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Interlude 1-Part 1Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of religious discrimination, gender discrimination, transgender discrimination, transgender discrimination, antigay bias, substance use, cursing, physical abuse, emotional abuse, and death.
Interlude 1 Summary
An unnamed narrator delivers a broadcast announcing a grim reality of the Allied liberation of concentration camps. All prisoners marked with pink triangles and qualifying black triangles are not being freed. Instead, the Allied forces are sending them directly to jail to serve out prison sentences for their “crimes.” The broadcast specifically warns “inverts, transvestites, and lilac people” (xvii) who survived the camps or avoided wartime detection that they are still not safe. The announcement concludes with a message of hope, promising that their community will see a better future after this dark period.
Part 1, Chapter 1 Summary: “Ulm, 1945”
In mid-May 1945, two weeks after the war’s end, Bertie (Berthold Durchdenwald) and his lover, Sofie Hönig, live under the aliases Goss and Ina Baumann on a small farm in Ulm. While reading an old American newspaper, Bertie cuts out an article about a woman who passed as a man, adding it to a collection that fuels his dream of escaping to the American Midwest. His quiet morning is interrupted by a foul smell, which leads him to discover an emaciated young man in a striped camp uniform, unconscious in his asparagus patch. Bertie recognizes the man and carries him into the house. Sofie agrees to help, and when the man awakens, Bertie introduces himself and Sofie as his lover, and reveals he is a “transvestite.” The young man, Karl Fuchs, responds that he is as well. He reveals that he has just fled the Dachau concentration camp. The liberating Allied forces are re-imprisoning prisoners with pink and qualifying black triangles. Realizing the danger, Bertie and Sofie immediately burn Karl’s camp uniform.
Bertie initially tries to give Karl his own clothes, but when they do not fit, he reluctantly enters the preserved bedroom of Gert, someone from his past whose loss still affects him. He retrieves clothes that fit Karl better. As Karl eats, he explains that he fled Dachau when the Allies arrived and has spent about two weeks hiding, wandering, and stealing food as he traveled to Ulm. Bertie brings out an old photo album and anxiously asks whether Karl recognizes several people, particularly Gert Baumann, but Sofie stops him from pressing Karl for answers.
Karl further explains that pink-triangle prisoners were immediately taken away after liberation, while black-triangle prisoners were checked against the surviving Nazi records. He escaped while the Allies were determining whether he qualified for imprisonment. Bertie and Sofie offer to hide Karl in their spare bedroom until they better understand the situation. Because Karl has difficultly passing unnoticed in public, Bertie offers to teach him how to “transvest,” and they agree that Karl must remain hidden for the time being.
Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of their suspicious neighbor, Frau Baer, forcing Karl to hide beneath the table. Frau Baer questions Bertie and Sofie about missing church and the clothing Bertie burned outside, but they manage to send her away without revealing Karl.
Bertie and Sofie explain that they assumed the identities of the couple who previously lived on the farm. Frau Baer is the only nearby person who would have known the real Baumanns. However, they do not understand why she has never exposed them. They then discuss a notice that Frau Baer pointed out that is nailed to their door. The order, issued by the U.S. Army, requires Goss and Ina Baumann to report to the Oberer Kuhberg camp on June 1 for compulsory labor or face imprisonment. Bertie realizes that reporting could expose their true identities and endanger Karl. Unable to remain safely on the farm, he considers a ship leaving Amsterdam for New York in three weeks, but he and Sofie lack the papers they would need to enter the United States.
Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary: “Berlin, 1932”
The narrative flashes back to December 1932 in Berlin. Bertie visits the Eldorado, a popular queer nightclub, for the first time since recovering from surgery. He reunites with his friends Gert Baumann, a carpenter’s assistant; Markus, a photographer; and their companions Gebhardt and Karsten. Gert excitedly announces he has obtained American citizenship, which will make it easier to travel back and forth between Germany and America with his American lover, Roy Collins, while remaining free to stay in either country indefinitely.
During the evening, Bertie works up the courage to speak with Sofie Hönig, a pianist he has long admired, and they feel an immediate connection. Later, a drunken Gert gets on stage and loudly celebrates Bertie’s recent chest surgery. At the crowd’s request, Gert prepares to sing the popular queer anthem “Das Lila Lied.” Sofie agrees to accompany him on the piano, and Gert pulls a reluctant but happy Bertie onto the stage to celebrate with him as the entire club joins in the song.
After the Eldorado closes at the newly imposed ten o’clock curfew, Bertie and Gert walk toward Bertie’s apartment but are stopped by a police officer who questions their appearance and intoxicated behavior. Bertie and Gert produce their “transvestite cards,” which permit them to wear men’s clothing, and the officer allows them to leave while warning them about “brownshirts” (Nazi members of the Sturmabteilung or SA) looking for trouble.
Back at Berie’s apartment, Gert examines Bertie’s surgical scars as he looks forward to undergoing the same chest surgery the following month. The evening also reveals that Bertie and Gert’s close friendship has previously included a sexual relationship, though Gert is now in love with Roy. Bertie shows Gert his album of photographs and American newspaper clippings and talks about his desire to visit America, particularly the Midwest, where many of the stories he has collected are set.
Gert becomes discouraged that he will never be able to legally marry Roy. However, Bertie reassures him that there are other ways to demonstrate love besides marriage. Gert decides he wants a tattoo of Roy Collins’s name as a permanent expression of his commitment, and Bertie drunkenly tattoos the name onto Gert’s back with a needle and ink before falling asleep beside him.
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary: “Berlin, 1932”
The next morning, Bertie and Gert wake up and discover the tattoo is crooked. Gert, dismayed but amused, quickly dresses and rushes off to meet his grandparents, Goss and Ina Baumann. They have traveled from Ulm to visit him in Berlin. Bertie hurries to his first day back at work following his recovery from surgery.
On his way, Bertie buys a copy of Das 3. Geschlecht, a publication for people like himself, before arriving at Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld’s Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute of Sexual Science). Bertie reunites with Hirschfeld and tells him that the identification card he used with the police the previous night was still honored. Because the Institut’s usual tour guide is ill, Hirschfeld asks Bertie to lead tours for visitors. Bertie guides several groups through the Institut, explaining its work, history, medical services, extensive archives, and efforts to educate the public about sexuality and gender.
Around lunchtime, Gert arrives at the institut with Goss and Ina, who want to learn more about the place that has helped their grandson. Bertie offers to give them a private tour after lunch. Goss and Ina express concern about the growing influence of the Nazis and their hostility toward people like Bertie and Gert, as well as Jewish people. Although Bertie points to the Nazis’ declining numbers in the recent election and President Hindenburg’s refusal to appoint Hitler chancellor, Ina warns that conservative political interests could still help Hitler gain power. Gert notes that political changes have already contributed to increased censorship, vice crackdowns, and restrictions on places such as the Eldorado.
Goss and Ina reveal that they want Gert to leave Berlin and return to their farm in Ulm because they believe he would have more warning and time to escape if conditions worse. Gert resists the idea, while Bertie struggles to believe that the threat could become serious enough to force them from their lives in Berlin. The conversation ends with Goss warning Bertie not to dismiss the danger before Bertie suggests they go to lunch.
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary: “Ulm, 1945”
The narrative returns to 1945, with Bertie, Sofie, and Karl discussing the order to report to the labor camp. Knowing this will expose them, they decide they must flee Germany. Bertie proposes a desperate plan: take a ferry from Stuttgart along the Rhine to the North Sea, connect to a ship in Amsterdam bound for New York, and seek help from Gert’s pre-war lover, Roy Collins. However, their plan is uncertain, as they have only heard rumors about the ferry in Stuttgart. Karl also resists the idea, not wanting to endanger Bertie and Sophie, but they insist that he join them posing as Sofie’s nephew.
Bertie begins teaching a resistant Karl how to “transvest,” or pass as a conventional man, to ensure their safety. Karl grows frustrated, arguing that he should not act or dress a certain way to conform to others’ expectations of what a man should look like. When Bertie argues that it is for his own safety, Karl contemplates whether he would rather die. He then reflects on the camps where people died arbitrarily. He wonders why he was able to survive when others were not. When Bertie tries to comfort him by showing his treasured photo album from his life in Berlin, Karl turns pale and stares at a picture of Gert, refusing to say if he recognizes him.
Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary: “Ulm, 1945”
Over the next two days, Karl physically recovers. He spends more time with Bertie, learning how to do things like shave to influence others’ perception of him. Karl asks to borrow Bertie’s photo album again because he enjoys seeing images of people like them happy before the war. Meanwhile, Bertie mails Sofie’s latest letters to her family along with a coded letter he has written to Roy Collins, hoping Roy will understand that they plan to arrive around June 10 and meet them. He goes to town and confirms that a ferry will soon leave Stuttgart and get them to the Amsterdam ship on time.
Bertie returns home and finds a uniformed American officer, Lt. William Ward, interrogating Sofie in their kitchen. Ward is openly hostile, accusing them of being Nazis and demanding to search their homes. A sudden thump from upstairs makes him suspicious. Bertie quickly claims the noise was only their neighbor’s cat, Katze. Ward storms upstairs to investigate but finds the room empty except for the cat. Seeing the rumpled bed, Sofie and Bertie improvise a story: He had criticized her cooking, she first kicked him out of the house, then out of the bed when he returned, and he had been sleeping in the guest room. Ward seems to accept the explanation and leaves, warning them to report for their labor duty.
After Ward is gone, Karl emerges from hiding. He explains that he heard the officer, grabbed the photo album, and escaped through the window. The close call terrifies them, and Bertie declares they have only nine days left to get to Stuttgart and escape.
