Don Faustino Lopez de Mendoza, scion of an illustrious but impoverished family of the highest nobility, believes himself destined for great accomplishments in the literary world, sees himself as a poet of the first rank, and immerses himself in grand, if not grandiose, illusions. While living in a provincial Andalusian town and dreaming of triumphing in Madrid's artistic circles, Faustino embarks on a discovery of love with three women. How he extricates himself from each relationship and meets his sad end constitutes the denouement of this searching novel that depicts the deleterious effects of the Romantic malaise that swept through western Europe in the early part of the nineteenth century.

With an introduction by Agnes Moncy.