Will Eisner's Final Graphic Novel Exposes the Origins of the Protocols of Zion

Will Eisner's final graphic novel, titled "Le complot" (The Plot), was released posthumously in French by Grasset and delves into the origins of the antisemitic forgery known as "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion." Eisner, who passed away in January 2005 at the age of 87, connects the document to Maurice Joly's 1864 pamphlet that criticized Napoleon III. The Russian émigré Mathieu Golovinski, commissioned by Tsar Nicholas II to produce a fraudulent document, plagiarized Joly's text, substituting Jewish conspirators for Machiavelli. Historian Norman Cohn describes the forgery as a “mandate for genocide,” and Eisner's narrative also investigates the 20th-century spread of the Protocols and its lasting appeal.