"Originally published as Le roi au masque d'or in 1892."--Title page verso.

The secret influence on generations of writers, from Guillaume Apollinaire and Jorge Luis Borges to Roberto Bolaño and J. Rodolfo Wilcock, Marcel Schwob (1867-1905) was as versed in the street slang of medieval thieves as he was in the poetry of Whitman (whom he translated into French). Paul Valéry and Alfred Jarry both dedicated their first books to him, and in doing so paid tribute to the man who could evoke both the intellect of Leonardo da Vinci and the anarchy of Ubu Roi.