We mourn the passing of Georg Stefan Troller

We mourn the passing of Georg Stefan Troller

We mourn the passing of Georg Stefan Troller. He passed away on Saturday morning in Paris, aged 103. An emigrant, chronicler and humanist, Troller had been an honorary member of PEN Berlin since 2023, for whom freedom of speech and human dignity were the measure of all things.

Born in Vienna in 1921, he fled the Nazis in 1938 and received a US visa in 1941. He was then drafted into the US Army in 1943. On 29 April 1945, he took part in the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp; nineteen members of his family were murdered in the Holocaust. In 1949, he settled in Paris, where he would work and live for the rest of his life.

Troller made his mark on German-language television with the Paris Journal (ARD/WDR, 1962–71), followed by the ZDF series »Personenbeschreibung« (Person’s description) (1972–93). His subjective, respectful and insistent gaze, and his creation of more than a thousand portraits, established him as an authority in television and documentary culture.

As a screenwriter, Troller – together with Axel Corti – created the emigration trilogy »Wohin und zurück« (Where to and Back): An uns glaubt Gott nicht mehr (God No Longer Believes in Us) (1982), Santa Fe (1985/86), and Welcome in Vienna (1986). The latter was submitted as Austria’s entry for the Foreign Language Oscar. These films are among the most powerful artistic self-portraits and depictions of the post-war period.

In addition to around 170 documentaries, Troller published more than 20 books, including the autobiographical »Selbstbeschreibung« (Self-Description), and wrote a monthly column in Literarische Welt until the end of his life. His work combined historical experience with contemporary insight, offering a model of careful observation, empathy and intellectual integrity.

For PEN Berlin, Georg Stefan Troller remains a role model as an artist of conversation, a defender of open society, a fighter against fascism and anti-Semitism, and a witness to a century in which freedom of speech was lost and regained several times. His work reminds us that freedom is not merely a state of being, but also an attitude and imperative. It exemplifies the idea that language can do more than just state facts; it can also save, preserve and transform.

PEN Berlin. We stand by our word.