Book Description
During the French Revolution's reign of terror, the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel rescues helpless men, women, and children from their doom in this unique, wonderfully colorful adventure classic.
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If you've never read The Scarlet Pimpernel, order this great book now! Move over Zorro and Superman ? here is the first costumed-hero with a secret identity, plus literature's most fiery, independent and alluring heroine.
Customer Reviews:
Delightful! .......2007-07-07
This book is a delightful read. In contrast to the sorrow and heaviness of other books on the French Revolution (including Marie Antoinette The Journey by Antonia Fraser), this book is a very different take on the tragedy. Sir Percy vies with his wife Marguerite, a brilliant French actress, in terms of acting ability. He has mastered the role of a brainless dandy to such an extent that he is the last person anyone would suspect as having the wits and wherewithal to be the Scarlet Pimpernel. Aristocrats are spared the guillotine time after time thanks to this man's ingenuity.
Shortly after Marguerite and Sir Percy marry, Marguerite tells Sir Percy of her involvement in the arrest of a certain marquis who had humiliated her brother. Marguerite does not tell her husband the whole story, including that she had no idea her words would be taken out of context and used against the marquis and that she had done everything within her influence to try to prevent the marquis's death at the guillotine. Sir Percy's attitude towards Marguerite changes: he is still the gallant he always was, but a certain coldness and reservation mark his manner. Marguerite had hoped that her husband would not need a full explanation, and that his worshipful devotion towards her would continue unabated. She is hurt by his changed opinion of her and retaliates with pointed sallies at Sir Percy's expense. She is considered one of the cleverest women in all of Europe, and she sharpens her wits by making fun of her husband, whom she wrongfully assumes is too unintelligent to take offense.
It is not until Marguerite partially confides in her husband when her brother's life is threatened that Sir Percy learns the truth of Marguerite's (unintentional) involvement in the marquis's death. Sir Percy repents his false impressions of his wife and vows that he will do everything within his ability to save Marguerite's brother. As Marguerite makes her way up the staircase after this intense communication, Sir Percy actually kisses the stairs where Marguerite had just walked! His worshipful attitude towards her is renewed, and Marguerite for her own part recognizes how much she has loved her husband all along. But is it too late for the lovers? Marguerite was forced by circumstance to reveal information about the Scarlet Pimpernel to an unrelenting French commissioner (an obsessive, Javert-like character) before realizing that the same man is her own husband.
The rest of the book is a clever game of cat and mouse, replete with a happily-ever-after ending (or rather, a happy-for-the-time-being ending, as there are more books in the Scarlet Pimpernel series).
I had seen the movie with Anthony Andrews and Jane Seymour several years ago. Both the book and movie are equally wonderful, though the movie's storyline is a bit different. Anthony Andrews (whom I had a crush on as a young girl after seeing him in a TV miniseries) was beyond perfection in the title role, and of course, Jane Seymour was wonderful as Marguerite.
Swashbuckling without swords and almost without violence.......2007-06-10
"The Scarlet Pimpernel" is a swashbuckling tale of the French Revolution's reign of terror, only without any swords swashing, and open contempt for the revolutionaries.
A couragous Englishman and a band of his fellow aristocrats rescue French nobles from death at the hands of unwashed masses who shout "Librete, Egalite, Fraternite!" and murder and suppress anyone associated with the earlier regime. The Englishmen don't do this out of duty, or opposition to the brutal leaders in France, but for the sport of it, or so they claim to conceal nobler motives. The sinister Chauvelin, an agent of the French Republic is dedicated to rooting out the Scarlet Pimpernel, the leader of the band who makes fools of the Revolution.
Short, very readable, with engaging characters who have personal lives, flaws, and issues as well as heroic traits and adventures, this book is pretty darned good. Unlike most stories of late Eighteenth Century Europe, swordplay and violence in general is conspicuous by its absence. The Scarlet Pimpernel uses trickery, cunning, and audacity to outsmart the French authorities who are bent on his destruction as they try to murder the remnants of the French Aristocracy. I liked it a lot, and largely because it wouldn't get good reviews in todays media.
