Leone Leoni

Leone Leoni relates the dangerous passion of a woman for an Italian nobleman, whose personality closely mixes great virtues and destructive vices, including a passion for gambling. The plot begins in Venice, in the early 19th century. Don Aleo is in love with Juliette Ruyter, a penniless woman he supports. Juliette is haunted by the memory of an old love that she struggles to forget and declines Don Aleo's proposals. He asks her to tell him in detail about his passion for the unsympathetic Leone Leoni, an aristocrat who leads a life of vices and took her with him and Juliette accepts and tells him their story.

George Sand (1804-1876) is a pen name of Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, a French novelist, memoirist, and journalist. She was one of the most popular writers in Europe in her lifetime, being more renowned than both Victor Hugo and Honoré de Balzac. Sand is recognized as one of the most notable writers of the European Romantic era.