Choderlos de Laclos had an interesting career - he was involved in a plot to dethrone King Louis and Marie Antoinette, was for a time a Jacobin, was appointed Governor General of French possessions in India in 1792 and ended his career as one of Napoleon’s minor generals. He is remembered, however, for his only work of fiction that, when published in 1782, caused a scandal throughout French society, while no less a personality than Andre Gide said that Les Liaisons was one of the ten most important books in French literature.

Les Liaisons Dangereuses chronicles the competition between Madame de Merteuil and Valmont to seduce and corrupt an innocent - the Chevalier Danceny and Cecile Volanges respectively. The novel caused a scandal because it brought to the public eye the well known, but hush-hush affairs of the aristocratic circles. On the face of it, the novel is simply about revenge: Valmont, the former lover of the Marquise, sets out to prove that he is better in the arts of seduction, than her and so the pair jostle for a position of sexual supremacy in society. Valmont tries to deflower the 15 year old Cecile Volanges, while the Marquise de Merteuil plumps for Cecile‘s paramour, the Chevavlier Danceny. The course of the novel - in letter form - follows first their joint efforts at conquering the couple - for sport - and then, as relationships strain, their singular attempts to outdo each other with their exploits. Despite the outrage caused at the time, Les Liaisons Dangereuses has a traditional morality story feel to it. The two protagonists, while destroying the lives of those around them, follow the traditional route of malefactors. Evil turns on itself and so they destroy each other - with the resultant death of Volanges in a duel with Danceny and (although an unsatisfactory outcome) Madame de Merteuil is bankrupted, ostracised and afflicted with the pox. None of the characters emerge unscathed, a salutary warning that no good comes of such behaviour as Valmont and Mme Merteuil manage to ruin not only themselves, but several innocents around them. As Gide said at the time, “There is no doubt as to his (C de L) being hand in glove with Satan. Yet this book, diabolical as its inspiration is, turns out, like every work of profound observation and exact expression, to contain, without the author’s desire, much more instruction on morals than many a well-intentioned treatise.”