"The Scarlet Pimpernel" shows the virtues of monarchy, the vices of democracy, the nobility of taking personal risk to life and limb for strangers, the villiany of the will of the masses, the weakness of grim single-minded determination, and above all, the strength of laughter and a light heart. All of which constitute heresy to "real" book reviewers in academia and the media. Read it, and enjoy a perspective not normally heard, as well as an outstanding adventure story.
God Save the King!.......2007-06-02
The Scarlet Pimpernel is a classic novel, though it is hard to categorize. It is part romance, part adventure, part spy thriller, and part superhero fiction. All of these elements went into the pot and the resulting stew is extremely entertaining.
The book follows the adventures of Sir Percy Blakeney as he seeks to help French aristocrats escape the guillotine during the French Revolution. Since official English policy forbids this, Blakeney adopts a masked identity as the Scarlet Pimpernel to remain anonymous. The French, of course, detest this interference in their affairs and set out to trap and kill the Pimpernel at all costs. As part of his effort to deflect suspicion from himself, he plays the fool in every day life and he does it well. His own wife considers him a useless fop... and that's where the story really gets interesting.
I won't give away more of the plot, but she ends up following him into danger in an attempt to save him. This allows the most suspenseful section of the book to be told from Mrs. Blakeney's perspective. Her terror for her husband's fate is pure and adds to the tension considerably. If we saw it through the Pimpernel's eyes, it would doubtless be far more composed and nowhere near as suspenseful.
In closing, The Scarlet Pimpernel is well worth buying. It's laugh out loud funny, suspenseful, romantic, and generally quite a page-turner.
One of the best books of all time........2007-02-22
I adore this novel and the Baroness' writing style. I'll admit that I chose this version for its cover, but had always wanted to read the novel. Once I picked it up, I couldn't put it down. This is a great book for anyone who is a fan of historical dramas, adventure and/or romance. It's definitely a great book for both sexes and many ages!
Dual Identity equals Adventure.......2007-02-19
This book is definitely on my top five of historical fiction. Similar in content to A Tale of Two Cities, the Scarlet Pimpernell follows a man of dual identity who, for sport, travels to France during the French revolution to rescue aristocrats. The book is filled with intrigue, romance, and adventure. A must read!
Customer Reviews:
Super Reader.......2007-08-30
Chauvelin seeks him here, he seeks him there, many, many times. The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel has a different structure as the book is a collection of short stories or escapades about people that the elusive Pimpernel himself has helped to rescue, along with his intrepid band of adventurers.
So, if you want a small dose of Pimpernel action now and again, this one is for you.
A review of The Adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel, and the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel........2006-12-10
These books is excellent! Other reviewers have critisized the fact these are books of short storys. But I think that is the best part about them! You can read adventure after adventure without having to endure hours of suspence. You can completely imerse yourself in Pimpernel Adventures without having to endure some of the excrutiatingly long desciptive paragraphs which delay many of her books(personally I find myself skipping whole paragraphs from some of Orczy's novels just to get back to the dialog and adventure.)
One thing I have noticed though is that the more pimpernel books I read, the easier it is to sense what is happening. When I first read The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Elusive Pimpernel I found that I was asking myself HOW IS HE POSSIBLY GOING TO ESCAPE!!!! After reading more of her novels I found myself asking istead "I wonder what he is going to devise to escape this time!" Which is fine with me. Now I am in no means saying that these storys are predictable. They provide plenty of twists and turns to suite any Pimpernel addict. I could go on but your probly bored already. I will then briefly give a list of my favorite stories in each. (I love Percy vs. Chauvelin confrontations so you can guess that these storys are full of them)
The Adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel:
Fie Sr. Percy
The Stranger from Paris
Fly-By-Night
In the Tiger's Den(My Favorite)
The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel:
Sir Percy Explains
Needs Must--
A Battle of Wits
They are all good but those are some of my favorites.
