I am unable to separate Rolf Hochhuth from his plays: he is completely one with the fiery rage, the restless drive, and the grand and noble simplicity of his old-fashioned drama that has recently changed the theater, publicly reminded us of our sins of silent complicity with evil, and challenged establishments old and new. (p. 137)

Hochhuth's implacable rage and his restless verse precariously hold together a ragbag of theatrical styles [in The Deputy], including elements of the old morality play, Schiller's (and Racine's) magnificent confrontations of noble antagonists, a good deal of naturalism (the Nazi functionaries in the tavern derive from Carl Zuckmayer's The Devil's General), Shaw's polemical stage directions, and a few stanzas of expressionist poetry…. Willy Haas has suggested that Hochhuth has written a historical play with a theological core, but I suspect that the play is structured the other way around: in his first act...