《朗讀者》是德國法律教授和法官本哈德·施林克於1995年撰寫的長篇小說。作品1995年在德國出版，1997年由卡露·布朗·珍妮維翻譯的英語版本於美國發行。《朗讀者》講述男孩米夏和女人漢娜之間充滿激情的忘年戀，而故事的深層含義則是近代德國人對於歷史、暴行與原罪的自我鞭笞式的反思。
朗讀者The Reader
CHAPTER TWELVE
A LL THIS happened ten years ago. In the first few years after Hanna’s death, I was tormented by the old questions of whether I had denied and betrayed her, whether I owed her something, whether I was guilty for having loved her. Sometimes I asked myself if I was responsible for her death. And sometimes I was in a rage at her and at what she had done to me. Until finally the rage faded and the questions ceased to matter. Whatever I had done or not done, whatever she had done or not to me—it was the path my life had taken.
Soon after her death, I decided to write the story of me and Hanna. Since then I’ve done it many times in my head, each time a little differently, each time with new images, and new strands of action and thought. Thus there are many different stories in addition to the one I have written. The guarantee that the written one is the right one lies in the fact that I wrote it and not the other versions. The written version wanted to be written, the many others did not.
At first I wanted to write our story in order to be free of it. But the memories wouldn’t come back for that. Then I realized our story was slipping away from me and I wanted to recapture it by writing, but that didn’t coax up the memories either. For the last few years I’ve left our story alone. I’ve made peace with it. And it came back, detail by detail and in such a fully rounded fashion, with its own direction and its own sense of completion, that it no longer makes me sad. What a sad story, I thought for so long. Not that I now think it was happy. But I think it is true, and thus the question of whether it is sad or happy has no meaning whatever.
At any rate, that’s what I think when I just happen to think about it. But if something hurts me, the hurts I suffered back then come back to me, and when I feel guilty, the feelings of guilt return; if I yearn for something today, or feel homesick, I feel the yearnings and homesickness from back then. The tectonic layers of our lives rest so tightly one on top of the other that we always come up against earlier events in later ones, not as matter that has been fully formed and pushed aside, but absolutely present and alive. I understand this. Nevertheless, I sometimes find it hard to bear. Maybe I did write our story to be free of it, even if I never can be.
As soon as I returned from New York, I donated Hanna’s money in her name to the Jewish League Against Illiteracy. I received a short, computer-generated letter in which the Jewish League thanked Ms. Hanna Schmitz for her donation. With the letter in my pocket, I drove to the cemetery, to Hanna’s grave. It was the first and only time I stood there.
第12節
轉眼間，這一切都成了十年前的事情了。在漢娜死後最初的幾年裏，那些老問題一直在折磨困擾着我，諸如，我是否拒絕和背叛了她，我是否仍欠她什麼，我是否有罪——因爲我曾經愛過她，我是否必須要宣佈與她脫離關係或者把她擺脫掉。有時候我捫心自問，我是否要對她的死負責，有時候我對她十分氣憤，氣憤她對我的傷害，直到那氣憤變得軟弱無力爲止，那些問題變得不重要爲止。我做過什麼和沒做過什麼，她對我有過什麼傷害——這些恰恰成了我的生活。
漢娜死後不久，我就下決心要把我和漢娜的故事寫出來。從那時以來，我已經在腦子裏把我們的故事寫過多次了，每次總有點不一樣，總是有新的形象、新的情節和新的構思。這樣一來，除了我寫出來的版本外還有許多其他版本。有保障的是寫出來的版本是正確的版本，原因在於它是我寫出來的，而其他版本我沒有寫出來。已經寫出來的版本是它自己想被寫出來，其他許多版本不想被寫出來。
起初，我想把我們的故事寫出來的目的是爲了擺脫她，但是，我的記憶不是爲這個目的而存在的。隨後我注意到，我們的故事是怎樣地從我的記憶中悄悄地消失。於是，我想通過寫作把我的記憶尋找回來。但是，就是寫作也沒有把記憶誘發出來。幾年來，我一直沒有云觸捫及我們的故事，我們相安無事。這樣一來，它反而回來了，一個細節接着一個細節，以一種完整的、一致的和正確的方式回來了，使我對此不再傷心。一個多麼讓人傷心的故事：我過去常這樣想。這並不是說我現在認爲它是幸福的。但是，我認爲它是屬實的。在這個前提下，它是傷心的還是幸福的`問題就不重要了。
當我想起它時，無論如何我總是想這些。當我覺得受到了傷害時，過去受到傷害的感覺就又重現出來;當我覺得我對某事應負責任時，就會想起當時的那種負罪感;如果我如今渴望得到什麼，或懷念家鄉，那麼我就會感覺出當時的那種渴望和懷鄉情。我們的生活一環套一環，後一環總是離不開前一環，已經過去的沒有結束，而是活現在現實中。這些我懂。儘管如此，我有時對此還是感到難以承受。也許我把我們的故事寫出來的目的還是爲了擺脫它，儘管我無法達到這個目的。
從紐約一回來，我就把漢娜的錢以她的名義匯給了"猶太反盲聯盟"。我收到了一封用電腦寫的短信，在信中，"猶太反盲聯盟"對漢娜·史密芝女士的捐贈表示了感謝。兜裏揣着那封信，我開車去了漢娜的墓地。那是我第一次，也是唯一的一次站在她的墓前。
