If you haven't read the novel "The Reader" by Bernhard Schlink or seen the film starring Kate Winslet, my discussion of the moral core of the story may not interest you and, if you intend to read the book or see the film, you might not want to spoil things by reading what follows in this blog entry.
On the other hand, if you've read the novel and/or seen the film, you might be interested in the following discussion of what Schlink is trying to do.
My review of the book
When I saw the film of "The Reader", I admired the brilliant acting by Kate Winslet but was disturbed by the moral confusion of the story by German law professor Berhard Schlink. I decided ro read the best-selling book to see if the moral issue became any clearer. This is a Holocaust work that attempts to explore the hugely sensitive issue of the guilt of the following German generation. It is a quick read since it is not a long work and the chapters are all unusually short - but does it make the moral question any clearer?
The first two-fifths of the story - located in 1958 - is about the relationship between 36 year old tram conductor Hanna Schmitz and 15 year old schoolboy Michael Berg; the second two-fifths - set seven years later - revolves around the trial of Hanna witnessed by Michael; and the final fifth or so concerns the time of Hanna's 18 year prison sentence.
What I found was that the movie is a faithful adaptation of the novel. Schlink's relatively sparse but moving writing is perhaps more revealing of Michael's thoughts about Hanna (frequent references to him feeling "nothing" and his "numbness") but no less illuminating about Hanna's motivations and feelings (twice she cries "What would you have done?" and seems to exhibit emotional autism).
The reader of the title is, at different times, Michael, Hanna and we ourselves. For me, the key sentence of the book is Michael's dilemma: "I wanted to pose myself both tasks - understanding and condemnation. But it was impossible to do both." Arguably most Holocaust literature has been more about condemnation than understanding, but Schlink runs the risk of showing more understanding than condemnation. Surely one has to do both, however difficult, and it is immensely difficult.
A comment on this review from an American Jewish friend
If I recall correctly, over time Hanna took several young women prisoners under her charge, provided special care for them in her hut, as long as they read to her and their number had not yet come up in the "selection." When that happened she turned them back into the mass (or was it when she tired of anyone of them?) for murder by gassing. Somehow the film script left this out - as it can complicate our difficulty in "judging" her.
Hanna's caring for some reader-prisoners would seem somewhat of an answer to the question she posed to the Judge - "What would you have done?" - in that she seems to have provided a brief warm respite (a short stay in her hut rather than a fatal moment in the gas chamber) for as many women as she could - probably to the consternation of the other (literate) camp guards (who probably only thought of this as a lesbian arrangement - like some such forced liaisons they may have enjoyed).
I note your comment does not mention Hanna's suicide, seemingly her own unforgiving judgment on her crimes: what do you make of it, and, its place in the scheme of the book's wrestling with "big questions."?
Finally, I agree that both/and thinking and feeling - while almost always more demanding and even enervating - generally trumps either/or thinking in matters as grave as these.
My response to my friend's comment
You remember correctly about Hanna's selection of young women readers in the camp. One interpretation of her conduct - that apparently favoured by Michael - is that she was showing them a kindness as long as she could. Another interpretation is that she was simply using them as readers as long as she could. She might have used them as lovers too - we don't know. When she later meets Michael, she could have simply befriended him and asked him to read to her - small thanks for the kindness she showed when he was ill. But she immediately had sex with him and never indicated that she loved him. Both her conduct in the camp and with Michael can be seen as predatory and selfish acts.
I don't mention the suicide in my review because I feel that would spoil the book for somebody who has not read it. Again different interpretations are possible. The first is the one you suggest: unforgiving judgment on herself. But, if she was consumed with guilt, she could have committed suicide at any point in her 18 year sentence and she never expressed guilt in her dealings with others in the prison or in her letters to Michael. A second interpretation is that she had become institutionalised from 18 years in prison and did not feel that she could cope outside or that she was afraid that outside she would be judged for her crimes by the people she would have to meet. Either way this would make her suicide a selfish act rather than a redeeming one.
Hanna's shame about her illiteracy explains why she volunteered to be a camp guard, why she befriended Michael, why she left her job at the tram company, and why she admitted to writing a report on the church fire that she was incapable of writing. Schlink seems to be suggesting that this explains her actions and should make us the reader understanding. But at no point does Hanna show any indication that she was making moral choices with consequences of life and death. She seems obsessed with practical issues without any understanding of the moral context which is why I suggest in my review that she exhibits a form of emotional autism.
So, what do you think?