The Berlin Boxing Club

Karl goes straight to shoveling coal from his successful first boxing practice. Again, Greta surprises him in the basement. Full of “adrenalin [sic] and testosterone,” he flirts with her more boldly than before (114). She proves to be unimpressed by his boxing lessons; nevertheless, the two end up kissing. They are surprised in the middle of doing so by Herr Koplek, the superintendent, who has stolen out of his apartment to spy on them. Horrified, Greta runs up the stairs.

Karl is aware that Greta is gentile and that there are widespread stories about Jewish boys preying on gentile girls. He believes at first that after the Koplek spying incident, she wants nothing further to do with him. However, when the two run into each other on the street one day, she signals for him to follow her into an art supply store. There, she tells him that they can still meet but that it must be in secret; her father does not want her dating any boys, Jewish or otherwise. She suggests that they meet regularly in the park after her Tuesday afternoon piano lesson. 

At the club, Schmeling teaches Karl not only about the correct way to throw punches—folding his thumbs within his fists, rather than on top of them—but also how to position himself and to keep up his strength. Karl learns to stand in the ring with his legs not too far apart, so that he will not get knocked down; to drink milk and to eat carbohydrates, in order to gain weight and to stay energized; to run regularly, in order to increase his lung power; and to breathe through his nose in the ring, since he is wearing a mouth guard.

Karl carefully follows Schmeling’s instructions and even illustrates them in his sketchbook. (An illustration of the correct and incorrect way to make a fist is shown.) Karl gradually gets stronger and more agile; Hildy mocks him for his self-absorption. Karl listens to Schmeling’s exchanges with the other boxers at the cluband notes that Schmeling avoids all talk of politics and sticks strictly to the science of boxing.

At the club, Karl becomes close to Neblig, the janitor and one-time boxer. Unlike Willy, a Nazi-affiliated boxer who plays frequent cruel pranks on Karl, Neblig is supportive and kind. Karl and Neblig share an interest in cartoons, and Neblig introduces Karl to the cartoon character of Joe Palooka, a powerful but kindhearted boxer. Karl works on his own cartoons featuring boxers and shows his drafts to Neblig, who is encouraging.

Neblig explains to Karl the reason he no longer boxes: as a young man, his eye was poked out by a group of bullies. Because of his speech defect, it was hard for him to find a job, until Worjyk hired him at the club. Neblig defends Worjyk to Karl, telling him that he might have a sharp tongue but that he is a kind man deep down.

One day, after Karl has had another sparring session with Johann, Worjyk and Schmeling tell Karl that he is ready to take part in a real fight. He will be representing the Berlin Boxing Club in a Youth Boxing Tournament the following week. 

Karl begins to secretly meet with Greta at the park on Tuesday afternoons. Greta confides in him about her dream of moving to France, to study music, and also about her lack of belief in God, despite her Catholic upbringing. Karl confides in Greta, in turn, about his odd feeling of safety in the boxing ring, his obsession with American comic books, and his desire to no longer be a victim.

Greta continues to be skeptical about Karl’s boxing hobby. When he tells her about his upcoming tournament, she tells him that despite believing neither in God nor in his boxing, she will be praying for his success during her next Sunday church service.

As they are leaving the park that afternoon, Karl spies his friends Kurt and Hans from a distance. The two boys are mocking and insinuating in their greeting, in a way that suggests that they know all about Karl and Greta’s involvement.

Karl witnesses his father negotiating more and more with desperate Jewish art sellers and with gentile buyers of their paintings. While his father is able to be persuasive and charming with the buyers, his smile disappears as soon as they are gone: “[…] he’d complain bitterly to my mother about the vultures coming to pick at our bones” (144).

One day, Karl comes home from the gym to find Hildy disconsolate and weeping in bed. She has been forced to read an anti-Semitic children’s book at school that demonizes Jews as “rotten apples,” and her classmates have been calling her a rotten apple ever since (145). Karl realizes that while both he and his mother are able to pass as gentile, his father and his sister are not, and that their lives are much harder because of this. He also realizes that because of his new obsession with boxing, he has not been paying enough attention to his sister.

He takes Hildy and her school book down to the basement of their building, and he makes her throw the book into the furnace. To cheer her up, he also draws her a new Winzig and Spatz cartoon.

Karl’s friends Kurt and Hans have joined Hitler Youth. They sheepishly downplay their new allegiance to Karl, telling him that it is not that different from being in the Boy Scouts. 

Near Neblig’s supply closet, Karl discovers an American sports magazine that features an article about Jewish boxers. He is particularly inspired to read about the Jewish champion Barney Ross, who transformed himself from a rabbi’s son into a fierce street fighter. He draws a picture of Ross in his sketchbook, noting the straightforward ferocity in his expression, very different from Schmeling’s diplomatic smile.

