‘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 18th-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: how reliable a witness is Des Grieux, Manon’s lover, whose tale he narrates? Is Manon a thief and a whore, the image of love itself, or a thoroughly modern woman? Prévost is careful to leave the ambiguities unresolved, and to lay bare the disorders of passion.