-E
Ending the Pimpernel Saga with a Whimper.......2006-07-13
Most of Orczy's other books in the Scarlet Pimpernel genre have struck me as being comparatively weak in character development and in being totally dependent upon their adventuresome plots to generate reader interest. LORD TONY'S WIFE is something of an exception in that its plot is more developed, its characters more rounded, and their motivations more complex than one sees in the earlier novels. Reading it, I thought that Orczy was finally developing into a rather decent novelist and was evolving beyond the pulp fiction style of her earlier works. Then I read THE LEAGUE OF THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL.
THE LEAGUE is not a novel. It is not even a collection of short stories. At best, it is a jumble of climatic episodes, most of which have no relation to any of the others, in which the Scarlet Pimpernel exercises his almost supernatural skill at disguise and impersonation to go unrecognized in the midst of his enemies and to spirit away the "aristos" before the Revolutionary government of late 18th century France can send them to the guillotine.
Why are these not short stories? An effective short story makes a point, delivers an observation, or offers a concept or an idea about human nature or society that transcends the literal action in the story. There is, in other words, a theme of broader application, something that enhances the reader's understanding of mankind and the universe in which we struggle. The story is merely the vehicle by which the author presents that theme to the reader. Orczy's episodes depicting various stratagems resulting in successful rescues have none of that; they are nothing more than brief adventures where the literal, superficial story is all there is. I even hesitate to ascribe the word "plot" to any of them, for they are too concentrated on one point in a larger scenario for any plot to be developed.
An effective piece of fiction will normally provide the reader enough background to identify with the place, the time, and the characters. Those characters will then encounter a conflict of some nature, either physical or mental or emotional. There will be rising action as the characters attempt to deal with that conflict until the situation reaches a climax. Some sort of resolution, which may be either positive and creative or negative and destructive, of that climax will follow. Finally, any loose ends will be wrapped up and the story effectively brought to a close in the denouement. LORD TONY'S WIFE comes very near to meeting all of these criteria, and the other Pimpernel novels at least flirt with several of these elements. Each episode in THE LEAGUE, however, begins and ends with the climax and resolution. It is as though Orczy picked the climaxes out of longer (and non-existent) novels and set them all down, one after another, in a book of their own.
As in several of her other Pimpernel novels, Orczy uses the darkness of night and often the obscuring nature of fog and heavy rain, as well as the art of disguise, to explain the Pimpernel's success in mingling with his enemies unrecognized. I fear that she carries this stratagem to extremes, so that the absolute blackness of French nights begins to tax the reader's credulity. At any rate, it is a stratagem that is used so often that it becomes both predictable and trite.
For a bit of light reading and fun adventure, start with the first novel, THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL, and enjoy the sequels through LORD TONY'S WIFE. Then read THE LEAGUE OF THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL to complete the series but for absolutely no better reason. After even the poorer novels, this collection of instant conflicts and climaxes is not particularly satisfying. One can conclude only that Orczy had "run out of steam" in her Pimpernel adventure genre and was trying to eke out one final book before leaving her hero behind forever.
Fun Short Stories.......2000-01-28
League of the Scarlet Pimpernel is an entertaining collection of short stories about Sir Percy Blakeney's adverntures outwitting the French Revolutionary Government. And, among the stories "The Traitor" was probably the most interesting--- What would happen if the Scarlet Pimpernel had a traitor among his league? Would he escape with his life?
not what I expected.......1999-12-08
I was expecting a regular Scarlet Pimpernel novel, rather than a collection of Scarlet Pimpernel stories. I was disappointed with my selection. I had hoped to get more insight into the actual League, but the stories did not reveal any new information.
Book Description
ENDURING LITERATURE ILLUMINATED
BY PRACTICAL SCHOLARSHIP
EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES:
• A concise introduction that gives readers important background information
• A chronology of the author's life and work
• A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context
• An outline of key themes and plot points to help readers form their own interpretations
• Detailed explanatory notes
• Critical analysis, including contemporary and modern perspectives on the work
• Discussion questions to promote lively classroom and book group interaction
• A list of recommended related books and films to broaden the reader's experience
Enriched Classics offer readers affordable editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and insightful commentary. The scholarship provided in Enriched Classics enables readers to appreciate, understand, and enjoy the world's finest books to their full potential.
