Diana's mother had died giving birth to her and her father had killed himself from grief, with the result that Diana grew up tomboyish, with a freedom that at the time was normally only allowed to boys.īefore Diana leaves on her journey, her independent character is further established when she refuses a proposal of marriage, explaining that she doesn't know what love is and doesn't want to know. Nobody thinks this is a sensible idea, and Lady Conway-a real person who appears in the book as a minor character-disapprovingly attributes Diana's adventurous plan to her "scandalous" upbringing. It transpires that Diana is planning to leave on a month-long trip into the desert, taking no one with her but an Arab guide.
A dance is being held, hosted by a young woman named Diana Mayo and her brother, Sir Aubrey Mayo.
The novel opens in a hotel in the Algerian city of Biskra. It was a huge best-seller and the most popular of her books, and it served as the basis for the film of the same name starring the Italian actor Rudolph Valentino in the title role. It was the first of a series of novels she wrote with desert settings that set off a major revival of the "desert romance" genre of romantic fiction. The Sheik is a 1919 novel by English writer E.
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