Captain Fracasse

A penniless young baron sits in his ruined château waiting to die of pride, until a troupe of strolling players asks for shelter — and by morning he has joined them as Captain Fracasse, the braggart in the mask. Gautier trained as a painter and led the Romantics at the riotous premiere of Hernani in 1830; he took twenty years over this book, and it is the most affectionate thing ever written about actors. Fifty-nine plates, from David Teniers the Younger to Edvard Munch, follow the same peasant and horse-borne world of the story through three centuries of painting.