Primo Levi · 1963 · rail

Primo Levi's 1963 memoir, the sequel to If This Is a Man, recounting his long and absurdly circuitous journey home after the Red Army liberated Auschwitz in 1945. Instead of travelling south and west to Italy, Levi and his fellow survivors were shunted east into Ukraine and then far north into Belarus, where months passed in Soviet limbo before a wandering train carried them home through Romania, Hungary, Austria and Germany. It is often called the Odyssey to the Iliad of his first book.

1. 1
   Auschwitz

   Liberated from Auschwitz by the Red Army in January 1945, Levi begins an eight-month journey home.

2. 2
   Krakow

   First to Krakow.

3. 3
   Katowice

   And a camp at Katowice, where news arrives of the war's end.

4. 4
   Lviv

   Then, bafflingly, eastward into Ukraine, to Lviv,

5. 5
   Zhmerynka

   and deeper still, to Zhmerynka.

6. 6
   Slutsk

   Instead of south to Odessa, the train is sent far north into Belarus, to Slutsk.

7. 7
   Starye Dorogi

   And the Red House camp at Starye Dorogi, where months pass in Soviet limbo.

8. 8
   Bucharest

   At last the homeward train, winding south through Romania.

9. 9
   Budapest

   Hungary,

10. 10
    Vienna

    Austria,

11. 11
    Munich

    and Germany.

12. 12
    Turin

    Home to Turin in October, twenty months after he was taken.