The Phantom of the Opera

• A new translation of Leroux's classic Gothic melodrama, the original novel behind Andrew Lloyd Webber's famous musical.
• A terrific story set in the Paris Opera House, that combines mystery, crime, adventure, detection, and tortured love, in a sparkling translation from the prize-winning editor and translator of Dumas.
• The only edition to combine a new translation and full editorial material which sheds light on aspects of the novel that intrigue readers.
• The introduction considers Leroux's life and career, the serialized fiction genre of which he was the last great exponent, and makes a case for the book as a work of considerable literary craft.
• Appendix on the construction of the Paris Opera helps set the novel in its architectural context.
• Notes explain allusions and provide illuminating contextual information.

Readership: Readers of popular literature, fantasy, fans of the stage show; students of popular literature, literature in translation, French studies, popular culture, the gothic, film studies.

Gaston Leroux

David Coward writes widely on the history, literature, and culture of France. A regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement, London Review of Books, and national newspapers, he won the Scott-Moncrieff Prize for Translation in 1996. He is the author of A History of French Literature (Blackwell, 2002), and for Oxford World's Classics has translated and edited works by Dumas, Diderot, Sade, and Beaumarchais.