Memory in The Reader

Today, I want to talk about memory and the issue of memory in The Reader. As far as I can tell, The Reader is a novel composed entirely of memory. There is no present, no future.

Michael himself is concerned with the issues of memory and hindsight. He asks:

"Why? Why does what was beautiful suddenly shatter in hindsight because it concealed dark truths?" (37)

Allow me now a digression:

When I was four (or maybe it was five), I lived in Korea. One family vacation was spent at a ski resort; there are still photographs of our trip there hanging on the walls of my parents' home. One picture is of my sister and me bundled up in ski jackets sitting on what must be the flattest part of the ski resort. My sister is smiling at the camera; I am staring off somewhere to the right of whomever is taking the picture.

I am not a skier. This is in part due to a horribly terrifying experience during that ski trip: I am sitting on the ski slopes by my wee lonesome self (playing with the snow, one must assume), when I begin sliding backwards slowly but uncontrollably. I am sliding towards a large, gaping dark hole, a chasm that yawns behind me. I call out to my mother for help. No one comes to save me.

After that incident, I harbored deep-seated anger at my mother—anger at her for abandoning me in my time of great need. I had never felt so alone, so helpless, so terrified. When I needed her most, she hadn't been there. For about 13 years, I blamed her for her neglect.

By now, you must have a number of questions: 1) What is a dark, yawning hole doing on a ski slope? 2) How does one slide spontaneously on a flat piece of land? 3) Who leaves a four year old child by herself at a ski resort?

The answers to your questions lie in the fact that this memory is a lie. This whole incident never happened. I must have imagined it, maybe dreamt it.

And yet, my anger as a result of this memory was real. 13 years of anger all for a figment of my imagination.

Honestly, finally learning about the truth was difficult. If memory is so easily counterfeited, how could I trust myself and my perception of reality? How could I trust my perception of myself?

In Karl's post on memory, he points out how identity and memory are inextricably linked. Our memories shape our decisions, thoughts, and emotions. Yet, apparently, our identity is built on a foundation of sand. According to a study conducted at Northwestern University, every time you recall a memory, your brain alters it. What ends up happening is that the brain remembers the experience of the memory as the original. The implication? The more you remember something, the further away from reality it becomes. Ironically, this means that your most treasured memories, the ones you go always go back to, are more fabrications that reality.

“Your memory of an event can grow less precise even to the point of being totally false with each retrieval.” 

 Donna Bridge, lead author of the paper being published in the journal Neuroscience 

In Michael's case, Hanna clearly is a memory he returns to obsessively—yet this means that his memories of Hanna are necessarily distorted. How much of the narrative can we trust?