The Immoralist ISBN=9780141182995

'To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one's freedom' - Andre Gide. Michel had been a blindfold scholar until, newly married, he contracted tuberculosis. His will to recover brings self-discovery and the growing desire to rebel against his background of culture, decency and morality. But the freedom from constraints that Michel finds on his restless travels is won at great cost. And freedom itself, he finds, can be a burden. Gide's novel examines the inevitable conflicts that arise when a pleasure seeker challenges conventional society and, without moralizing, it raises complex issues involving the extent of personal responsibility.

Andre Gide was born in Paul Guillaume in Paris. He was author of over 50 volumes of fiction, poetry, plays, criticism, biography, belles lettres, and translations. Among his best-known works are FRUITS OF THE EARTH and THE COUNTERFEITERS, his translations of OEDIPUS and HAMLET, and his JOURNAL. He received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1947. Gide died in 1951.