Bernardin de Saint-Pierre

Pablo y Virginia es una novela de amor. Los protagonistas son dos amigos de la infancia que se enamoran inocentemente pero terminan muriendo de forma tr gica cuando naufraga el barco en el que viajan (un hecho real que sucedi en el a o 1744). La historia est ambientada en la isla Mauricio durante el gobierno colonial franc s. El lugar se llamaba entonces Isla de Francia, y el autor lo hab a visitado. Escrita en v speras de la Revoluci n Francesa, la novela es considerada la mejor obra de Bernardin. Muestra el destino de los hijos de la naturaleza corrompidos por el sentimentalismo falso y artificial que prevalec a en la poca entre la lite francesa.

Bernardin de Saint-Pierre is for most people the author of one book: Paul et Virginie. This new edition of his play Empsaël et Zoraïde, presented in a modernised spelling, makes available a considerably more muscular text which illustrates his abolitionist stance through its central irony: the masters are black and their slaves white, joining forces in the antislavery debate which reached its height with the French Revolution. Bernardin thus introduces into it a rare element of humour which, had his play ever been performed, would have made his audiences sit up and think. This will be of interest to scholars and senior students interested in Black Studies, the French Enlightenment and the literature of revolution.