The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumasโs most famous and enduring novel, completed its serial publication in the summer of 1844, and by the time of its book publication at the end of that year readers were already demanding a sequel. They got it starting in January, 1845, when the first chapters of Twenty Years After began to appearโbut it wasnโt quite what they were expecting.When Twenty Years After opens it is 1648: the Red Sphinx, Cardinal Richelieu, is dead, France is ruled by a regency in the grip of civil war, and across the English Channel the monarchy of King Charles I hangs by a thread. As dโArtagnan will find, these are problems that canโt be solved with a sword thrust. In Twenty Years After, the musketeers confront maturity and face its greatest challenge: sometimes, you fail. Itโs in how the four comrades respond to failure, and rise above it, that we begin to see the true characters of Dumasโs great heroes.A true literary achievement, Twenty Years After is long overdue for a modern reassessmentโand a new translation. As an added inducement to readers, Lawrence Ellsworth has discovered a โlostโ chapter that was overlooked in the novelโs original publication, and is included in none of the available English translations to dateโuntil now.