SERIES EDITED BY CYNTHIA BRANTLEY JOHNSON
Customer Reviews:
God Save the King!.......2007-08-11
The Scarlet Pimpernel is a classic novel, though it is hard to categorize. It is part romance, part adventure, part spy thriller, and part superhero fiction. All of these elements went into the pot and the resulting stew is extremely entertaining.
The book follows the adventures of Sir Percy Blakeney as he seeks to help French aristocrats escape the guillotine during the French Revolution. Since official English policy forbids this, Blakeney adopts a masked identity as the Scarlet Pimpernel to remain anonymous. The French, of course, detest this interference in their affairs and set out to trap and kill the Pimpernel at all costs. As part of his effort to deflect suspicion from himself, he plays the fool in every day life and he does it well. His own wife considers him a useless fop... and that's where the story really gets interesting.
I won't give away more of the plot, but she ends up following him into danger in an attempt to save him. This allows the most suspenseful section of the book to be told from Mrs. Blakeney's perspective. Her terror for her husband's fate is pure and adds to the tension considerably. If we saw it through the Pimpernel's eyes, it would doubtless be far more composed and nowhere near as suspenseful.
In closing, The Scarlet Pimpernel is well worth buying. It's laugh out loud funny, suspenseful, romantic, and generally quite a page-turner.
Product Description
Vocal Selections from "The Scarlet Pimpernel" contains notes from Frank Wildhorn and director Peter Hunt, Nan Knighton's "The Making of 'The Scarlet Pimpernel' documenting the eight-year journey to The Great White Way, a full song and story outline, and beautiful full-color photographs of the production and its stars. Includes the Top 40 Single hit recorded by Peabo Bryson and Linda Eder.
Customer Reviews:
Yeah well, I was kind of dissapionted........2007-07-26
The music on the soundtrack is SOOO good. It is one of the best musicals I have ever heard really! But this music book is not so hot. It looks like someone just threw it together one day. The bass clef usaully just has one note on it for a whole measure! Some of the sections don't even sound like the real music. I was really sad because I like the music a lot. The songs are in the right key, but the accompanyment is not worth the money, unless you plan on adding in your own chords.
La...but PRAYER?!.......2005-05-21
I recently played the musical accomaniment for this entire show in a local production. I fell absolutely in love with the music and have been singing along with the original and encore recordings since...Sir Percy's "Prayer" is always going to be my favorite. One may imagine my disappointment when I discovered Prayer was missing from the book! And "Madame Guillotine" is practically the equivalent to Jekyll and Hyde's thunderous "Facade" and should have definitely been included. Even the relatively short reprises of "When I Look at You" and "Where's the Girl?" would have been awesome additions! I love Pimpernel too much to rate this book anything less than a '4' but I'm crossing my fingers to soon see a new edition that includes EVERYTHING from the show. Even the new material from the Encore version!!
A great modern musical gets a great Vocal Selection book.......2001-05-03
Complete with color photos and information from the Director, Lyricist and Composer of The Scarlet Pimpernel. This is one of the most informative vocal selection books I have bought in a while.
However the importance is in the songs that are featured. The only notable absence from the book is "Prayer". Yet all the great songs are there. From "Where's the Girl" to "Into the Fire" this book contains some great sings for different ranges. The piano accompaniment is quite good and does the job of accompanying the singer quite well. However it cannot compare to the original orchestral arrangement. The songs are almost exactly the same (singers interpretation causes differences) as those featured in The Original Broadway Recording of The Scarlet Pimpernel (Douglas Sills and Terrence Mann).
A great group of vocal arrangements are presented in this book and is highly recommended.
This is cool!.......1999-05-04
This score of the amazing musical was the BEST! I loved the arrangements and certain harmonizings that the arranger added. I have many of these "play" books, and this was one of the best! "The Scarlet Pimpernel" rocks!
Very Good Music.......1999-03-31
This was a really good book, the music is easy to play on the piano and it's just as pretty, if you like playing Broadway songs on an instrument, then you need this book!
