After the war the entire Berlin S-Bahn belonged to the East German Reichsbahn: whoever boarded it in the Western sectors rode a piece of really existing socialism. Many West Berliners switched to other transport, especially since the building of the Wall and following a boycott call. The tracks were left to slow decay, numerous stations were closed and fell into a Sleeping Beauty slumber. Renate von Mangoldt, born in Berlin in 1940, is one of the great portrait photographers in Germany; her black-and-white photographs of writers belong to the visual memory of the world of literature, and her name is closely linked with the Literarisches Colloquium Berlin.