From the very moment Alfred Dreyfus was placed under arrest for treason and espionage, his entire world was turned upside down, and for the next five years he lived in what he called a phantasmagoria. To keep himself sane, Dreyfus wrote letters to and received letters from his wife and exercised his intellect through reading the few books and magazines his censors allowed him. In this volume, Norman Simms explores how Dreyfus kept himself from exploding into madness by reading his essays carefully, placing them in the context of his century.

Through a spinning prism lightly. Random words of a solitary man ; The phantasmagoria of anti-semitism and anti-zionism. -- The ultimate contraption. The final prison cahiers: Nostalgia, anxieties, and reveries ; The Jewish syndic, satan's synagogue and cynicism ; Through the prism of anti-semitic discourse ; Dreyfus and socially-constructed autism. -- Transcending radical solitude. A poor pedlar's bundle of things ; Dreyfus, Jewish art and midrashic aesthetics.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.