“In this brilliantly argued, deeply researched book, historian Modris Eksteins links the rise of the world’s most popular artist, Van Gogh, to the fraudulent German dealer who sold forgeries of his work in the 1920s. The dealer was charged and put on trial, but the question of the paintings’ authenticity was never resolved. Eksteins sees this outcome as part of a broader political assault on truth in postwar Europe – and one that still resonates in our own age of celebrity worship and digital duplication. Anchored in a thrilling courtroom drama and sweeping in scope, Solar Dance creates an unsettling portrait of twentieth-century history and culture.” – 2012 Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction Jury (James Bartleman, Charlotte Gill, and Marni Jackson)