Average customer rating:
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Scarlet Pimpernel, The (The Classic Collection)
Baroness Orczy
Manufacturer: Brilliance Audio on MP3-CD Lib Ed
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Binding: MP3 CD
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ASIN: 1596009489
Release Date: 2005-05-25 |
Book Description
Perhaps the most famous alias of all time, "The Scarlet Pimpernel" hides the identity of a British nobleman who, masked by various disguises, leads a band of young men to undermine the Reign of Terror after the French Revolution.
The Scarlet Pimpernel makes daring raid after daring raid into the heart of France to save aristocrats condemned to the guillotine. At each rescue, he leaves his calling card: a small, blood-red flower - a pimpernel - mocking the power of Robespierre and his Committee of Public Safety.
Having been told that his own wife was an informer who delivered an aristocrat into the hands of the Committee, the Scarlet Pimpernel must keep his identity and work a secret while he struggles against the love he feels for her. Until the day her own brother is taken prisoner...
Customer Reviews:
A page turning Classical and Somewhat Historical Read!.......2007-05-25
It occured to me Orczy was more invested in creating influential points in her saga than in strict accuracy. She decidedly invested in telling a good tale than in strict historical accuracy. Her sympathies are plainly (and understandably) with the aristocracy, and there are several distortions of historical record and characterization. In particular, the career of Chauvelin, the recurring villain of the series, is much altered; in fact, Bernard-Francois, Marquis de Chauvelin, survived the Revolutionary period to become an official under Napoleon I of France and a noted liberal Deputy under the Bourbon Dynasty, restored.
From the Book: It is set in 1792 and France is in the grip of a seething bloody revolution. Mobs roam the streets of Paris hunting down royalist. Every day hundreds die under the blade of Madame Guillotine. But in the hearts of the condemned nobility there remains one last vestige of hope: Renounced for his unparreled bravery and his clever disguises, the Pimpernel's identity remains as much a mystery to his sworn enemy, the ruthless French agent, as to his devoted admirer, the beautiful Lady Marguerite Blakely.
First published in 1905, The Scarlet Pimpernel is an irresistible novel of love, gallantry, and swashbuckling adventure. Enjoy! I did.
A Fun Romp in a Field of Swashbuckling Predictability.......2006-03-18
THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL, published in 1905, derives from an even earlier play, and the reader can see it easily revert to the earlier form in his mind's eye as he is carried from plot to plot, mystery to mystery, and intrigue to intrigue. In becoming a short novel, the plot has in no way lost its entertaining histrionic attributes.
The story is essentially a mixture of imaginative intrigue and swashbuckling adventure. Written purely to entertain, it achieves its ends well enough. The character of the Pimpernel is, of course, not to be taken seriously, for his adventures, successes and escapes in the face of determined opposition are incredible. He simply cannot be vanquished, and his cunning is always a step ahead of that of his enemies. He is of the genre of Rafael Sabatini's heroes such as the Sea Hawk and Captain Blood, though he is no copy of them, for he has his own unique personality. As do Sabatini's swashbucklers, he does, predictably, win his fair lady by story's end.
In short, the reader never fears that the Pimpernel will win out in every situation, yet the odds seem so stacked against him that one cannot but wonder whether or not his luck is about to change! It is this current of uncertainty beating against the reassurance and security that one feels in the presence of the indefatigable Pimpernel that brings tension to the story and leads the reader ever forward through its pages.
If I must find something in Baroness Orczy's work to criticize, it would be that her use of language, while assuredly correct, is neither imaginative nor creative. The exclamations and expressions of her characters become rapidly predictable, even repetitious at times. The language is not plodding exactly, but neither does it excite the reader. The speech of Orczy's characters as well as the narrative descriptions and expositions of the narrator are rather flat; there is simply no linguistic excitement in her writing. The second criticism I would levy is that the pronouncements of the horrors of the French First Republic under Robespierre are all but unceasing. Not to excuse its excesses or to make light of its copious use of the guillotine, but I found the too-frequent "Republic bashing" tedious after a while. The loathing becomes hyperbolic.
