French novelist, poet, short story writer, and literary critic Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly died #OTD in 1889.
His work depicts the ravages of passion, whether carnal (Une vieille maîtresse, 1851), filial (Un prêtre marié, 1865), political (Le Chevalier des Touches, 1864) or mystical (L'Ensorcelée, 1855). In particular, Les Diaboliques in which the unusual and the transgressive plunge the reader into an ambiguous universe, earned the author accusations of immoralism.