GE3904 - Der Vorleser

Introduction:

First published twenty years ago, Der Vorleser is remarkable not for its literary quality, but it is still one of the most successful German post-war books. The author departed from the traditions of holocaust literature in writing from the perspective of a perpetrator rather than the victims, something which had previously been a taboo. The book focuses on the question of guilt on multiple levels, e.g. legal, human and ethical, developing a perspective which forces us to deal with that question without giving an absolute answer. The question of guilt is thus relativised.

Author:

The author is Bernhard Schlink, a German law professor and judge at a constitutional court in one of Germany's federal states (each state has its own constitution and as such, its own constitutional court). Der Vorleser is based on some of Schlink's biographical details.

 The Setting: 

•  The book is set in roughly in the 60s - the trial takes place in the late 60s when the question of guilt in Germany finally begins to arise post war
• In the 50s and early 60s, there was a public silence on the subject of the holocaust 
• After the war, the Allies investigated ~2.5 million suspected Nazis, classing them as follows
• Hauptschuldige (major offenders; war criminals) and Belastete (offenders; activists, militarists, profiteers) = 1.5%
• Minderbelastete (lesser offenders)
• Mitläufer (opportunist followers) = 54%
• Unbelastete (exonerated) und anerkannte NS-Gegner (resistance = 0.6%).
• Outcome: 5025 convictions, of which 806 death sentences. 34.6% of proceedings were quashed.
• Many criminals fell through the cracks and the Nazi ideology lingered on in Germany through the people who were not prosecuted
• A great number of former high ranking Nazi functionaries and SS-officers escaped prosecution and succeeded in re-building their careers as civil servants, judges, university professors, police and Bundeswehr officers, even as politicians.
• In the late 60s, the dissatisfaction of younger generations with their elders boiled over in the form of student rebellion
• general political awakening across society 
• Beginning of an uncompromised critical analysis of Germany’s National-Socialist past. The Holocaust becomes a thematic focus in public and academic discussions, also in school curricula
• Generational conflict: radical rift between the generations is opening up; a culture of unmitigated protest defines the younger generation in their moral rebellion against the generation of their parents, accusing them of having born the evils of fascism in the past, and still bearing fascistic and authoritarian structures in the present society.

Legal Response to the Holocaust:

•  Guilt can be moral or legal
• the law is theoretically based on moral principles  
• Prosecuting war criminals was a legal problem because the crimes they committed weren't against the law at the time 
• retroactive jurisdiction - when a law is created in order to prosecute a crime which was not illegal when it was committed
•  The Frankfurter Auschwitzprozesse (1963-68) were the first attempt by Federal Germany to deal with legal guilt for the holocaust
• A Jewish judge from Hessen, Fritz Bauer (an exile during the war) was given jurisdiction for Auschwitz and made the trials happen despite facing much resistance

The Story:

• Told in three parts
•  I - the love story between the narrator, Michael, then 15 and Hanna, then in her 30s
• this relationship is morally questionable because of the age difference
• it represents an abuse of power, because her advanced age gives her a psychological advantage but there is a mutual dependency
• a crime is committed so the question of legal and moral guilt is raised from the beginning
• II - the trial of Hanna, who stands accused of the murder of several hundred Jewish women for her part as a prison guard in Auschwitz
• this raises the question of guilt within the holocaust
•  Michael's perspective (as a law student taking part in a an academic project to do with the trials) the defines the experience of the reader
• III - supplement to the plot of the first two parts 
• Hanna is imprisoned and their relationship continues in the form of the tapes in which he reads to her
• Hanna is ultimately released but commits suicide without leaving prison
• the effect which their relationship had on the rest of his life becomes evident

Characters: 

•  Michael - the narrator 
• two different perspectives from him - the child and the adult narrator
• a degree of difference exists between them, but the narrator is clearly influenced by his experiences as a child
• e.g. he can never quite shake his feelings for Hanna
• Hanna - the perpetrator and in some ways, the protagonist
• a prison guard at Auschwitz, later Michael's lover 
• conceals her illiteracy
• does she accept the harsh sentence handed down to her because she's ashamed of her illiteracy or because she's aware of her own guilt and feels she deserves it?
• does her illiteracy relativise her guilt? 
• is she guilty of abusing Michael as a boy?
• With their age difference, they represent the two sides of the generational conflict - the 68ers vs the war generation  
• Michael's perception of the guilt question is affected by his relationship with Hanna

