Marguerite Yourcenar

Published to great acclaim in France in 1993, this collection is not only a delight for Marguerite Yourcenar fans but a welcome port of entry for any reader not yet familiar with the author's lengthier, more demanding works. The sole published work of fiction by Yourcenar yet to be translated into English, this …

These three tales are set in the Renaissance. Nathanael, the protagonist of "An Obscure Man" is innocent and shaped by his suffering. In "A Lovely Morning" Nathanael's son Lazarus escapes his tutelage to join a group of actors. The final story, "Anna, Soror" in an account of passion in Naples.

Set in the Baltic provinces in the aftermath of World War I, Coup de Grace tells the story of an intimacy that grows between three young people hemmed in by civil war: Erick, a Prussian fighting with the White Russians against the Bolsheviks; Conrad, his best friend from childhood; and Sophie, whose unrequited love …