The Romance of the Forest

The Romance of the Forest (1791) by British author and poet Ann Radcliffe is one of the definitive examples of the Gothic novel. Radcliffe’s books influenced many later Romantic and Victorian writers in Europe and the United States, and several of the tropes she relied on became standard for the genre. While her first novel, The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne (1789), and second, A Sicilian Romance (1790), were not widely noted, The Romance of the Forest helped establish Radcliffe’s reputation. Her next novels, The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) and The Italian (1797), were best sellers. Her contemporaries generally considered The Romance of the Forest Radcliffe’s best book. Set in 17th-century France, the romance blends the signature Gothic elements of terror, suspense, and pathos into the tale of a young woman, Adeline, whose protectors endeavor to shield her from the villainous Marquis de Montalt. While the action focuses on Adeline’s escape from threats, falling in love with a knight named Theodore, and discovering her true identity, the novel weaves strands of Romanticism and 18th-century philosophy into its discussions about human character. It explores themes of The Power of Imagination, The Effect of Landscape on Emotion, and Self-Interest, Self-Preservation, and the Insistence on Virtue. 

This guide refers to the Oxford World’s Classics 1991 paperback edition. 

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of sexual violence and harassment, incest, death by suicide, death, illness, and racism.  

Plot Summary

In 17th-century France, a gentleman named Pierre La Motte flees Paris to escape persecution for a crime. When he stops to ask directions on a dark night, a stranger in a remote cottage produces a young woman and charges La Motte to take her far away. Moved by her plight, La Motte and his wife take Adeline on their journey. When they discover a ruined abbey deep within the Forest of Fontanville, La Motte decides it will be safe to stay. There are rumors that a man was held prisoner and later murdered at the abbey, and the villagers believe it is haunted. La Motte hopes this reputation will provide further protection from discovery. When he explores the abbey further, he finds a human skeleton in a chest hidden in the oldest part of the abbey. La Motte decides not to share this information with the others, who include his wife, Adeline, and two servants.

Adeline reveals her history. After her mother died, she was raised in a convent but begged her father not to compel her to take vows. He escorted her from the convent, but his compatriots then imprisoned Adeline in the cottage where La Motte found her. She has no idea why she was sent away but is grateful to La Motte and Madame for being her benefactors. The household takes up residence in the abbey, refurbishing the medieval ruin to become partially habitable.

Instead of adapting, however, La Motte begins to absent himself from the abbey for long periods. Madame suspects he is having an affair with Adeline, who often takes walks through the forest. When a soldier comes to the abbey, La Motte initially hides the family in terror until he realizes the man is his son, Louis. Louis quickly falls in love with Adeline, though she does not return his affection. Instead, a different young man Adeline meets in the forest intrigues her. 

On a stormy night, a group of men on horseback arrives at the abbey. Their leader is the Marquis de Montalt, who owns the place. He allows La Motte to remain living there and becomes keenly interested in Adeline. Adeline, in turn, is pleased to discover that the young man she saw in the forest is a soldier in the Marquis’s employ. Theodore is handsome, well-mannered, and courteous, but he tells Adeline that she is in danger and arranges to meet in the forest so he can explain. When Theodore never appears for their meeting, Adeline wonders what danger he means.

Adeline has a haunting dream in which she explores the depths of the abbey and witnesses a man’s death. Soon after, she discovers a door behind the tapestry in her room and explores it to find the rooms from her dream. She stumbles across a manuscript that turns out to be the diary of the man who was held prisoner at the abbey. The account of his sufferings moves Adeline.

Adeline’s peace of mind is further threatened when the Marquis declares that he is in love with Adeline and wants to marry her. Adeline knows his wife is living, and the Marquis hopes to make her his mistress. La Motte urges her to accept the Marquis’s protection, as La Motte owes him a debt. Adeline refuses and plans with Peter, La Motte’s servant, to escape. Instead, a servant of the Marquis tricks Adeline and carries her off to the Marquis’s chateau. Adeline refuses the Marquis’s advances and climbs out the window, where she becomes lost in the dark gardens of the estate. At first fearful when she sees someone approaching, she realizes the man is Theodore, who came to rescue her. He drives them away in his carriage, and Adeline hopes they are safe.

Their refuge is short-lived as officers from Theodore’s regiment come to arrest him for deserting his post. When he fights them, refusing to abandon Adeline, Theodore is injured. As Adeline tends to him, she falls in love with the noble young man who adores her. When the Marquis arrives, Theodore fights and injures him. Theodore is taken away to prison, and Adeline is returned to the abbey and La Motte. She fears she will once again suffer the Marquis’s attentions, but he plans a worse fate: The Marquis blackmails La Motte into murdering Adeline.

At the moment, La Motte cannot go through with the deed. Instead, he charges Peter to take Adeline out of the country. Peter takes her to his home village of Leloncourt in Savoy, where, due to illness, Adeline is brought into the household of the kind cleric, La Luc. La Luc’s lively and sweet-tempered daughter, Clara, becomes Adeline’s friend, and the household enjoys the visit of a French knight, Monsieur Verneuil. When La Luc’s physician suggests he travel to Nice and then Montpellier to regain his health, Adeline goes with him.

In Montpellier, Louis La Motte approaches Adeline. He has befriended Theodore and is traveling to Leloncourt to inform Theodore’s father that he has been sentenced to death. Adeline is grieved at this news and astonished to discover that Theodore is La Luc’s son. At once, the family sets off to the prison where Theodore is being held.

When La Luc fails to obtain a pardon from the king, it seems as if Theodore will be executed. Adeline falls ill with distress, feeling she is to blame for Theodore’s sentence. Louis arrives with news from Paris that puts the execution on hold. In the course of La Motte’s trial for an earlier robbery of the Marquis, which he committed while living at the abbey, the men who put Adeline in La Motte’s care have surfaced. They testify that she is the natural daughter of the Marquis, and he intended to have her murdered.

Adeline travels to Paris to attend the trial, which reveals more surprises. The man whom Adeline thought her father, Jean d’Aunoy, was actually in the Marquis’s employ. He was hired to kidnap, imprison, and then murder a man who turns out to be Henry, the previous Marquis de Montalt. The current Marquis, Philippe, was Henry’s half-brother and responsible both for ordering his murder and sending away his infant daughter, who turns out to be Adeline. Henry was held at the abbey before his death, and Adeline realizes the manuscript she found in the abbey was written by her father.

With his crimes exposed, the Marquis takes poison rather than face punishment. When Adeline is declared the new heir, she begs the king for pardons for Theodore and La Motte. La Motte, who repents of his crimes, is exiled with his wife to England. D’Aunoy is hanged. After a period of mourning her father, Adeline marries Theodore. Clara marries Monsieur Verneil, and they all return to the neighborhood of Leloncourt. There, La Luc’s health has been restored. La Luc once again presides over a peaceful countryside, where Adeline and Theodore live in the happy society of their family and friends, including Louis La Motte.