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I mostly enjoyed the book, but did not care much for the writing. I got annoyed with the repetitiveness of some character descriptions--did anyone ever tell Baroness Orczy to show, not tell? I especially got tired of hearing about how clever Marguerite was, when there was little to support it. Why in the world keep portraying her that way, then show her being rather easily duped? It seemed to be an avoidable disconnect.
Not sure if this was a first read (I think I read it around the same time I read A Tale of Two Cities and conflated the two books), but I certainly knew the identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel, as surely as I know Clark Kent is Superman.
I HATED the blatant, horrible anti-Semitism in the scenes with the "Jew"; I knew right away who it really was, because there was simply no other reason for that character to be there. So I also hated the clunkiness of those scenes.
After I finished the book, I watched the Leslie Howard movie--he and Raymond Massey were both wonderful.
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