  Mr. Samsa, who was 
retired, must go back to work to support his family.  It's difficult to blame 
him for treating Gregor as he does initially.
	That's not to say that Mr. Samsa's actions are completely excusable; 
they're not.  However, to regard him as evil is inaccurate based on the 
circumstances of the novel.  Rejecting a son because of who he is or what he 
has done is one thing; rejecting a son because of the fact that he's turned into 
a giant insect is quite another.
	Also, how could Mr. Samsa even have been sure that the beetlelike 
insect was Gregor?  Gregor could not communicate and had no means of 
actually showing that he could still think and feel and function.  His father 
couldn't know that, and that fact is important in understanding that perhaps 
Mr. Samsa didn't even realize that he was rejecting his son.  If one truly 
thinks about how Mr. Samsa's character is presented and what circumstances 
he was under, one could not consider him to be truly evil, only misguided 
and completely normal in his reaction.  This is why we react more 
sympathetically with Mr. Samsa's character: we know that if we were placed 
in his situation, we'd most likely react similarly.


	This essay is well-written and is correct in its claim that Mr. Samsa 
could be viewed with sympathy, but its argument is thin in some places and 
invalid in others.  The writer, perhaps searching for reasons to back up his or 
her assertions, inaccurately states that Mr. Samsa was a hardworking, 
dedicated father.  Actually, the man was rather dependent on Gregor for 
money and only returns to work out of necessity.  Nevertheless, the writer 
was rewarded for what he or she did well, which was write about an original 
character that certainly took some thought to come up with.  The reason the 
essay did not receive a high score is the incompleteness of the response.