Prosper Merimet (1803-1870) — French writer and translator, public and political figure, historian, ethnographer and archaeologist — entered the history of world literature as an unsurpassed master of the novel genre.Merime was one of the first Europeans to appreciate Russian literature. Thanks to his translations into French, Western readers got acquainted with the works of A.S. Pushkin and N.V. Gogol. Merime was a great admirer of the work of I.S. Turgenev and created the preface to the translation of his novel Fathers and Children.Merime chooses exotic locations and vivid characters for his novels. So the action of the novella 'Mateo Falcone' (1829) takes place on the shores of Corsica, 'the homeland of Corsican shepherds and all those who are at odds with justice'. Ten—year-old Fortunato, the son of Matteo Falcone, saves a man, and then gives him to the gendarmes. How would his father, a proud Corsican and a Christian, look at it?..The brave sailor Ledoux, who lost his arm in the Battle of Trafalgar, but did not lose hope of going to sea again, becomes captain of the brig Nadezhda and trades in the slave trade. This is how the novella 'Tamango' (1829) begins.The book also includes P. Merime's short stories "Venus of Illia", "Carmen", "The Blue Room" and others.