The Tunnel

“Bernhard Kellermann’s spectacular and thrilling narrative of a rail tunnel dug under the Atlantic, linking Europe and North America, was first published in April 1913 in Berlin . . . By 1930, The Tunnel was onto its two hundredth printing; by 1939, it had topped a million sales . . . His masterpiece . . . Reading The Tunnel now, more than a hundred years after its first appearance, we may be astonished to see its astute identification and dramatization of forces and tendencies in society and civilization that we think of as recent and exclusive to us . . . His book [is] hardly obsolete; in our “infrastructure”-obsessed times, it fits as well now as then. Better, I would say.”

—Michael Hofmann, from the Foreword

“The story of the construction of a tunnel from New York to Europe. Deep under the Atlantic, hordes of people burrow towards one another. It’s a crazy story: science fiction mixed with realism, social criticism with engineering romanticism, capitalist belief in progress with wearily apocalyptic fantasy. The tunnel collapses, leading to strikes, rage and misery below the earth, and stock market flotations, dreams of marriage and disillusionment above . . . And so Kellermann succeeds in creating a great novel.”

—Florian Illies, 1913: The Year Before the Storm

“ The Tunnel shows what it means to sweat and toil for a great dream. Compared to the dramatic impact of Kellermann’s book, other novels about similar titanic undertakings are pale things indeed.”

—Frank N. Magill, Survey of Science Fiction Literature

“Bernhard Kellermann’s spectacular and thrilling narrative of a rail tunnel dug under the Atlantic, linking Europe and North America, was first published in April 1913 in Berlin . . . By 1930, The Tunnel was onto its two hundredth printing; by 1939, it had topped a million sales . . . His masterpiece . . . Reading The Tunnel now, more than a hundred years after its first appearance, we may be astonished to see its astute identification and dramatization of forces and tendencies in society and civilization that we think of as recent and exclusive to us . . . His book [is] hardly obsolete; in our “infrastructure”-obsessed times, it fits as well now as then. Better, I would say.”

—Michael Hofmann, from the Foreword

“The story of the construction of a tunnel from New York to Europe. Deep under the Atlantic, hordes of people burrow towards one another. It’s a crazy story: science fiction mixed with realism, social criticism with engineering romanticism, capitalist belief in progress with wearily apocalyptic fantasy. The tunnel collapses, leading to strikes, rage and misery below the earth, and stock market flotations, dreams of marriage and disillusionment above . . . And so Kellermann succeeds in creating a great novel.”

—Florian Illies, 1913: The Year Before the Storm

“ The Tunnel shows what it means to sweat and toil for a great dream. Compared to the dramatic impact of Kellermann’s book, other novels about similar titanic undertakings are pale things indeed.”

—Frank N. Magill, Survey of Science Fiction Literature

Bernhard Kellermann (1879–1951) was a poet and popular novelist of the early twentieth century. Wildly popular in his lifetime and largely forgotten thereafter, he was censored and criticized for his anti-militaristic views. The Nazi regime burned his books; he moved to East Germany after the War and died in Potsdam, calling for the two Germanys to reunite. The award-winning poet and translator Michael Hofmann has also translated works by Alfred Döblin, Jenny Erpenbeck, Werner Herzog, Gert Hofmann, Franz Kafka, Heinrich von Kleist, Joseph Roth, and Wim Wenders, among others. His translation of Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck was awarded the International Booker Prize in 2024.