Reissue of the decadent fin-de-siecle examination of bourgeois Parisian society, masochism and sexuality, with the action shifting to China in the second half. Initially published in 1898.
Octave Mirbeau (1848-1917) was a radical journalist who is best known today for his decadent classic, Torture Garden and his satire of Parisian society in the wake of the Dreyfus affair, The Diary of a Chambermaid. His first novel Le Calvaire was a succes de scandale followed a year later by Abbe Jules. Together with Sebastien Roch these novels form a very powerful indictment of French society as seen from an anarchist's perspective and are Mirbeau's revenge on society for his upbringing.
