Just temporarily, you understand, until the real Rudolf is found and rescued. Step in, replacement cousin Rudolf, and take the throne, take the princess, and take out Black Michael. The king, also a Rudolf, is about to be crowned, but he has also just been kidnapped, by his wicked half-brother Black Michael, and if he does not ascend the throne at the appointed time, Michael will take it, and his fiancée, their cousin, the impossibly beautiful Princess Flavia, from him. But Rudolf arrives at the moment of a crisis. This is not a great surprise, because Rudolf Rassendyll is also descended from the Ruritanian royal family, after a dangerous liaison between Rudolf V and his married grandmother, earlier in the century. His most famous is The Prisoner of Zenda, from 1894, in which Rudolf Rassendyll, a flaming-haired English gentleman, travels to Ruritania for a holiday, and discovers that he is the spitting image of that nation’s king. Hope was a respectable Victorian London lawyer, but he had a secret passion for the romantic and dramatic, and wrote many novels. Storytelling power of Hope’s classic tale.Antony Hope’s invention* of the cardboard kingdom in The Prisoner of Zenda is the subject of this week’s Really Like This Book podcast scripts catch-up. A whole new subgenre of ‘Ruritanian romances’ followed, though no imitation managed to capture the charm, exuberance, and sheer As Nicholas Daly’s introduction outlines, this thrilling tale inspired not only stage and screen adaptations, but also place names, and even a popular board game. Succeeds, our hero and Flavia will have to choose between love and honour. Although the story is set in the near past, Ruritania is a semi-feudal land in which a strong sword arm can carry the day, and Rassendyll and his allies fight to rescue the king. Role becomes more complicated when the real king is kidnapped, and he falls for the lovely Princess Flavia. Englishman Rudolf Rassendyll closely resembles the King of Ruritania, and to foil a coup by his rival to the throne, he is persuaded to impersonate him for a day. ‘If love were the only thing, I would follow you-in rags if need be … But is love the only thing?’ Anthony Hope’s The Prisoner of Zenda is a swashbuckling adventure set in Ruritania, a mythical pocket kingdom. A whole new subgenre of ‘Ruritanian romances’ followed, though no imitation managed to capture the charm, exuberance, and sheer storytelling power of Hope’s classic tale”– As Nicholas Daly’s Introduction outlines, this thrilling tale inspired not only stage and screen adaptations, but also place names, and even a popular board game. But if he succeeds, our hero and Flavia will have to choose between love and honour. However, Rassendyll’s role becomes more complicated when the real king is kidnapped, and he falls for the lovely Princess Flavia. Anthony Hope’s The Prisoner of Zenda is a swashbuckling adventure set in Ruritania, a mythical pocket kingdom.