Guilt About the Past

April 15, 2010
Based on a series of lectures that Schlink (constitutional law, Humboldt Univ., Berlin; "The Reader") delivered at Oxford University, these six essays grapple with the question of guilt, particularly collective guilt as understood in the aftermath of the Nazi genocides. Schlink brings his knowledge of both law and fiction to bear on this difficult subject. While he writes that guilt is universal and not limited to German history and national consciousness, German guilt permeates his work, although other national histories do figure in his writing, with references to Rwanda, the Stalinist USSR, and South African apartheid. Schlink's essays tackle the complexities of guilt: how the actions of individual perpetrators become another generation's guilt; the connection between past and present; fiction, literature and truth; how individuals live with and overcome past guilt; and the role of law. His legal analysis complements Ian Buruma's "The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan". VERDICT Recommended for readers and researchers interested in the philosophical questions surrounding national atrocities, trauma, collective guilt, reconciliation, and the Nazi genocides.Karen Okamoto, John Jay Coll. of Criminal Justice Lib., New York

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