Key Moments: 

•  p.15/16 - Michael's first glimpse of Hanna and his sexual awakening - did she leave the door open on purpose so that he would see her undressing?
• he blushes when she sees him - shame 
• "Ich wurde rot. Einen kurzen Augenblick stand ich mit brennendem Gesicht. Dann hielt ich es nicht mehr aus"
• she does seem conscious of the dynamic between them 
• her in power, him fascinated by her
• Michael becomes aware of sexuality and its interplay with power and is initially overwhelmed
• If Hanna is aware of this power dynamic then this relationship is abusive
• the look she gives him - he doesn't know whether it's "wissend" or "verwundert" 
• too ambiguous to be sure 
• however the narrator never fully passes judgement, even though he does have issues with creating lasting relationships once he discovers she was a war criminal 
• p.20-22 - the first moral reflections of the teenage Michael  
• he feels guilty about his sexual fantasies because he knows the moral figures in his life (parents, older sister, priest), whom he has always trusted, would disapprove
• "Ich wachte jeden Morgen mit schlechtem Gewissen auf"
• he makes moral arguments as to why he should go to see Hanna again 
• if he's damned anyway for having sinful thoughts, he might as well do the sinful deed as well  
• he rationalises that if he went to Hanna, nothing would actually happen, which would banish the sinful thoughts
• the adult narrator here discusses a pattern of behaviour which he has noticed in himself 
• that his conscious reasoning seems to have no decision making power and it is always this mysterious 'es' which drives him to act
• this relates to the Freudian model of the human psyche - id (es), ego (ich), superego (überich)
• the es, not the ich, is the agent
• the ego must achieve balance between the demands of the id (libido powered) and the superego (the authorities of social life, e.g. religion, parents etc) 
• the id is raw energy, which can be creative or destructive 
• it must be transformed with the help of the superego into some socially acceptable impulse 
• this is known as sublimation 
• the actions of the young boy can be explained by this Freudian analysis - the superego cannot overwhelm the force of the id 
• therefore in 15 year old Michael's case, there is no question of guilt for his relationship with Hanna
• p.26 - He undresses to have a bath at Hanna's and turns to find her looking at him 
• his reaction: "Ich wurde rot" - their relationship from the beginning is founded on guilt and shame
•  p27 - when she propositions him, he is not able to give proper consent
• Ich wußte nicht, was ich sagen sollte. Nicht ja, aber auch nicht nein"
•  p28 - the narrator hints that his experience with Hanna affected him permanently 
• Bis heute stellt sich nach einer Nacht mit einer Frau das Gefühl ein, ich sei verwöhnt worden
• p.38 - the adult Michael is sad when he reflects on his time with Hanna, even though he was very happy at the time
• however at that point, he could not see the negative effect that his relationship with Hanna would have on the rest of his life
• the sadness comes from her betrayal - she was not who he thought she was 
• he is troubled by her guilt - he was not aware of it when he fell in love with her, however he continues to have feelings for her after he discovered it 
• this leads to shame
• p.40 - the account of Hanna's past is instantly suspicious because women did not become soldiers
• she was a German speaker from Romania, i.e. ethnically German but not from Germany
• it's clear she has something to hide from this passage 
• "es war, als krame sie, was sie mir antwortete, aus einer verstaubten Truhe hervor"  
• Hanna has tried to forget about the past
• p.42-44 - Michael's happiness in their relationship is acknowledged by the narrator
• the act of reading strengthens their relationship and shifts the balance of power
• he becomes the dominant one because he can offer something she can't
• however he is unaware of this, so the imbalance remains
• p.48 - their first fight, when Michael goes to see her on the tram
• "Hatte sie vielleicht recht, nicht objektiv, aber subjektiv" 
• raises the notion of relativised guilt, the possibility that right and wrong aren't black and white
•  Michael takes the blame even though he doesn't understand why which becomes a trend
• "Wenn sie drohte, habe ich sofort bedingungslos kapituliert. Ich habe alles auf mich genommen."  
• a clear power imbalance, and perhaps explains his later shame - if he was already used to taking the blame for her, it makes sense that he would continue to do so
• p.54 - Hanna's reaction to Michael going out and leaving a note shows her insecurity
• the fact that she strikes him shows the flaws in their relationship
• p.57 - the poem Michael writes - a description of how they merge when they make love 
• wenn wir vergehen du mir in und dir in ich 
• a description of the dissolution of subjectivity via intimacy
• p.72 - Michael feels that he has betrayed Hanna by being unable to integrate her into his life 
• he is in fact not guilty - the relationship is inappropriate and he shouldn't have to feel that way however he feels it anyway 
• "Dann habe ich begonnen, sie zu verraten"
• p.87-88
• the students accuse their parents' generation of having tolerated perpetrators in their society since the war
• they sentence the previous generations to shame 
• Wir alle verurteiltenunsere Eltern zu Scham, und wenn wir sie nur anklagen konnten, die Täter nach 1945 bei sich, unter sich geduldet zu haben
• the students are ready to begin the 'Aufarbeitung' process - coming to terms with the past 
• they feel an ethical imperative to determine the guilt of those gone before and they are proud of this 
•  p. 96 - Michael begins to experience a numbness which continues for some time 
• an inability to confront his feelings 
• "war mein Gefühl wie betäubt."
• this numbness spreads to every other area of his life
•  the numbness is also experienced by the other people involved in the proceedings - the horror gradually wears them down and becomes part of the routine
• the narrator compares the experience to being in a death camp, having gotten used to the routine
• "wie der KZ-Häftling, der Monat um Monat überlebt und sich gewöhnt hat"
•  the trauma symptoms exhibited by survivors taken on by others in the court as they become witnesses to this trauma
• the perpetrators also experienced this numbness and seemed to still be affected by it
• p.99 - a reflection on how the 2nd generation after the war should deal with it
• Michael's enthusiasm at the beginning of the seminar dampened, as he realised the guilt would be attributed to some few and their generation would ultimately end up living in silence caused by revulsion, shame and guilt
• p.105 - Hanna wants justice in the courtroom 
• ironic, given her participation in previous injustices
• p112 - the story about Hanna having favourites who used to read to her 
• alarmingly reminiscent about her behaviour with Michael
• was she just repeating old patterns in their relationship? Finding someone weaker than her, a relationship where she was in power so that she could be read to without having her weakness questioned?
• p112 - in the courtroom, Hanna looks directly into Michael's eyes, in a moment very similar to the early scene where he saw her undressing
• just as she did then, she knew he'd been watching all along
• this time, a very different kind of nakedness is revealed
• Michael has seen her in her moral vulnerability 
• when she sees him, he blushes - a reaction related to shame 
• "als ich unter ihrem Blick rot wurde"
  
