The Reader (1995)

I enjoyed this story but I am getting a bit tired of coming of age stories. Not sure why I suddenly seemed to be reading them it was definately not intentional. Well written. ( )

4.5 stars
Check out my Book Movie Review of the Reader here! ( )

Boy reads for ill estate woman who works at train station. Her attempt to cover up her illiteracy lands her in trouble with authorities. Second World War. ( )

In 1958, Michael Berg is a middle-class, 15-year-old living in West Germany. As he is recovering from a prolonged illness, he meets a 38-year-old working-class woman, named Hanna Schmitz. Hanna quickly seduces Michael, and the two characters begin a relationship that lasts for several months. Michael begins regularly to visit Hanna at her apartment where they have sex. Hanna mentally dominates Michael and controls the relationship. Michael falls in love with Hanna, but the emotional attachment is not reciprocated. Upon Hanna's request Michael begins to read aloud to her on each of his visits. When Michael is not having sex with Hanna he attends school, develops friendships and infatuations, and otherwise behaves like a typical teenager. Then one day Hanna simply vanishes, and Michael is left feeling guilty and sickened by the strange end of their relationship.
Many years later after WW 2, Hanna is put on trial for her part as a guard in a Jewish Concentration Camp. She is accused of causing the mass murder of many Jewish women and children who are locked in a church and are burnt to death when the church catches on fire. Why didn’t Hanna let them out? Hanna is blamed for writing the report which caused the massacre. Michael is a law student and attends the trial every day. They do not speak, but it suddenly occurs to him that Hanna can not read or write, which is why she loved being read to. Michael realizes that Hanna is admitting her guilt to a crime she did not commit, but is too embarrassed to admit that she is illiterate. Michael does not tell the judge this. He is there when Hanna is sentenced to life in prison.
Again many years later, Michael, feeling guilty, starts to read again to Hanna while she is in prison by recording himself reading on tape. Just before her release, Hanna commits suicide.
Overall, a love story more than a story of the Holocaust. Quite slow and deep. Would be good for an advanced reader. ( )

In post-war Germany, a chance meeting brings 15-year-old Michael Berg and 34-year-old Hanna Schmitz together and they soon become lovers. About a year into their “passionate, clandestine love affair” Hanna abruptly moves away. Oh, I should mention that between their bedroom trysts Michael reads aloud to Hanna, and this seems rather sweet because ***SPOILER Hanna is illiterate and she takes significant steps to hide this from everyone, including Michael. END SPOILER***

Michael next encounters Hanna when he is a law student observing a Nazi war crime trial and Hanna is one of the defendants. Skip ahead a few years and we find Hanna in prison and Michael divorced and unable to sustain a relationship because no woman can measure up to Hanna and he is still confused about how he is supposed to feel about himself, having loved a war criminal.

I probably would have enjoyed this more if I hadn’t seen the movie and known what was coming. But I did find that because I had already been exposed to the statutory rape relationship I was able to focus more on the story and writing. The writing is spare with barely any superfluous words, making what is there so much more poignant. And the juxtaposition of ages and experiences gives the book more tension than was expressed with words. ( )