394
PARTISAN REVIEW
dream come true: the thousand-year-old hope which had become Israel, a
home to yesterday's refugees. Surely only a very few members of the audi–
ence recognized in this didactic Hollywood cliche the very same solution
that social realism had once offered for all artistic and not only artistic
dilemmas in the Communist world. And just as few, apparently, were those
who felt taken aback by the simple "functionality" of the picturesque
characters, the spectacular improbability of their relations to one another,
and the film's whole ineffably kitschy aura. (Seen from such a perspective,
the hero's long melodramatic final speech to those he's saved reaches far
from enviable heights.) Even fewer of the satisfied consumers who had
partaken of this cheap trick were able to offer resistance to the tri te, moral–
istic message of this conunercial masterpiece by invoking their own
experiences in the concentration camps.
That so few were able to resist guaranteed the fihn's success: a success,
one could perhaps say (and this would not be the only paradox of the real–
ity we live in), that will ensure the memory of the Holocaust for coming
generations, who will have neither their own memories of this tragedy nor
any reason to occupy themselves with it.
The applause in the movie theater, which gave the film's consumers the
agreeable sensation of partici pating briefly in a victory, continued after–
wards at the live ceremony in which the director, smiling among the
spotlights, received his Oscar-a scene that would have deserved to be
spliced into the film. In his acceptance speech, the recipient of the award
reminded the audience that there were stiJl a good three hundred thousand
surviving "Holocaust experts," and encouraged schools, nursing homes,
and cultural institutions to use them and popularize their sufferings.
Needless to say, I was more horrified than flattered by my sudden promo–
tion to the "endangered experts" category.
Subsequently, the award-winning director initiated the project of a
vast Holocaust Archive, a laudable endeavor that well befits our time. The
film's therapeutic and profitable happy ending made possible a new, phil–
anthropic phase in our day-to-day lives, a charitable result that will, of
course, in turn receive deserved applause-even in Germany. The Spielberg
Archive, we are told, might even serve as a welcome substitute for the con–
troversial Holocaust Memorial in Berlin. A good solution, many say.
Is this a good way of diverting the "moral cudgel" that has been
repeatedly raised against Germany and the Germans in the trivial mass
media of which Martin Walser spoke? Is this an alternative
to
the "monu–
mentalizing of German shame" which Walser, perhaps rightly, so fears?
Although I understand why Walser is fed up with the media 's primi–
tive representations of the Holocaust and German guilt, it would be
difficult for me not to distance myself from his position on several counts.