The female protagonist becomes a bit annoying, too, I'm afraid, but is probably an appropriate heroine for the time in which she was created. Her intentions are noble enough, but she is of the "weaker sex" and unwittingly creates problems for herself and others. On several occasions, she foolishly acts to the detriment of her friends; indeed, her remarks send the entire St Cyr family to the guillotine. The strong heroine had yet to make her appearance when Orczy wrote.
Still, its uninspired language, predictability and negative hyperbole notwithstanding, the novel remains an entertaining read. Now and then, a reader needs to be able to relax in the assurance that a swashbuckling hero will overcome all odds and win the day. THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL provides such relaxation while definitely avoiding boredom and is a rational expenditure of one's reading time. If I cannot recommend it "enthusiastically," I can at least recommend it just because it's fun.
La! Delightful!.......2005-10-24
The Scarlet Pimpernel is truly a magnificent book. For something that looks, at first glance, to be an action-adventure novel, it is surprisingly character-driven. The man for whom the book is titled is not, in fact, the primary figure in the piece, but rather focuses on the incomparable character of Marguerite. The tale is wonderfully romantic -- Percy and Marguerite battle with pride and passion to such a degree, and with such vitality, that the reader can't help but weep for them. And aside from the romance, the book is full of intrigue, suspense, and excitement -- definitely something you'll want to read over and over again.
Beyond a classic!.......2005-08-21
As I was browsing in a local bookstore for something new to read, I accidentally came over the Scarlet Pimpernel. At first, I had put the book down numerous of times, despite the price. Somehow at first, it did not appeal to me as much, even if the first page caught my eyes, but how I was wrong. It was amazingly written with an ardent array of mystery, romance, and suspense. It was everything that you expect from a book!
The characters are just simply memorable and unforgettable. The book kept me up late at night, urging me to read till the last page. An unbelievable piece of work!
Great Edition.......2005-06-26
This is one of my favorite books. I love the story and was excited to finally own my own copy. This edition is really great because it is lightly annotated. There are one or two footnotes on just about every page, defining french terms or just uncommon words. This makes reading that much more enjoyable because one understands more.
If you enjoy the book, there is a musical with an amazing soundtrack by the same name.
Customer Reviews:
Super Reader.......2007-08-30
Again, this is not a full length novel, but a group of shorter works. So the title is apt, as there are indeed several adventures of Sir Percy and the gang to be found in these pages.
A couple of the opening paragraphs are pretty funny:
"You really are impossible, Sir Percy! Here are we ladies raving, simply
raving, about this latest exploit of the gallant Scarlet Pimpernel, and
you do naught but belittle his prowess. Lady Blakeney, I entreat, will
you not add your voice to our chorus of praise, and drown Sir Percy's
scoffing in an ocean of eulogy?"
and
"Oh!" he said, "do not ask me to inculcate hero-worship into this mauvis
sujet. If you ladies cannot convert him to your views, how can I...a
mere man...?"
And His Highness shrugged his shoulders. There were few entertainments
he enjoyed more than seeing his friend Sir Percy Blakeney badgered by
the ladies on the subject of their popular and mysterious hero, the
Scarlet Pimpernel.
Adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel.......2002-07-14
During the year 1792, while the French Revolution is at its peak, a mysterious young Englishman vows to rescue innocent people from their death at the guillotine. Each time he succeeds in sneaking someone out of France, he leaves a note signed with a little flower called the Scarlet Pimpernel. No one can identify this mysterious person, but a French spy has sworn to bring this meddlesome man to his death. Meanwhile, a beautiful, young, French exile, named Marguerite Blakeney marries a tall dull Englishman. The plot thickens as the French spy, Chauvelin, tricks Marguerite into betraying her own husband. But when the Scarlet Pimpernel gets caught in a trap, he always has a daring plan to get out.
I liked the book because it was very exciting and the characters seemed incredibly real. Just when you thought you knew what would happen, the author, Orczy, would change things around. Also, whenever one of the characters was in danger, I was scared for them and had to keep reading until they were out of trouble. Overall, I loved the book and would definitely recommend it to someone else. It was cleverly written and full of intrigue.
