"While John Bunyan was in prison for preaching without a license, he came up with one of the most inspired plots ever to grace English literature. Bunyan turned the Christian life, with all its struggles and its victories, into a romantic quest through a strange land. A man called Christian flees the City of Destruction and journeys to the Celestial City. Along the way he meets such memorable obstacles and characters as the Slough of Despond, Mr. Worldy Wiseman, Apollyon, the Valley of the Shadow of Death, Vanity Fair, Giant Despair, and finally the River of Death," (back cover).