Baroness Emmuska Orczy

The Scarlet Pimpernel is a play and adventure novel by Emma Orczy set during the Reign of Terror following the start of the French Revolution. The title character, Sir Percy Blakeney, represents the original "hero with a secret identity" that inspired subsequent literary creations such as Don Diego de la Vega (Zorro) and Bruce Wayne (Batman).

Baroness Emma Magdolna Roz lia M ria Jozefa Borb la "Emmuska" Orczy de Orczi (23 September 1865 - 12 November 1947) was a British novelist, playwright and artist of Hungarian noble origin. She is most known for her series of novels featuring the Scarlet Pimpernel. Set in Holland in 1623/1624, The Laughing Cavalier, by British novelist Baroness Orczy, revolves around Percy Blake, a foreign adventurer and ancestor of the Scarlet Pimpernel who goes by the name Diogenes. Diogenes, we are told by Orczy, is the real subject of the famous painting The Laughing Cavalier by Frans Hals. The son of an English Nobleman and a Dutch woman, his father abandoned his mother after Diogenes was born, and he was brought up by Hals in Haarlem. He has spent his life fighting in various battles as a mercenary for hire, but now, along with his two sidekicks - fellow 'philosophers' - Socrates and Pythagoras, he is back in Haarlem, penniless and looking for entertainment. The book is followed by The First Sir Percy. (wikipedia.org