Sentimental Education is the story of Frederic Moreau, a young Frenchman living through the 1848 revolution and the establishment of the Second French Empire. Moreau is predisposed to flights of imagination and to romantic wanderings. He broods extensively on his affection for a handsome older woman as chaos escalates around him and France falls into bloody infighting. The novel is critical of both decadent French culture and the hypocritical austerity of the first Revolution.