This collection of essays seeks to acquaint the English-speaking reader with the life and work of Georges Rodenbach, a Belgian poet, essayist, playwright, novelist, and short-story writer best known for Bruges-la-Morte, his novel of obsessive love, and for his characteristic visions of Bruges, a beautiful but melancholy city lost in the mists rising from its medieval canals.

His pervasive interest in Bruges suffuses his work with the quiet, spiritual atmosphere of the "dead" city, a theme frequently evoked by writers of the fin de siecle.