The Wolf-Leader

The Wolf-Leader is a supernatural novel written by Alexandre Dumas and first published in 1857.

Set in the forests near Villers-Cotterêts, the story follows Thibault, a poor shoemaker who saves a mysterious black wolf from hunters. In return, the animal offers him the power to make his wishes come true, but each wish brings suffering to someone else.

Driven by resentment and ambition, Thibault uses this gift to seek wealth, revenge, and social advancement. As his desires grow more selfish, he becomes increasingly separated from ordinary society and gains a strange authority over the wolves of the forest.

Blending folklore, fantasy, and moral drama, the novel explores the destructive consequences of greed and unchecked desire. Thibault’s supernatural rise ultimately leads him toward fear, isolation, and a confrontation with the cost of his bargain.

"WHY, I ask myself, during those first twenty years of my literary life, from 1827 to 1847, did I so rarely turn my eyes and thoughts towards the little town where I was born, towards the woods amid which it lies embowered, and the villages that cluster round it? How was it that during all that time the world of my youth seemed to me to have disappeared, as if hidden behind a cloud, whilst the future which lay before me shone clear and resplendent, like those magic islands which Columbus and his companions mistook for baskets of flowers floating on the sea?"

This edition was translated into English by Alfred Richard Allinson (1852–1929), a British scholar and translator known for his versions of French literary and historical works.