Set to the music of Franz Schubert's string quartet piece in a snow covered central European forest in the 1830s, Death and the Maiden tells the tale of a beautiful young maiden's encounter with the Angel of Death. She comes upon a dark and handsome stranger in the forest dressed in the riding clothes of a nobleman. When he reveals that he is Death, and that it is her soul he has come to take, she is naturally very alarmed. As the story progresses, Death finds himself becoming enamoured with the young maiden, while she, accepting that he must do what he was sent for, takes him back to the cottage she lives in with her grandfather. There she goes to bed for the night, expecting Death to take her away in the night while she is asleep. But Death finds his duty even more difficult as he spends the night with his hostess, watching the sleeping maiden and drinking in her beauty. In the morning the maiden awakes to find she is alone in the cottage, and fearing that Death has taken her ...