About the Author
Marquis de Sade’s name alone brings to mind the darkest creations of the human imagination, although the man remains a mysterious figure for most readers. Sade was born in Paris in 1740, the son of a minor noble, and as a young boy, he lived at the royal court. At the age of twenty-three, Sade was incarcerated for the first time, probably for acting out a pathological sexual practice. By the time he died in 1814, at seventy-four, Sade had spent thirty years in various institutions and jails, including the legendary Bastille and the infamous Charenton asylum where he was sent for having written Justine.