Percy Rocks!.......1999-11-30
"Adventures" is a collection of short stories about the exploits of the Pimpernel and his league. They are wonderfully entertaining and Pimpernel addicts will be in heaven! Lots of disguises and narrow escapes here. I particularly enjoyed "Fie, Sir Percy!" The prince of dandies falls asleep during a recitation of the pimpernel's adventures, bringing the playful wrath of the ton down on his immaculate head.
This adventure will weave a spell around any reader!.......1999-11-04
This novel is a treasure because of the way that the author protrays the hardships of the nobility during the French Revolution. The book mainly focuses on the Scarlet Pimpernel, his wife, and the villian who is a spy for France's Republic. The Scarlet Pimpernel, in short, is a rescuer of the nobility of France. He and his nineteen comrades take numerous and daring trips accross the English channel to help unfortunate and innocent people escape the clutches of the dreaded guilloutine. His wife unknowingly places him in danger and then when she realizes that, she risks her life to find him and warn him of the death that awaits him. Read this novel and throw yourself into a time that is past where heros exist and love is everlasting.
Customer Reviews:
The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel Review.......2007-07-11
Suspenseful and realistic, The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel leaves the reader wanting more. It all seems so real. Could there really have been an Englishman who helped aristocrats escape out of Paris during the French Revolution? Each of the Scarlet Pimpernel's plans actually could have worked. Finding out the ingenious schemes the Scarlet Pimpernel used was my favorite part of the book. The plans the Scarlet Pimpernel used to get the aristocrats safely out of Paris included several disguises and even fake passports. I would recommend this book to people who enjoy short adventure stories. These stories include tricky English spies, determined French patriots, scared French aristocrats, and severe consequences.
Book Description
It was a mere flash! One of memory's swiftly effaced pictures, when she shows us for the fraction of a second indelible pictures from out our past. Chauvelin, in that same second, while his own eyes were closed and Robespierre's fixed upon him, also saw the lonely cliffs of Calais, heard the same voice singing "God save the King!" the volley of musketry, the despairing cries of Marguerite Blakeney; and once again he felt the keen and bitter pang of complete humiliation and defeat.
Download Description
On! ever on! in that wild, surging torrent; sowing the wind of anarchy, of terrorism, of lust of blood and hate, and reaping a hurricane of destruction and of horror.
Customer Reviews:
Super Reader.......2007-08-30
You can't catch him! A French agent is sent to England undercover as a French diplomat, to try and capture Percy Blakeney (or, actually, his alter-ego, the Scarlet Pimpernel) and get him back to France where they can lop him for all the humiliation and trouble that he has caused.
Said dodgy Frenchman with the help of a sneaky French actress manages to get his hands on Marguerite, and has her in prison.
This leaves the Pimpernel to come up with a plan that will make the Frenchies look silly again.
Definitely an entertaining adventure.
THE ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL.......2006-09-02
The Elusive Pimpernel follows closely on the heals of the first book of the series, The Scarlet Pimpernel. It seems to me that Baroness Orczy was pouring out her own heart feelings through that of Lady Blackney. Her excellent use of discription makes your own heart ache till near bursting with devotion, love, passion and even fear. There is never a dull moment in this wonderfully wriiten book. I love it and will read it over and over.
"They seek him here, they seek him there, that demmed elusive pimpernel!".......2006-05-10
THE ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL, the third book in the Pimpernel series by Baroness Orczy, thoroughly establishes the predominant feature that the reader has come to expect in Orczy's novels: faultless cunning and adventurous bravado by the heroic Pimpernel that never fails to foil the nefarious schemes of his enemies, the revolutionaries of Robespierre's 18th century French Republic.
The reader also knows to expect a bit of archaic word usage, such as "lanthorn" for "lantern," as well as a little French slang here and there that will not succumb to most translating dictionaries, such as "calotin," which, by virtue of the context, I take to be a derogatory term for a churchman. Orczy also throws a few quite good but somewhat uncommon terms into her prose, such as "Columbine," a stock character from Italian drama. Merely because I generally feel rather cheated if I miss the full implication of an author's words, I found it comforting to have one of my English dictionaries as well as my French translating dictionary near at hand while reading Orczy, although it is quite possible to enjoy the plot without recourse to such references, especially if one is adept at grasping the general meaning of unusual words from their context in the story.
