Jay Winter

His original idea in the 1919 version of J' accuse was to make one of the heroes who dies in the war return and live with his widow and her new husband in a supernatural menage a trois.

The 'pillar of fire' - in Hebrew 'Shoah' - reverts back to the original Biblical meaning of holocaust, as a ritual purification or sacrifice

Beckmann developed a style both romantic and ironic, disclosed by his jibe to a friend that instead of serving in Belgium, he wished he could read Jean Paul on Mars.