This is the story of the passionate love affair between George Sand and Alfred de Musset. Both were famous writers when they met, neither of them believed in love any longer. Yet they were to have a heartbreaking affair that haunted them for the rest of their lives. Like Hugo, Balzac and Delacroix, Musset grew up on the ruins of Napoleon's Empire. Like all children of his century, he experienced a lasting malaise. Neither gambling nor debauchery could save the 23-year-old poet from the abyss. Sand was an independent, free-spirited young woman who smoked a pipe and dressed as a man. Yet she was also vulnerable, gnawed by doubt, and disappointed by life. She decided to become a journalist and a writer. These things simultaneously pushed them apart and drew them together. Against all odds, they fell in love, mutually dazzling one another. They joined their creative genius and talent, exchanging ideas and projects. But their affair outraged families, friends and the Paris salons where reputations were made and unmade. So they fled to Venice in search of an unrealistic happiness, embarking on a tumultuous adventure typical of the Romantic 19th century, which their lives exemplify.