As in her other novels, Orczy's characters are stereotypes and are "flat"; that is, they remain the same throughout the story and do not undergo any particular development or change. Sir Percy Blakeney remains the stalwart, unshakable and indestructible adventurer throughout. His arch enemy, Monsieur Chauvelin, begins and ends as a dark, despicable creature who constantly connives to bring down Sir Percy. Lady Marguerite Blakeney plays the part of every significant female figure in Orczy's novels: She means well ands her motivations are impeccable, but her "feminine weakness," the fatal flaw that she suffers merely because of her sex, leads her into unwittingly betraying her husband and placing them both in such jeopardy that nothing short of the audacity and swashbuckling daring of the Scarlet Pimpernel can possibly save them.
As stereotyped characters, the actors who populate Orczy's novel are all somewhat larger than life. Sir Percy is invariably heroic and gently but firmly conquering. Lady Blakeney is invariably the pure, honorable but weak woman. Chauvelin and other leaders of the French revolution are invariably terrorists and anarchists. Abbe Foucquet is invariably the naive old priest who constantly murmurs his Paters and Aves in good times and bad. The attraction of Orczy's novels lies firmly in their suspenseful plots, not in the roundedness or the development of their characters.
Thinking of her depiction of the old priest as well as some descriptions in the preceding novel, I WILL REPAY, I find Orczy's attitude toward religion to be interesting. On the one hand, she depicts churchmen as naive and guileless innocents, rather useless and, at best, irrelevant in the worldly struggle that surrounds them. On the other hand, she portrays the revolutionaries in the harshest of lights and sarcastically observes that they have replaced the good God (le bon dieu) with the "Goddess of Reason," who, in being represented by an incompetent actress during her inaugural procession, is shown to be false. Hence, we find criticism both of those who would nay-say the existence of God and of those who would guide the devotions of his followers.
While it is not absolutely necessary to have read the two preceding novels in order to enjoy THE ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL, the earlier works do establish the background for certain relationships, and a few events in them do receive occasional references in this novel. One's understanding of the third book in the series will certainly be enhanced by an acquaintance with the earlier books. On a final note, which I do hope piques my readers' curiosities, if one is not aware of the differences between the songs "Ca Ira" and "La Marseillaise," a brief Internet search will bring up the historical backgrounds, words and tunes of the two, enabling one to appreciate much more fully Orczy's references to them.
In brief, THE ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL continues its author's romp through the adventurous fields of a France racked by revolution and invaded by "that demmed elusive pimpernel." It's lightweight reading that mixes fun and relaxation in equal amounts. If we can think of some books on serious scientific or social topics as "classroom reading," then the Pimpernel books are our "recess reading" and should be enjoyed as such.
Fairly good sequel..........2002-11-02
"Elusive" isn't my favorite Pimpernel sequel, but it's not bad at all either.
First, the bad: While I can understand that Marguerite is a woman in love, some of her stupidity at the beginning bordered on unbelievable (I don't mean this as an offense to Margot, who is one of my favorite characters, but if you read this book, you'll understand what I mean when I say she makes a bad decision). As usual, Percy becomes a secondary character in his own books, and that bothers me. Lastly, the choice Chauvelin gives Marguerite and Percy gets to be a little too much.
The good:
When Percy is around, he really shines. He has some really great moments in this book (which I won't spoil). The reader gets an idea of some of the emotions that are going on behind the facade. Also, "Elusive" has much more of a climax than some of the other Pimpernel books, which is a nice relief. Lastly, Desiree Candeille is an interesting character.
In all, I would recommend Eldorado between Elusive Pimpernel, but it's still a good read anyway.
The Scarlet Pimpernel does it again!.......2002-03-19
What a great book! It's a worthy follow-up to the original, with plenty of excitement, loads of humor, world-class table-turning and narrow escapes.
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The Scarlet Pimpernel
Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
Manufacturer: Quiet Vision Pub
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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