• he  feels ashamed on her behalf because he's a war criminal and he loved her - therefore her shame is his shame
• p.113 - Michael attempting to relativise her guilt 
• comes up with a reason for her picking favourites which paints her in a favourable light
• is this the truth or is it just what he wants to believe?
• p.123 - Hanna explains why they didn't open the church
• relativism - presents an almost sympathetic POV of the perpetrators - they were in a difficult situation and no one knew what to do 
• "So konnte man, aber man wollte sich nicht vorstellen, was Hanna beschrieb."
•  not willing to see things from Hanna's POV because there's something basic missing - the shame, the guilt - the compassion for others
• p124 - Hanna incriminates herself to avoid revealing her illiteracy
• p127 - Michael's epiphany - Hanna was motivated by shame 
• the shame lead to the action which lead to the guilt
• p.129 - Michael's feeling of guilt about their relationship goes from
• p151 - Michael can't understand Hanna while condemning her crime and vice versa 
• 2 impossible urges which he can't integrate 
• p154 - Michael speaks to the judge - tells himself he wants to prevent miscarriage of justice but he actually enables it
• p160 - the numbness Michael is experiencing becomes a physical sensation - he actually becomes sick because of it - trauma symptom
• p161 - shame over the Nazi past and its lingering presence in German society 
• "Kollektivschuld – für meine Studentengeneration war sie eine erlebte Realität"
• assigning blame alleviated some of the suffering caused by shame 
• p.162 - Michael can't point a finger at anyone else because he shares the shame of the war generation because he loved Hanna 
• he loved someone from that generation which is different from the parent-child relationship because you can't choose your parents
• he has a unique perspective, somewhere between both generations
• p.169 - Hanna's lingering influence on all his subsequent relationships
• p172 - Michael takes refuge in legal history research 
• where he is not obliged to sit in judgement of or to advocate for or prosecute any living person
• p182 -  Michael doesn't want Hanna in his life 
• he denies the responsibility for her born of shame
• p187 - Michael meets Hanna in prison
• Hanna's idea of justice - only the dead can hold her to account
• the power balance has shifted in their relationship 
• he has all the control now
• "Ich hatte Hanna eine kleine Nische zugebilligt, durchaus eine Nische, die mir wichtig war, die mir etwas gab und für die ich etwas tat, aber keinen Platz in meinem Leben."
• he decides how much of himself to give to her now 
• unlike the past when she made that decision and he desperately threw all of himself at her
• p196 - Hanna in prison
• she lived out the sentence like a penance
• when she got too comfortable she punished herself, gave up on self care so as to lose the respect of others 
• sought out literature on the holocaust and read it, informed herself
• p201 - Hanna wanted to give her time in prison meaning 
• but seeking meaning in the holocaust experience is supposed to be impossible
• is her gesture of atonement meaningless?
• p205 - Michael haunted by the same questions of guilt and responsibility for years after
• did he betray Hanna?
• was he guilty for having loved her?
• was he responsible for her death? 
• however these eventually fade and he becomes accepting of the path his life took
• p.206 - Michael displays trauma symptoms - he is neither able to remember Hanna nor forget her 
• he shares the trauma through the intimacy and shame which he shares with a witness (and perpetrator) of the holocaust
• however unlike the victims, he is able to overcome this trauma to reflect on the experience and write about it

