The Story of the Chevalier Des Grieux and Manon Lescaut
The sweetness of her glance,or rather my evil star already in its ascendant and drawing me to my ruin,did not allow me to hesitate for a moment. So begins the story of Manon Lescaut,a tale of passion and betrayal,of delinquency and misalliance,which moves from early eighteenth-century Paris--with its theatres,assemblies,and gaming-houses-via prison and deportation to a tragic denouement in the treeless wastes of Louisiana. It is one of the great love stories,and also one of the most enigmatic: