Chapter 1, No Return Summary and Analysis

The fairly short introductory chapter introduces Muller into Auschwitz I as a typical slave laborer, one of many. Much of the book's general setting is developed in these introductory pages. Muller served in the capacity of slave laborer for about six weeks before being selected to work in a crematorium, the subject of the remaining chapters of the autobiography. Filip Müller was forcibly transported from Slovakia to the Auschwitz death camp in April, 1942. He performed forced labor for several weeks until being selected as a member of the Sonderkommando, an assignment from which there was no release. He subsequently worked in the crematoria of Auschwitz I and later Auschwitz II-Birkenau until c. November, 1944, when mass murder by gassing ceased. Müller survived the forced evacuation of Auschwitz and was ultimately liberated, being one of the very...