The Scarlet Pimpernel

by Baroness Orczy

ISBN : n/a

First published 1937

192 pages

Publisher: University of London Press Ltd

Illustrations by Richard Kennedy

5/5 Stars

A 1966 impression of this English classic, first published in 1937. The Scarlet Pimpernel was the first masked hero, ahead of Zorro or the Lone Ranger and late incarnations such as Batman. The eponymous flower is shown below;

This is one of the strengths of the book. It is based on historical facts. Facts that can be checked and verified. It also encompasses the horrors of the French Revolution, although we never read of the horrors in graphic terms, we are always reminded of the carnage happening just across ‘La manche’. This is historical fiction, before the term was popularised in the later 20th Century.

The novel’s great strength is in its pacing, the creation of dramatic tension, with a faux resolution and then further heightening the reader’s apprehension. This is done, not through fights and battle scenes, but through the medium of the English social scene. At aristocratic balls, where political under-currents are never far from the surface and one word out of place can lead to a person’s demise, kidnap or worse, being spirited across to France.

The novel is also ahead of its time, in that it is written from the point of view of Marguerite Blakeney, now married to an English Lord, but previously from a French aristocratic family. A fierce and independent heroine, one suspects there is something about Baroness Orczy in Marguerite. Although we support the Scarlet Pimpernel, we empathise with Marguerite and see the action through her eyes. A strong husband and wife team, rare in fiction, but portrayed with sympathy and emotion.