First published in several issues of the Frankfurter Zeitung newspaper in the spring of 1924, the novel by the famous Austrian writer and journalist became one of the bestsellers in Weimar Germany. The action takes place in a hotel in the Polish town of Lodz, which is inhabited by soldiers returning home from the First World War, impoverished citizens of the collapsed Austro-Hungarian Empire, bankrupt businessmen seeking to leave for America, unemployed cabaret dancers and other characters from the outskirts of Europe.