The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Couverture souple

Alexandre Dumas (1802 – 1870) demonstrated his propensity for literature early on, despite the lack of education and wealth he received as a result of his father's early death when Dumas was four. Dumas had his first play, Henry III and His Courts, produced in 1829 and was immediately met with widespread acclaim. Following the end of press censorship in France, Dumas began first writing novels, eventually founding a production studio, allowing him to publish hundreds of stories penned by a staff of writers under his guidance. Although he was married in 1840, he was said to have had around forty affairs, including one with the highest paid American actress at the time, Adah Isaacs Menken. During the election of Napoléon Bonaparte, he had to leave France and lived in Belgium, Russia and Italy before returning to Paris thirteen years later and lived there until his death in 1870. Dumas rarely addressed his African ancestry but when insulted because of it, famously replied,

It is May 1660 and the fate of nations is at stake. Mazarin plots, Louis XIV is in love, and Raoul de Bragelonne, son of Athos, is intent on serving France and winning the heart of Louise de la Valliere. Meanwhile, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos all undertake their own mysterious enterprises. The Vicomte de Bragelonne opens an epic adventure which continues with Louise de la Valliere and reaches its climax in The Man in the Iron Mask. This new edition of the classic translation presents a key episode in the Musketeers saga, fully annotated and with an introduction that sets Dumas's saga in its historical and cultural context.