A classic
swashbuckling novel by
Anthony Hope, first published in
1894, and English literature's answer to
Alexandre Dumas classics such as
The Count of Monte Cristo. The story of
mistaken identity was successfully translated to the silver screen twice, and its fictional setting of
Ruritania has become a byword for
royal ceremony laced with
intrigue.
Zenda's
MacGuffin is the striking resemblance between the
stiff upper lipped hero,
Rudolf Rassendyll, and the ruling
Elphberg dynasty of Ruritania, the result of King
Rudolf III's adventures on the
wrong side of the blankets during a state visit to England in
1733. The Elphberg blood makes itself known every so often in a characteristically shaped nose and
red hair, which, for all we know, will eventually be added to the gossip about
Prince Harry.
With the disregard of any self-respecting
English hero for perfectly
sensible warnings, Rassendyll takes it upon himself to visit Ruritania to watch the coronation of King
Rudolf V. Innocent
Victorian that he is, he accepts the invitation of two strange men he meets in the woods to dine with his
lookalike, the King.
Lo and behold, their wine has been drugged by the King's
wicked stepbrother Black Michael and Rudolf V is insensible for the morning of his coronation. (In a thousand years of
fast-living kings, it can't have been the first time.) Roped in by the King's loyal servants to
understudy Rudolf V during the ceremony in the Ruritanian capital
Strelsau, Rassendyll makes the acquaintance of
Princess Flavia, the future
Queen Consort. It's an
ill wind that blows nobody any good.
Confounded by the quick thinking of
Colonel Sapt and his aide
Fritz von Tarlenheim, and their sheer blind luck in stumbling across a dead ringer for the King, Black Michael meanwhile abstracts the rightful King to his castle of
Zenda. Rassendyll is provided with the opportunity to test his
fencing skills against the Duke of Strelsau's six dastardly henchmen, and Hope with the rationale for the remaining eighteen chapters.
As the plot evolves, or rather, twists and turns around a moat, a ladder, and an impregnable cell, Hope appears less attached to Black Michael than to his lead henchman
Rupert of Hentzau, Rassendyll's nemesis and an all-round
bad egg. In his way, Hentzau is as dashing as his adversary, with all the arrogance and flair to be expected of a
series villain; he's duly accorded a
mysterious exit to match.
After a regulation
tearful but dutiful farewell to Flavia, Rassendyll returns to London ready to be called upon in three years' time for
The Prisoner of Zenda's lesser-known sequel, titled - perhaps an admission of Hope's real sympathies -
Rupert of Hentzau. Published in
1898, this time in the
serial form that served Dumas so well,
Rupert is a bleaker work, with an elegiac finale deserving the full
screen funeral treatment
and ensuring Hope would never be called upon for a trilogy.
Hope had previously returned to Ruritania in
1896 with a collection of short stories entitled
The Heart of Princess Osra, set during the reign of Rudolf III. Later in life, he tried to repeat the Ruritanian formula with
Sophy of Kravonia, but evidently ran up against the
law of diminishing returns.
Six films have been made of
The Prisoner of Zenda, but the most famous are the
1937 and
1952 versions. The first, assembling a run-down of action stars of the era, features
Ronald Colman as both Rudolfs,
Douglas Fairbanks Jr. as Hentzau, and
David Niven as von Tarlenheim, as well as
Mary Astor in the role of
Antoinette de Mauban, Black Michael's scheming love-interest and a not entirely successful echo of
Milady de Winter of
The Three Musketeers.
1957 paired matinee idol
Stewart Granger, fresh from his swordsmanship in
Scaramouche, as the two Rudolfs with the Scottish actress
Deborah Kerr, repeating their partnership in
King Solomon's Mines.
Zenda's legacy to the language has been the invention of Ruritania, commonly supposed, without any indication in the book, to be a
Balkan monarchy. In fact, Ruritania's prevalence of German names suggests that - if you want to
peep behind the curtain at all - it was probably intended as another
Liechtenstein overlooked in the process of
German unification.
Zenda castle, too, seems to have its analogue in the real world, although one of which there is no reason for Hope to have been aware. Black Michael's stronghold is a medieval fortress with a modern
chateau attached;
Trsat Castle, overlooking the
Croatian city of
Rijeka, was fortified in the sixteenth century against the
corsairs of the
Ottoman Empire and renovated, by the
Austro-Irish general who acquired it 300 years later, with a
neo-classical folly occupying most of its grounds.