Alexandros Papadiamantis (1851-1911), one of the greatest European short story writers, will begin his writing career as a novelist.
"The Merchants of Nations" (1882) is the second of the author's three novels. The action is set between 1199 and 1207, that is, shortly before and shortly after the Fall of Constantinople to the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade.
Is it a historical novel, concerning the conflict between Venetians and Greeks in the Aegean? Or perhaps a novel "with a position," which defends the Greek Orthodox East against the Roman Catholic West?
It is primarily an astute and penetrating study of romantic passion, carnal desire, and longing. Augusta leaves her husband Ioannis Mouchtras and follows the Venetian Marco Sanouto, not because she is unhappy with the first and wants to be happy with the second, but because she is captive to an irresistible, literally deadly romantic desire.
In complete mental weakness to do anything else, Augusta will follow the path of her passion to the end, until death, her own certainly fatal death: She is burned alive, alone on her lover's flagship.
[Excerpt from the text on the back cover of the edition]
