Hanns Johst took part in the literary movement of expressionism before he turned to the conservative treatment of nationalist themes and finally succumbed to the National Socialists' expectations for political propaganda literature. At first sight, there seems to be little in common between the humanitarian-pacifist sentiments and antibourgeois outcries of Johst's early works and the chauvinistic glorification of heroic militarism and German superiority in his later writings. On closer analysis, however, a common denominator can be discerned in the irrational current that underlies both the metaphysical aspirations of his early protagonists and the anti-intellectualism of his later ones; also, the young Johst's view of the artist's elevated position in society was echoed in the later Johst's call for a leader-artist who would combine the German nationalist state with a new type of cult theater.

Johst's abandonment of individualism for totalitarianism was shared by other expressionist authors; but unlike...