Interlude 1-Part 1 Analysis
The novel establishes immediate tension through a nonlinear structure that forces readers to experience the past with knowledge of its destruction. Interlude 1 opens with a radio broadcast detailing the re-imprisonment of queer concentration camp survivors and warning those who escaped that “you are still not safe” (xvii). The narrative then moves backward to the vibrant queer culture of Berlin in 1932 before repeatedly returning to the precarious lives of Bertie, Sofie, and Karl in 1945. This arrangement creates dramatic irony, where the reader knows something that the characters do not. When Bertie and Get confidently present their identification cards to a police officer or celebrate openly at the Eldorado, the reader already knows that these limited protections will disappear. Goss and Ina recognize the danger more clearly than Bertie, warning him that political conditions can change despite his confidence that the Nazis are losing influence. The tone of persistent, inescapable danger in the present sharply juxtaposes the scenes of joy at the Eldorado nightclub, creating tension and an air if inevitable despair. The relative freedom of the Weimar era, historically a period of original progress for LGBTQ+ rights in Germany, is presented as a fragile ecosystem. Its destruction introduces The Need to Protect Marginalized Groups, demonstrating how a thriving culture, without legal and social safeguards, can be systematically dismantled.
The Allied liberation of Germany provides an ironic backdrop for the main characters’ central conflicts. Karl’s testimony that the Allies “sent all the pink triangles to jail” (19) confirms the radio broadcast’s warning and reveals the hypocrisy of the Allied occupation. Historically, the Allies continued to enforce Paragraph 175, the Nazi-era law criminalizing homosexuality, transferring many queer survivors directly from camps to prisons. This policy is embodied by the American officer, Lt. William Ward, who accuses Bertie and Sofie of being Nazis while his own government perpetuates their persecution. Ward’s self-righteous monologue about rooting out Nazis culminates in the bitterly ironic assurance, “If you’re not Nazis, then you have nothing to be afraid of” (88). Bertie and Sofie are, in fact, afraid precisely because they are not Nazis; they are part of a group still criminalized by the very laws the Nazis amplified. This situation complicates the idea of liberation and expands the theme of Passivity as Complicity in Atrocities beyond German citizens to include the Allied forces, who fail to dismantle the legal machinery of oppression.
Another idea which connects the two timelines is the emphasis on the performance of identity. In Berlin in 1932, Bertie and Gert possess official cards that allow them a limited ability to move through public life as themselves. By 1945, Bertie must teach Karl how to alter his appearance and behavior so strangers will perceive him as a conventional man. Karl resists because the lessons require him to conform to someone else’s definition of masculinity, yet Bertie insists that such a performance is necessary for survival. Across the two timelines, the purpose of performance is therefore reversed: what once allowed Bertie a degree of public recognition becomes a means of concealment. The reversal emphasizes the psychological consequences of losing social and legal protection. Survival increasingly requires Bertie, Sofie, and Karl to continually manage how other people perceive them, sacrificing their own sense of self due to their marginalization by society.
This internal conflict is further developed through the photo album, which emphasizes the tension between visibility and danger. In 1932, it is a key part of Bertie’s personal life, containing photographs of his friends alongside newspaper clippings about people like him living in America. The collection serves as a bridge between past and possible future, evidence of the life Bertie has while he imagines another life he might build. In 1945, however, the same album has become a record of a community largely destroyed by the war. Karl repeatedly studies its photographs because they allow him to see people like himself experiencing happiness before the Nazis, but his reaction to Gert’s photograph foreshadows the connection between their pasts. When Karl escapes through a window during Ward’s search, he makes sure to save the album as well, underscoring its importance to both of them. Preserving the alum means preserving evidence that they and people like them existed, loved one another, and experienced joy before prosecution threatened to reduces their lives to stories of victimization.
The early chapters establish that survival, though typically portrayed as a measure of worth or strength, is often simply a matter of circumstance, breeding guilt in those who endure. Karl, having survived Dachau, is consumed by the senselessness of it all, stating that “there is no sense to be made” (79) of who lived and died. His anguish directly articulates The Arbitrary Nature of Survival. Bertie, who survived the war hidden on a farm, feels “ill at ease with their fortune” (13) and questions if there is “something in his blood to be terrible” (10) when making life-or-death decisions even on the farm. His abstract guilt becomes a concrete crisis with Karl’s arrival. Lt. Ward’s accusation that Bertie was “complicit” (86) in Nazi atrocities hits a nerve because Bertie has already been wrestling with the moral ambiguity of his own passivity. The stark contrast between Karl’s traumatic experience and Bertie’s relative safety forces Bertie to confront the difficult questions of what it means to survive when so many others did not. The opening section therefore leaves its characters facing two different threats: the immediate problem of staying alive and the more difficult question of how to understand having survived at all.
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