Landgericht

Richard Kornitzer, a Jewish judge, returns to Germany in 1947 from exile in Cuba and takes up work again as a judge at the regional court in Mainz. He repeatedly meets rejection and resistance, which sits painfully with his faith in law and the rule of law. He fights for his rights as a displaced person and tries to reunite a family scattered by the Nazi years: his wife, who stayed in Germany, and their children, who were sent to England.

A long flashback tells how the couple met in 1930s Berlin. The novel is partly documentary and is based on the life of a real judge.