{"product_id":"9789635222452","title":"The Abbess of Castro","description":"Brigands, convents under siege, a prince who'd do Machiavelli proud...This adventurous novella from a writer famous for far longer works is a singular take on love and war in Renaissance Italy.\u003cp\u003eClaiming to be translating from sixteenth-century manuscripts, Stendhal tells the story of two doomed young lovers-one the daughter of the wealthiest man in the district, the other a brigand. It's a genuinely moving tale of impossible love-with plenty of swordfights thrown in-that's unique in Stendhal's oeuvre, not least in its portrait of an intelligent woman who, ill-starred in love, turns to worldly power. There's also some sparkling analysis of the conditions that produced the great art of the Renaissance.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut The Abbess of Castro-first published in the same year as Stendhal's novel The Charterhouse of Parma-is also characterized by themes that pervade his longer novels: political and familial machinations, a profoundly unsentimental view of war, ambitious individuals undone by passion.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Booklassic","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47183555264752,"sku":"9789635222452","price":0.96,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9789635222452_p0.jpg?v=1763682881","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9789635222452","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}