It has been reported that US immigration agents have seized an 89-year-old man who is suspected of Nazi War crimes. John Demjanjuk was seized at his home in Ohio and is accused of being an accessory to the deaths of some 29,000 people in Nazi-occupied Poland in World War II.
When I read this report I thought of the recent book and film The Reader. The film is an examination of generational guilt in the aftermath of the holocaust. Kate Winslet plays an ex-nazi guard on trial for war crimes, who previously had a haunting affair with a young German boy. Having seen the film (and now reading the book) I wanted to put down some thoughts on the film’s treatment of the subject of generational guilt, particularly now that a real life case of a Nazi trial has hit the headlines.
When seeing The Reader I was unsure about the ethics of using the holocaust as the backdrop for a scandalous relationship between a young boy and a woman. I have seen the subject of the holocaust dragged through various Art forms, the worst case was when I visited Madrid last year; the local Theatre was showing “Anne Frank: The Musical.” I wanted to give the show a chance to redeem itself of the apparent bad taste, so I bought tickets.
The redemption didn’t happen; Anne Frank was grinning like a Cheshire Cat through most of the scenes and I wanted to walk out when she danced at a Nazi Ball in a dream sequence. I concluded then that any sort of appearance to profit from the holocaust, be it financial or for creative or intellectual credit, is abhorrent on every level.
The film The Reader does briefly address the issue of the relationship born between the Arts and the holocaust. A character, who is a holocaust survivor, tells the protagonist “do not look to the [death] camps for catharsis. Go to the Theatre. But not the Camps, there is nothing there.” (this is a quote from memory, so not exact).
When we constantly relive the awful reality of the holocaust through various Art forms we lose a little of that sense of reality of what really happened. The holocaust is not some distant history that can be retold mythically; it happened just a few hundred miles from where I live and at a time when my living grandparents were the same age as me. Having visited Auschwitz in Poland with my school, I know that the reality of history can never be truly expressed through Art forms.
The Reader does not seek to portray the holocaust; it focuses sharply on the story of the two characters in the relationship, this saves it from the criticism of exploiting history.
One criticism, however, was that I found the film appeared to be split into two threads of narrative: first the scandalous relationship, and second the story of the woman’s horrific past as a Nazi guard.
But reading about the current real life case of John Demjanjuk, I can begin to see that this is the nature of generational guilt. The guilt of the holocaust is at odds with everyday living; a conflict between moving forward, living our lives, yet at the same time trying to remember past horrors and to save ourselves from patterns of hate repeating. Similarly, the film shows two narratives at odds with each other, like two stories welded together.
When the war ended, many Germans took off their uniforms and went home and within five years the world wanted to start to move on from the horrors of the Second World War.
The process of coming to terms culturally with the holocaust is still in motion. It is as though we are now stepping out of the glare of the two worst wars humanity has ever experienced and we are blinking, trying to see where it has left us. Many of our current conflicts are as a direct or indirect cause of the 20th century world wars, there is a ripple effect still moving back and fourth across the globe.
No doubt my views on this subject will change and develop with time.
The image above is the Holocaust Memorial in Budapest entitled 'Shoes on the Danube'. The memorial is to the people who fell victim to the Arrow Cross militiamen in Budapest and depicts their shoes left behind on the bank when they fell into the river after having been shot during World War II. Flickr image from Neil Hooting's photostream.
I wanted to share a piece of good news: I got a mention on the blog of Antony Gormley's Fourth Plinth Art Project, called One & Other, in Trafalgar Square! Take a look here.