Karl comes across two Nazi boys defacing Herr Greenberg’s art supply store—the same store where he and Greta once hid and kissed. He confronts Greenberg afterward, but Greenberg refuses his help: “The world is going crazy, Karl. And when the world is crazy, a sane man is never okay” (154). 

Karl has his first serious boxing match; Schmeling is at a match of his own and is unable to come along. Neblig offers to stand in his corner, and Karl is grateful for his support but secretly worried that he will be mocked because of Neblig’s stutter. Worjyk also accompanies Karl and, at the last minute, gives him a new pair of boxing gloves. Karl’s uncle Jakob has told him that he will come to watch the fight and will bring several of his friends along as well; however, Karl does not see his uncle in the audience.

Karl notes that many of the fighters and their parents are Nazis. This includes his opponent, a boy named Strasser. During the first round of the match, Karl is nervous and disoriented. He forgets everything he has learned from Schmeling, and he can offer only a weak defense to Strasser’s jabs and punches. However, after Neblig and Worjyk give him a scolding pep talk, he gradually regains his strength and confidence and ends up winning the match. 

Karl returns home in a triumphant and elated mood, hoping to boast to his family and to his girlfriend about having won his first real fight. At home, however, only Hildy is waiting for him. She tells him that his mother received a mysterious and upsetting phone call, and that she had to leave immediately afterward. (The children are relatively accustomed to their father not being home very often.)

Their parents return that evening. Uncle Jakob has been sent to the concentration camp at Dachau, which marks the first time that Karl has heard of these camps. Jakob has been sent to the camp because of his communist activities. Karl’s parents fight furiously about what to do next. His father is in favor of laying low and staying in Germany, his mother of speaking up and fleeing. Their fight explodes;Karl’s father stomps out of the apartment, while his mother shuts herself up in her room.

In his own room, Karl consoles himself by remembering his boxing triumph and drawing a picture of his defeated rival’s face. He reflects that things are far fairer and simpler in the boxing ring than they are in the rest of his life. 

At the club, the boxers shower Karl with boxing gloves, a mark of their congratulations and respect. Schmeling is still gone, this time to the United States, where he hopes to have a match with the promising black boxer Joe Louis.

Karl has more and more boxing matches, all of which he wins. After winning a tough match with a particularly skilled boy named Budd, Worjyk tells him that he is “a real fighter” (187). He continues to draw pictures of his rivals in his sketchbook, noting their different fighting styles alongside their sketched faces. 

Back at school, Karl learns that Herr Boch has been dismissed and that a man named Herr Kellner, who has a tiny, Hitler-like moustache, will be taking his place as his main instructor.

At another assembly, Principal Munter tells the school that the Nuremberg Laws have gone into effect. According to these laws, anyone who has three or four Jewish grandparents is officially a Jew, and Jews are not allowed to have sex with or marry non-Jews. Jews are also not allowed to display the Nazi flag or hire female domestic workers under the age of forty-five. Munter ends the assembly by announcing that all of the Jewish students in the school will be expelled. He calls Karl’s name from the roll.

Afterward, the other students chase Karl and Benjamin, another Jewish boy, through the hallways of the school. The boys do not catch Karl, as his training has made him a fast runner, but they do catch and fall on Benjamin. Karl tells himself that he had no choice but to run away and that he could not have defended Benjamin against all of those boys, even had he stayed behind. 

Karl and Hildy are sent to a Talmudic school in place of their old school. Karl feels no identification with the Orthodox students there and spends as little time with them as possible. 

His father instructs him to deliver another package to the Countess. When he arrives at the apartment, an unfamiliar, middle-aged man opens the door. The man tells Karl that Fritz, the Countess’s boyfriend, is gone, and that the Countess herself is feeling under the weather. His manner toward Karl is strangely familiar, and Karl gradually realizes that the man is the Countess. The man introduces himself, with some irony and ceremony, as Bertram Heigel.

Heigel tells Karl how he first met Karl’s father: they were soldiers together during World War I, an event Karl’s father—now a self-declared pacifist—never speaks about. Heigel tells Karl, however, that his father was a natural leader and that he once saved Heigel’s life by providing him with a gas mask during a mustard gas attack. He gives Karl a photograph of his father looking brave, exhausted, and determined.

Heigel tells Karl that even though he no longer needs the flyers—as he cannot risk throwing these parties—he will continue to pay for them, since he knows Karl’s father needs the money. He instructs Karl to say nothing about his new circumstances to his father: “He’s a proud man” (204). Karl returns home and visits his father in his study; though he feels an impulse to talk to him, Karl ends up simply wishing him good night. In his room, Karl compares the photograph of his father to that of the Jewish Barney Ross, his boxing hero, and is struck by the similarities in their expressions: “[…] hard looks of determination, as if they were both fighting for their lives” (205).

