The Reader

I have to admit, I had no idea what this book was about before I started reading it. I read it because it was on a list of great novels, and because the movie was on a list of great movies. I am SO glad I read it. It's a truly moving novel.

While on the surface this is the story of a young man who reads to, and falls in love with, a mysterious older woman, it is so much more than that. It is a story of forgiveness, and redemption, and deception, and a number of other moral issues. And I am not sure that the characters - or those of us who read the book - ever come to any real kind of resolution.

In a larger way, it is about how an entire country, an entire population, is able to - chooses to - move forward following a nationwide atrocity. It is in a way specifically about how the German people dealt, or didn't deal, with the shame of the Holocaust - and even how some of them didn't feel any shame. For such a simply and beautifully written short novel, it packs a lot of punch.

I've put the movie on my Netflix, at the top. I'm not sure how much I'm looking forward to seeing it, but I really want to see it. Does that make sense?

The Reader