„The Passenger“ in Berlin

“The Passenger” (Der Reisende) can now be seen in Berlin. An adaptation of the novel by Dunera Boy Ulrich Boschwitz is being presented by “Kleines Theater” on Südwestkorso. It is directed by Mirko Böttcher, with set and costume design by Flavia Schwedler and compositions by Michael Kessler. Jonas Laux, Silke Buchholz, Matthias Rheinheimer and Michael Rothmann can be seen on stage.

In his novel “The Passenger”, Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz tells the story of the Jewish merchant Silbermann, who is cheated out of his share in the company by his German business partner. Robbed of his livelihood, he spends his life on railroad trains and observing people and events at train stations.

“The fact is that I have already emigrated… to the Deutsche Reichsbahn. I am no longer in Germany. I’m in trains that run through Germany.”
(Otto Silbermann)

Boschwitz wrote under the impression of the persecution of Jews in his hometown of Berlin and the pogrom on 8th and 9th November 1938.

While Ulrich Boschwitz was working on the manuscript of his first book “Menschen neben dem Leben” (People beside lives), the son of a Jewish merchant was himself on the run with his Protestant mother – in contrast to the inner escape of his tragic hero Silbermann went to Sweden in 1935, where the book was first published under the pseudonym Johne Grane. “The Passenger” was published in 1937 in the UK under the title ‘The Man who took the Trains’.

Boschwitz’s escape continued via France to England. There, mother and son were interned as “enemy aliens” in 1940. While Marta Boschwitz was behind bars on the Isle of Man, her son was deported to Australia on the scandal ship “Dunera”. There he remained behind barbed wire first in the Hay camp (New South Wales), the in Tatura (Victoria). In August 1942, he was given the opportunity to return to England. However, the passenger ship “Abosso” was sunk by the German submarine U575 on October 29, 1942, shortly before the port of destination Liverpool and near the Azores. Of the 392 passengers and sailors, only 31 survived, including one of the 44 internees on board.

Ulrich and Marta Boschwitz are commemorated by stumbling stones in front of the house at Hohenzollerndamm 81 in Berlin-Wilmersdorf.

Berlin publisher Peter Graf rediscovered the forgotten writer and published both of Boschwitz’s novels in German for the first time in 2018/2019.

A first theatrical adaptation of the material as a one-person play was shown in Stuttgart in June 2024.

UIlrich A. Boschwitz. Source: Leo Baeck Institute DTLPID 2267158.

Scene photo. Source: Kleines Theater.

Further information about the play and the performance dates online at Kleines Theater (German).

(Right: Cover of the Swedish first edition of “Menschen neben dem Leben”.)