Max Schmeling returns to Germany from the States, where he has been lobbying to fight Jimmy Braddock for the heavyweight title. For a chance at this, he must first fight Joe Louis, whose most popular nickname is the“Brown Bomber.” During one of their training sessions, Schmeling tells Karl that Nazi officials don’t like the idea of him fighting a black man: “[They’re] afraid I might lose. A German losing to a Negro would hurt their theories of German superiority” (209). He also tells Karl that he has watched films of Louis fighting and thinks that he has figured out a possible way to beat him.

Schmeling remains a mysterious figure to Karl. While revered by the Nazis, he is also friendly to the Jewish community; he even has a Jewish manager, Joe Jacobs. Jacobs is American as well as Jewish, and when Schmeling takes him to a fight in Germany, his appearance causes consternation on both sides of the Atlantic. Jacobs is obliged, like all of the other spectators at the match, to give the Hitler salute, and for different reasons, this offends both American Jews and German Nazis. 

Karl and Greta plan to meet at their usual park to celebrate her sixteenth birthday. Beforehand, he makes her a card of the Eiffel Tower and buys her a silver charm shaped like Notre Dame.

When Karl arrives at their designated park bench, he does not see Greta at first. He then hears gasps in the bushes nearby and finds Herr Koplek pressing her up against a tree. He frightens Koplek away, but in retaliation Koplek threatens to expose them both and to kick his family out of the building.

Karl and Greta walk home together, both distraught and frightened. Karl wants to take preemptive action against Koplek, while Greta believes that Koplek has more power than they do. Karl also wants to stay with Greta and comfort her, but Greta will not allow him to do this. She ends up running away from him. 

Karl hopes to meet Greta again—among other reasons, because he still has not given her the birthday present—but she is avoiding him. Meanwhile, as his family is dining together one night, Fritz Dirks, the manager of their building and a one-time friend of Mr. Stern’s, knocks on the door. Dirks’s visit is not friendly this time. He tells Mr. Stern that Herr Koplek has caught Karl being inappropriate with Greta and that their family, as a result, can no longer stay in the building. As Jews, they no longer have tenant rights, and they cannot contest Koplek’s accusation. Dirks is regretful but firm.

The family must search for a new apartment, but they find little that is available or livable. They finally decide to stay at their gallery, which is no longer in use as a gallery. Karl’s mother is against the idea, but his father tells her that they have no choice. He adds that he, she, and Hildy will stay in the main room and that Karl can stay down in the basement, as he is a young man and needs his privacy.

The family sell most of their apartment belongings before moving out. As they are leaving the building, Karl thinks that he sees someone peering through the curtain from one of Greta’s family’s windows; however, she does not come out to say goodbye to him. 

The Stern family settles into their new living quarters, trying to make them as homelike as possible. Though their lack of privacy is uncomfortable, it also creates a sense of intimacy and adventure.

One day at the market, Karl’s mother is approached by a ragged stranger, whom she first assumes is either a beggar or a thief. Gradually, she recognizes Stefan, one of her brother’s communist comrades. He tells her that Jakob is unwell at Dachau; he then tells her that she should not be seen talking to him, and vanishes.

At home, Karl’s mother and father argue. Karl’s mother wants to see Jakob at Dachau, whatever the risks; Karl’s father does not see the point of putting their family in danger. Eventually, he relents and says that he will get in touch with Lutz, an old army friend of his who now works for the police. Several nights later, Lutz, a courtly, middle-aged man, knocks on the door. He advises Mr. Stern to turn off all of the bright lights in the apartment, so that they are not suspected of having a secret meeting. He then delivers the news that Jakob has died in the camp. 

Karl’s mother is devastated and angry to hear about her brother’s death, from dysentery. Later that night, once Lutz has left and the family have all gone to bed, Karl hears his mother whispering to his father that they need to get out of Germany; for the first time, his father agrees.

Karl has a boxing “exhibition” the following day, and he arrives there in a surly and defiant mood. He is angry about losing his uncle, his girlfriend, and his old family apartment; he is angry his mentor Max Schmeling is gone on another trip to the States. He looks forward to this fight as a way to express his fury: “I made my arm muscles pulse under the skin, taking inventory of each in an agitated roll call” (243).

Being paired off with a Hitler Youth member galvanizes him all the more, and he fights an aggressive and reckless fight. Though he wins, he realizes that he went too far, and Neblig, who has accompanied him, clearly disapproves. As they are leaving the gym, Karl sees Gertz Diener, his old tormentor from school, in the audience. 

In the States, Max Schmeling fights Joe Louis in a match that has received much publicity on both sides of the Atlantic. For the German Nazis, the fight has huge symbolic meaning, and the pressure on Schmeling to win is immense. Karl listens to the radio broadcast of the fight in the Berlin Boxing Club.

