Anna Seghers’ novel Überfahrt. Eine Liebesgeschichte [Crossing: A Love Story, 1971] chronicles the life story of Ernst Triebel. Triebel left Germany for Brazil with his mother and father shortly before the so-called “Kristallnacht” (Night of the Long Knives), when the Nazis destroyed many Jewish shops, homes, and synagogues, and organized a brutal pogrom against Jews on 9 November 1938. He returned to East Germany with his father in 1946 where he studied internal medicine, a career that has situated him in the present narrative context of leaving Germany for a conference in Bahia and returning to Rostock by ship.
The title labels the book as a love story, and much of the narrative indeed devotes itself to Triebel’s childhood sweetheart Maria. Triebel relates his history with and affection for Maria, another German in exile who...
933 words
Citation: Boney, Kristy. "Überfahrt: Eine Liebesgeschichte". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 August 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=19322, accessed 09 June 2026.]
