The Phantom of the Opera (1911), the best known of all of Leroux's works first published in French as Le Fantôme de l'Opéra and in the following year in the English version.
The actors, singers and patrons of the Paris Opera House say that a ghost haunts the labirynthine chambers beneath the stage. While there are those who laugh off such superstitions, they always do so nervously, in the bright light of the day. Nearly everyone connected with the Opera House in any way has felt the phantom's vague, troubling presence. But beautiful, talented young singer Christine Daae will soon experience a terror far more acute than any vague feeling of unease. For she is about to learn the secret of why the man who has made the tunnels beneath Paris his private domain must forever hide his face behind a mask.