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L'Immoralist (1902) is a famous controversial novel by André Gide (1869-1951) about freedom, morality and paradoxical human nature. Recovering from a serious illness becomes a kind of rebirth for Michel, an antiquities researcher, which reveals new, hitherto hidden facets of his self. Michel's mental metamorphosis is expressed in the realisation that all moral precepts are fictitious. So he chooses new principles that promise true freedom and consist in rehabilitating his physicality, focusing on the present and detaching himself from his surroundings. This moral doctrine, which is related to the ideas of Nietzscheanism, also implies the need to sacrifice the weak for the sake of one's own goal. The protagonist has to choose between his wife, who would be a lifelong dream for many, and his own natural urges. The dramatic events, depicted in expressive, clear language, take place against the backdrop of breathtaking landscapes of Italy and North Africa. Written in 1902, The Immoralist is today hailed as a forerunner of French literary existentialism, and echoes of its poetics and philosophy can be found in works as diverse as Albert Camus's The Outsider and Georges Perec's The Things.