"When Matthew Lewis#25;s The Monk was published in 1796, readers were shocked by this gripping and horrific novel. Lewis#25;s story, which drove the House of Commons--of which he was a member--to deem him licentious and perverse, follows the abbot Ambrosio as he is tempted into a world of incest, murder, and torture by a young girl who has concealed herself in his monastery disguised as a boy."--