 Schuld vs Scham: 

• Schuld is legal and moral - it applies to individuals and must be clearly defined - objectifiable
• therefore collective guilt is very hard to apply - it tars the innocent with a guilt they do not deserve and allows the guilty to share their burden
• collective guilt does not serve justice - it is not democratically ethical
• guilt must assigned to an individual agent
• Scham is purely ethical and intersubjective (i.e. shared by more than one conscious mind)
• goes beyond legal process and individual agency
• a subjective feeling
• there is no objective reason for feeling shame - it connects people as subjects without an objective link 
• we can feel ashamed of/for someone else, even if we do not share their guilt 
• shame has a moral quality because it has the power to connect people - to make us feel responsible for actions of others
• blushing is a symptom of shame, hence Michael's reaction to being seen by Hanna
• shame occurs when intimacy transcends subjectivity
• Subjectivity: 
• Something being a subject, narrowly meaning an individual who possesses conscious experiences, such as perspectives, feelings, beliefs, and desires.^[1]
• Something being a subject, broadly meaning an entity that has agency, meaning that it acts upon or wields power over some other entity (an object).
• In the early years, the war generation, when asked by their children, what have you been, what have you done, as children often ask, Hanna's generation did not respond with shame or guilt but rather secrecy
• Michael's sense of responsibility for Hanna stems from shame - he loves her, they have been intimate
• Aufarbeitung and Aufklärung - the processes by which the past of Germany is explored and guilt and shame are determined

Interpretation: 

• Hanna's guilt
• Her relationship with Michael - an abusive power structure 
• Her actions during the war and part in the holocaust - allowed the deaths of 100s of people - no matter what the excuse, that's unacceptable
• Interfered with the carriage of justice in the trial by not being fully honest
• Hanna's shame 
• her illiteracy - actually causes all her guilt 
•  ultimately overcomes the source of the shame but by then it is too late 
• Does she feel shame for her actions? Her behaviour in the prison suggests yes
• Michael's guilt 
• often feels guilty (e.g. for sexual fantasies, for 'betraying' Hanna) but actually responsible for very little
• is responsible for the miscarriage of justice in Hanna's trial by virtue of not speaking up
• is he guilty for not condemning her?
• central question of the novel 
• I would argue not - he feels shame for her which is far more nuanced
• if no objective reaction is possible to the holocaust than a subjective reaction is the only morally acceptable response
• Michael's shame
• for voyeurism - sexual in her flat as she undresses and moral in the court case 
• both moments where subjectivity is being transcended 
• in the first case Hanna's nudity and the sexual promise, in the second, Hanna's vulnerability as all her secrets are laid bare

Criticism:

• Is it morally wrong to try and get the audience to sympathise with Hanna, a perpetrator?
• Does the book downplay the culpability of the intellectual class in the holocaust?
• Does the book attribute all Hanna's guilt to her illiteracy rather than holding her accountable herself 
• Michael eventually comes to term with the events and is able to relativise and reflect on them. He is able to overcome the trauma, in some ways. Is this really a realistic representation of the holocaust? Is this denying the presence?