Excuse vs. Explanation in Schlink's The Reader

The struggle which Michael Berg experiences between informing the judge of Hanna’s illiteracy and allowing her to be punished for acts she could not have accomplished on her own, is illustrative of the struggle the generation of Germans born immediately post-World War II had with addressing Germany’s Nazi past. The novel The Reader is not an attempt by Bernhard Schlink to absolve the perpetrator generation of its crimes, but rather is an attempt to provide an explanation for the actions of said generation. A significant amount of the apprehension the younger generation of Germans has in regards to Nazi criminals is reconciling the supposed monstrous nature of their actions with the “ordinary” people many call neighbors. Most accounts of Nazi guards in concentration camps and the actions of factions within the government of the Third Reich, such as the Gestapo, suggest that the people undertaking these activities were not human; the despicable ways in which they carried out their orders seemingly without question made them into monsters not of this world. Given this description Michael, like many of his generation, struggled with how to best make these criminals account for their wartime actions. Schlink is not providing an excuse but rather an explanation. An excuse would imply that such actions are justifiable to society as a whole, while an explanation demonstrates how an individual justifies his or her actions.

With the novel The Reader Schlink explores the deeply controversial and ambiguous question of what makes a person act as he or she does; the answer to such a question it most often more complex than we think as demonstrated by the revelation of Hanna’s illiteracy. Schlink’s story, like the counter-monument movement, presents as idea which is controversial in nature and causes the reader to pause and reflect on his or her own moral values. No he does not seek to excuse Hanna’s actions, but Schlink does wish to provide a more “human” explanation for the actions undertaken by Nazi criminals such as Hanna and in doing so opening a new line of inquiry into the most basic question asked of people who commit such heinous acts: Why?