First published in 1905, "The Scarlet Pimpernel" was written by Baroness Emmuska Orczy. The novel is the first in a series of tales that follows the fictional main character infamously known as the Scarlet Pimpernel.

The story is set at the time of the French Revolution, which occurred in the latter part of the eighteenth century. This revolt involved the overthrow of the French monarchy. A notorious Englishman sympathetic to the crisis in the aristocratic ranks helped sneak French royals out of the country to safety across the English Channel. This Englishman was known by the name of the Scarlet Pimpernel because upon making a clean escape from the French patrols, he would leave a note describing the caper, and it would be signed with a red, star-shaped flower the English called a scarlet pimpernel.