[2] The book was translated into English by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos in 1919 and published by Dodd, Mead and Company.

The book is a so-called psychological novel and deals with the life of widow Cecile van Erven who meets Taco Quaerts.

This Taco Quaerts sees in her an exalted love while Van Erven longs for a more humane role in his life.

[7] In a review in the "Tweemaandelijks Tijdschrift" of March 1895 Lodewijk van Deyssel wrote an article about Couperus and praised his book Ecstasy.

[8] In a letter (8 July 1890) Couperus wrote to his friend Frans Netscher that his novel Footsteps of Fate would be published in October in "The Gids" and that he had plans to write a large novel, called Ecstasy.

When Couperus wrote Ecstasy he was inspired by the book of Paul Bourget, Un coeur de femme, which was then published as a serial in Le Figaro.

[9] The motive of this book (a young heroine meets a profligate man) Couperus mixed with his own favorite theme: caresses without lust, kissing of the soul.

Veen he wrote: I think of a large star with a single line of a cloud to the upper left and the title should be positioned at the bottom right.