At the beginning of the match, it seems that Louis will win. The German radio announcer describes his fighting style in racially-charged language: “‘He fights more like a wild animal than a man’” (247). Schmeling gains the upper hand in the second round, however, and he wins the match.

The boxers go out to a beer hall to celebrate, and Karl gets very drunk. He goes into a urinal to relieve himself and is joined there by a stranger, who declares: “Too bad [Schmeling] can’t fight a Gypsy next, or, even better, a Jew!” (254). Karl is suddenly aware of his exposed circumcised penis: confirmation of his Jewishness. He feels dizzy and nauseous, and he vomits and soils himself. He wakes up the following morning naked in a cot at the Boxing Club, where Neblig has put him to bed. 

Max Schmeling returns home from the Joe Louis match a celebrity. Karl is confused to see pictures in the paper of him and his wife being feted by the Nazis, and to see that Schmeling has even written the introduction to a book entitled Germans Fight for Honor: Boxing as a Race Problem. He wonders who the “real” Max is.

Germany hosts the summer Olympics, and the Nazi regime must hide all overt signs of its persecution of Jews and other minorities for the benefit of American visitors. Restrictions are removed from restaurants, and Nazi propaganda posters are removed from the streets. Hitler must tolerate the black American runner Jesse Owens winning several gold medals and becoming as big a celebrity as Schmeling.

At home, Karl and his father receive a mysterious envelope from Schmeling. It contains two tickets to the Olympic Games and represents the first communication from Schmeling that Karl has had in some time. Karl’s father, however, sells the tickets to an “Herr Rolf,” telling Karl that they need money more than they need to watch sports. Karl is disappointed, but knows that his father is right. 

With the Olympics over, Berlin’s regular Nazi climate returns. Karl goes to Herr Greenberg’s art supply store, as he is still working on his cartoons. He has not been in the store in some time, and the changes in both the store and in its proprietor shock him. Few supplies are on the shelves, and Greenberg seems abstracted and depressed. He nevertheless puts on a good face for Karl, selling him two bottles of ink, as well as two apples from his cousin’s farm. Before Karl leaves, Greenberg touches his head and blesses him with a Talmudic prayer.

At home, Karl’s mother is locked in her bath, and his sister issitting on her bed. Hildy tells Karl that some Hitler Youth boys egged her coat as she was leaving school that afternoon. She also tells him that yesterday was her birthday. Karl realizes how little he has noticed his sister recently in his obsession with boxing.

Hildy runs out of the apartment in anger, leaving Karl behind in her room. He looks through her journal and discovers both her depression and her writing talent. He then goes to his basement room and tries to lose himself, first in a boxing workout and then in a drawing of a new cartoon for Hildy; however, he cannot come up with any suitable ideas. 

Neblig and Worjyk select Karl to fight in the 1937 Youth Boxing Championship. He is thrilled, as it will be his first tournament. Max Schmeling continues to be absent from Karl’s life, as he is busy lobbying to fight Jimmy Braddock and socializing with high-ranking Nazi officials.

In the stadium locker room, Worjyk and Neblig present Karl with a silk boxing robe, “Berlin Boxing Club” spelled out on its back. Karl notices Gertz Diener’s name in the registration book and wonders if they will later fight. While he fears that Gertz may expose him as a Jew, his desire for revenge gets the upper hand.

Karl is first paired off with a mediocre boxer named Meissner. Karl can easily beat him but is also afraid that if he fights too well, Gertz will be threatened and will expose him as a Jew to the tournament officials. He is therefore careful to let Meissner get in a few punches, while not allowing him to win the match outright. Gertz wins his own match, and the two are then paired off in a fight.

Karl quickly detects a flaw in Gertz’s boxing technique, and he easily defeats him in the first round. In retaliation, Gertz’s Wolf Pack friends, all of whom are watching, expose Karl as a Jew to a tournament official. Karl is banished from the tournament—chased out of the stadium while being pelted with garbage—and knows that he can no longer return to the Berlin Boxing Club for fear of bringing disgrace on Worjyk. 

Karl’s father sends Karl to make a delivery of printing materials to an apartment on the busy Friedrichstrasse. He hands off the materials to a hand sticking out of an apartment door; the hand then gives him money as a disembodied voice from within the apartment commands him to leave.

While making his way back home, and feeling jealous of all of the leisurely German shoppers, Karl spots Greta in an ice cream parlor, sitting next to a tall, handsome boy. On an angry impulse, he goes in to confront her, dropping the charm that she has given him into her ice cream sundae. Greta says nothing and looks down at her lap. The boy confronts Karl, and Karl pushes him away. He leaves and continues home: “It was as if the sidewalk were sinking beneath my feet with each step, like the ground was literally collapsing beneath me” (296).