Raising the dead in interwar France

What is it about?

This article examines a range of French visual representations of ghosts and the theme of haunting from war memorials to films such as Abel Gance's classic 'J'Accuse' (1919).

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Why is it important?

Here I argue that ghosts and haunting serve socio-political ends. The dead remind the public not so much of the debt owed to them, however, but to the veterans who have survived them and through whom they live on. Visual representations of the dead by veterans therefore reflect the fluctuating fortunes of France's veterans in the interwar years.