Why a Booktrail?
1900s: A disillusioned German soldier, is travelling on a troop train to the Eastern Front
The Train Was on Time
What you need to know before your trail
Twenty-four-year-old Andreas, a disillusioned German soldier, is travelling on a troop train to the Eastern Front when he has an awful premonition that he will die in exactly five days. As he hurtles towards his death, he reflects on the chaos around him – the naïve soldiers, the painfully thin girl who pours his coffee, the ruined countryside – with sudden, heart-breaking poignancy. Arriving in Poland the night before he is certain he will die, he meets Olina, a beautiful prostitute, and together they attempt to escape his fate…
Travel Guide
Travel on the train BookTrail style from Germany to the Eastern Front
Most of this book takes place on a moving train so locations are vague and fleeting. Private Andreas journeys on a troop train across the German countryside to the battle on the Eastern front. Trapped, he knows that Hitler has already lost the war … yet he is suddenly galvanised by the thought that he is on the way to his death.
Things which will soon become memories float past the window- the cities, the girl-volunteers serving coffee at the stations, the German sky, the air of the countryside.,,,is this the last time he will see any of these things?
The soldier knows that he is on his way to Przemysl, and then Lviv in a heavily Polish part of the Ukraine. Many Jews and others were victims of the death camp at Ukwhich had been established in 1941 by the SS in Lviv. The reader understands that this very train journey is the one those people would have taken to their deaths.
Booktrail Boarding Pass: The Train was on Time
Destination: Poland, Ukraine, Europe Author/Guide: Heinrich Boll Departure Time: 1900s
Back to ResultsWhere Next?
