Author: Maria Chzhen
Date: 23 June 2020
The Reader, or Der Vorleser in German, is the kind of book that can keep you hooked until the last page, until the last word. The book was written by Bernhard Schlink in 1997. Although it has 200 pages, you can read it in less than 2 hours without getting tired. As you can remember, I did a review about the movie version of The Reader (press to read) with Kate Winslet in it.
The events of the book are not much different from the plot of the movie. The setting takes place in the 1960s. A 15-year-old boy called Michael Berg meets and starts an affair with a 36-year-old woman Hanna Schmitz. They have this affair for quite a long time - many months before Hanna disappears. Hanna worked as a conductor on a bus, and Michael was a student. On many accounts, this relationship was not right. Michael and Hanna could not possibly love each other - the society does not accept it for obvious reasons. But there they were until Hanna left Michael and the city.
The next time Michael sees her happens in court. He has a seminar about war criminals while studying law. For gaining experience, their group went to court to see how the actual process went. That is where Michael saw Hanna as one of the convicted people - the guards. She was said to have written a report on a church that went on fire and killed 300 Jewish prisoners. Hanna went to prison for life because of this event.
Michael was devastated. Especially after he understood that Hanna was not guilty. She could not read nor write! She could not be in charge of that case. Michael had a chance to speak up, which he didn't use. That let Hanna down because if he spoke, she would face a lot less time in prison. Not only did Michael ruin life for Hanna, but Michael also drained his own life! Never did he find comfort in anything.
Eight years into Hanna's incarceration, Michael started sending her packages of tapes and a tape machine. He read books on these recordings. Through his help, Hanna learned to read and, eventually, write. Michael was immensely proud of her but felt too guilty to write back. When Hanna was about to be released with parole after spending 18 years in prison, she and Michael had to meet again, because she had no other friends.
The story is loosely based on one of the female guards in Auschwitz. This book was a straightforward read, meaning that I took almost no time to finish it compared to other books. It got me thinking about the guards from World War Two. I mean, for sure, some guards hated their job, right?
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