The Mark of Zorro

First published in 1919, ‘The Mark of Zorro’ is the foremost work to feature the Californio character Diego Vega, the masked hero also called Zorro, written by Johnston McCulley, an American writer, the author of hundreds of stories, fifty novels, numerous screenplays for film and television, and the creator of the character Zorro.
Set in Mexican California during the 1820s, the story tracks the career of Don Diego Vega, by all impressions a degraded and dapper aristocrat. But Vega’s introverted standing is nothing more than a mask to cover his alter ego—a California Robin Hood known as Zorro, whose snappy blade smacks down those who manipulate the impoverished and victimized. The motivation for dozens of film and television adaptations, it stays a paradigm of daring adventure.