The Scarlet Pimpernel

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emma Orczy (baroness Emma Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála "Emmuska" Orczy de Orczi), a British writer of the Hungarian origin. During the French Revolution a battlefield Englishman Percy Blakeney (with a nickname the Scarlet Pimpernel) rescues aristocrats from the guillotine right in front of their executioners. This novel is considered to be the first one in the "masked avenger" genre with its such followers as Zorro, Batman and other Supermen.