Book

The Reader

by Bernhard Schlink · first published 1995

The Reader (German: Der Vorleser) is a novel by German law professor and judge Bernhard Schlink, published in 1995. The story is a parable dealing with the difficulties post-war German generations have had comprehending the Holocaust; Ruth Franklin writes that it was aimed specifically at the generation Bertolt Brecht called the Nachgeborenen (those who came after). Like other novels in the genre of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (the struggle to come to terms with the past), The Reader explores how the post-war generations should approach the generation that took part in, or witnessed, the atrocities. These are the questions at the heart of Holocaust literature in the late 20th and early 21st century, as the victims and witnesses died and living memory was fading.

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