Oscar Wilde entirely dedicates this play to the exploration of the way a woman can be saved from destruction in this society of appearances. A woman was the victim of an imbroglio in the past and abandoned her daughter. This woman comes back and the daughter ignores her relation to her. She is brought back into societry by the daughter's husband who knows the truth but does not want his wife to know it. But there is some kind of malediction that flies over the heads of these women. The daughter nearly does the same mistake as her mother but she is saved by her mother who accepts to be tainted in her daughter's place. Bus Oscar Wilde must think there is some kind of reward for a good deed and all is well that ends well, and this play has a happy ending. In spite of all the melodramatic sentimentalese atmosphere, Oscar Wilde definitely explores in this play the great disadvantage of a woman in society. Men can do nearly all they want. Women are extremely limited and have to walk a very straight and narrow line. Oscar Wilde seems to be ahead of his time as for the fate of women: he seems to aspire for real equality for them, though he shows in all possible ways that this is impossible in his society.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan

My first experience reading Oscar Wilde... and certainly not my last.

Wilde's sardonic wit and ineffable satire had me enchanted from page one. Wilde writes with devastatingly appealing witticisms, and with a style and cleverness matched by few other authors. It is said that he is one of the more oft-quoted authors in the English language, and I now understand why.

In addition to axioms and aphorisms of pure genius, the plot both captivates and surprises the reader. Lady Windermere discovers that her husband has been cheating on her, and a folly of misunderstandings and poor advice then unfolds; all the while satirizing society.

This play is very interesting to read (according to me). I saw a lot of hypocracy and snobery of people in this play. But a lot of peole said that the plays of Oscar Wilde have no satire, means, there is no factor of politics, socials,etc. I think, what he wrote in this plays and other plays had something to critize the people in that time. I want more information about Lady Winderemere's Fan, I mean what is the background of Wilde wrote yhis novel. Is there any important effects so that he wrote this first play?

"The Wilde Century" positions Oscar Wilde as the archetypal queer of the 20th Century (although perhaps not too far beyond), and as such it's insightful and enormously entertaining. Those not familiar with gender studies will marvel as Sinfield neatly constructs a convincing paradigm of queer/homosexual history. If you'd like a readable introduction to the germ of queer theory I'd recommend this book.

After a spate of books in queer studies anachronistically identifying this or that work as "gay," Alan Sinfield produced this thoughtful, accessible book that gives gay readings their due while simultaneously attempting to read things with a sense of historical responsibility, postulating the Oscar Wilde trial of 1896 as a marker for the formation of a queer identity that incorporates effeminacy into its battery of indicators. A smart, responsible, and well-written study.

Oscar Wilde touches here a fundamental subject in Christian lore : Salome and John the Baptist, and through them Jesus and the prophesy that he is the Messiah. It would be a perfect subject for an opera because the events are contained in too short a time and the feelings and motivations are too simple and intensely concentrated for a dramaruc play. Salome asks for John's head out of spite because she could not possess him, because he refused to acknowledge her, and also because she knows this will mean the downfall of her step-father, the killer of her own father, and the incestuous husband of her mother. So vengeance is her second motivation. Those motivations are too simple to build up the tragical force of a play, but they are so intense that they could have inspired the most dramatic and powerful music. Oscar Wilde's language is beautiful in many ways but this beauty does not give any complexity to the simpleness of the emotions and motivations. This beautiful language could have become the carrier of a beautiful music. Actually we can hear the music of a Scarlatti, or of a Purcell behind the words, maybe even a Haendel. But as a play it is a little bit flat and without enough depth to build a beautiful performance. As a matter of fact the centrepiece of the play, the dance of the seven veils, is not a dramatic event but a visual and musical event. And we cannot in anyway escape the recollection of the fantastic little black and white film by Clive Barker on the subject. Salome is worth more than just a dramatic play. She can only find her full strength when music and dancing come into the picture, when it is fully visual and musical.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan

I found this book to a very quick and interesting read. Salome is both loved and feared by men. She uses her deadly seductive power to get anything she wants, almost.
The price of the book is so cheap how can you resist not buying it.

Wilde was the Irish Lord of the Language (English or French, it is the same). I concede that Michael Flatley is the Lord of the Dance... In any case, Wilde's words are worth being listened to. Salome possesses a rich texture of fine images and figures of speech that come to life through the voices of the actors.

This performance of "Salome" is a radio recording from a Canadian station broadcasted in the late sixties. It is too bad that radio theater be a rather defunct art. It has many values of its own. This abridged performance is based in the Alfred Douglas's translation of the original French play (Wilde wrote it directly in Frech, and it was the cause of his breaking up with Pierre Louys and serious trouble with Doulgas). I refrain from rating it with 4 stars because it is edited and abridged -slightly-.

Every interpretation is correct and some outstanding. It has even a fit original score. Wilde fans wouldn't be disapointed.