Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz

Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, pseudonym John Grane (April 19, 1915, Berlin – October 29, 1942, North Atlantic), was a German author.

Life

Boschwitz was the son of Salomon ‘Sally’ Boschwitz and Martha Ella, née Wolgast. Salomon was a wealthy Jewish factory owner who had converted to Christianity, in 1911, when he married Martha. Martha was descended from a prominent Lübeck

In 1935, Boschwitz’s uncle, the lawyer Alexander Wolgast, was murdered in the street after criticizing the Nazi’s anti-semitic Nuremberg Laws. The same year, Boschwitz received draft orders to join the Wehrmacht. Shortly thereafter, Boschwitz and his mother fled Germany for Norway; his sister, Clarissa, had already left Germany, in 1933, for Palestine, where she would live the rest of her life.^[2]

In Norway, Boschwitz wrote his first novel, Menschen neben dem Leben (‘People Alongside Life’), which was first published in Swedish, under the pseudonym John Grane, as Människor utanför, in 1937. From Sweden, he and his mother moved to Luxembourg, France, and Belgium, before ending in Britain in 1939. In either Belgium or Luxembourg, in response to the horrors of Kristallnacht, he wrote Der Reisende (which was published in English as ‘The Man Who Took Trains’ (1939) in the United States and ‘The Fugitive’ (1940) in the United Kingdom). The book failed to make an impact after it was originally published and was out of print shortly thereafter. However, in the 2010s the book was rediscovered and re-released as "The Passenger".^[3][4] The revised and re-released edition was a massive success, being translated into over 20 languages and entering The Sunday Times top ten list of best selling hardbacks more than 80 years after it was originally published.^[3]

When WWII broke out, Boschwitz and his mother were arrested by the British, classified as ‘enemy aliens’, and interned on the Isle of Man. In July 1940, Boschwitz was deported to Australia, where he was interned at a camp in New South Wales. On the voyage there, on the HMT Dunera, a crew member threw the only draft of his latest work, Das Grosse Fressen (‘The Big Feast’), into the ocean.^[4]

In Australia, Boschwitz worked on revising a second edition of Der Reisende and began a new novel, Traumtage (‘Dream Days’). In 1942, he was freed and allowed to return to Britain. On 29 October, the vessel he was on, MV Abosso, was torpedoed and sank by the German submarine U-575. Boschwitz, aged 27, was one of the 362 people onboard who died. His last works died with him.^[4]

Literary works

Posthumously, following the 2021 re-publication of Der Reisende, Boschwitz has been compared favourably to John Buchan, Franz Kafka,^[5] Thomas Mann, Heinrich Böll, and Hans Fallada.^[4]

His first novel, Menschen neben dem Leben (People Parallel to Life), recounts the lives of a variety of characters living through the post-First World War economic crisis in Germany. The novel was first published in a Swedish translation in 1937.

His second novel, Der Reisende, is set in Nazi Germany in November 1938 immediately after

Ulrich Boschwitz Collection, AR 25553, at the Leo Baeck Institute New York.

References