Inspired by his life, and his passionate affair with the actress Maria Ignacia Ibanez, Noches lugubres is the most famous of Cadalso’s work. It was written in 1774 and serialized in the Correo de Madrid in the years 1789 and 1790. Tediato, the protagonist, talks with Lorenzo, the gravedigger of the cemetery where his lover is buried and gains permission to unearth her body. After three nights spent digging up the corpse of his beloved to take home he commits suicide by incinerating himself along with the remains of his lover.