Paul and Virginia – Bernardin de Saint-Pierre by Bernardin de Saint-Pierre

"Their lives seemed linked to the trees which had grown with them."

Paul and Virginia grow up together on the tropical island of Mauritius, children of two outcast women living in harmony with nature. Their innocent, brother-and-sister love blossoms into romance as they reach adolescence. But civilization intervenes when Virginia is sent to France for an inheritance, leading to a tragic separation and a fateful shipwreck upon her return.

This novel was a global phenomenon in the 18th century. It is a pastoral idyll that contrasts the purity of nature with the corruption of society, a key text of sentimentalism.