In these tales, most of them being sad and even very sad, Oscar Wilde looks for a way to save one's soul in front of the misery of the world. Anyone in society who lives in the upper classes does not necessarily see the ugliness and suffering of the world when one looks at the lower classes. But in these tales the Happy Prince, or the Selfish Giant, or any other character will manage to get salvation out of their upper class blindness, by opening their eyes to misery and suffering and by doing what they can to repair these pains and evils because they will realise they have to feel responsible for the world, because they are more powerful and could easily impose their selfish rule. But the giant will discover nature, if not God, punishes him for his selfishness. The nightingale will try to redeem a young student by giving him a red rose in a season when read roses do not bloom. And yet the student will not get the love he wants because he is nothing but a non-entity for the girl he would like to be loved by. There is also a very sad note in A Devoted Friend and how friendship can become a mask for selfishness, a nice appearance for an ugly and egoistic attitude. Those tales are sad and at the same time they convey a moral full of hope. All is not lost if the Happy Prince can give away his happiness for those who suffer, even if later the powerful of his society will reject him when he does not look happy and beautiful any more

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan

As a child I didn't have the books of Oscar Wilde but rather the records. My imagination soared with his descriptions of life, and my eyes overflowed with tears at each story. The record of the Happy Prince was read by Bing Crosby and Orson Wells and each year at Christmas we still play that old scratched thing, just to hear it's wonderous love story and that of The Selfish Giant. Now I have to get the book so my nieces and nephews will share in my treasures of love!!!! What is this world if it isn't all about Love?

I remember this book from my childhood. I had my parents read each story to me over and over. When I learned how to read I read this book until the pages fell out. In short it is a great book that encourages youthful imaginations. And, it makes for great bedtime stories. A real classic. I bought it for my children.

Oscar Wilde, in this Canterville Ghost story, reaches a tremendous level of humor and caustic social vision. The humor comes from the fact that the American family that buys the ghost along with the mansion takes him as being real and apply to him all the possible modern techniques to improve his life and make his sojourn in the mansion untroublesome for the new inhabitants. It is also funny because two young boys play all kinds of tricks to the ghost and there is no end in their creativity. But the story is also a little bit sad because it reveals the ghost has become a ghost when the brothers of his wife, whom he had assassinated, took vengeance and starved him to death. It also reveals that the ghost can be redeemed if love comes along and frees him of his misery and fate. And this love will come from the young daughter of the American family. She will naively open her heart to the suffering of the ghost and thus free him of his lot. This also shows how the attitude of the English owner of the mansion are just not interested in the suffering of the ghost, whereas the Americans will take this ghost seriously and will try to understand him and give him solace. Beyond the humor of the tale there is the tremendous belief that suffering can be solved.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan

This book has truly charming (not "cute," but very cat-like) line drawings of a cat, accompanied by quotations from Oscar Wilde that are very apposite for a cat. It's a perfect gift for occasions when you don't want JUST a card, but a full-scale book or other present is too much. I've probably given away 10 copies in the past few years, and can think of another 10 possible recipients. (Plus, it's fun to have around for yourself)

This is a CBC dramatized interpretation of Wilde's short story. Taped in front of live audience, this is by far the best story- telling that has ever done to Wilde's work. Both music and sound effect are superb, and best of all, the narration and dialogues closely follow the original story. In this respect, CBC has outperformed BBC by a large degree.

I was anxious to ready Lady Windamere's Fan after I'd read Oscar Wilde's other more popular play, The Importance of Being Earnest. I'm not quite sure what I expected, but I was surprised at the content of Lady Windamere's Fan. Considering the lifestyle that Wilde indulged in, it was interesting to see his take on the confusions and lack of communication between a husband and wife. He introduced the subject of a possible affair and divorce, but sketched his main characters as honorable citizens who were willing to go against the "impulse of the moment" and instead, stay true and faithful to their spouses. The person of Lady Windamere is interesting and effective. She is one who many women would do well to emulate. She demonstrates great love and devotion to her husband and her child, and shows forth woman's indwelling feeling of responsibility for her offspring.

As always, Wilde gives us an interesting little "twist" at the end of the play, just to keep us on our toes and prove again that we aren't nearly as clever as he! Wilde proves himself again with Lady Windamere's Fan-- a job well done!

Essential for any lover of great poetry, and certainly for any fan of Oscar Wilde is his great poem, "The Ballad of Reading Gaol." Scarcely the only thing he wrote after his return from his notorious 2-year prison term, The Ballad of Reading Gaol is a moving and tragic account of one man's suffering. One could go on and on - writing hundreds of pages in essay form - about the indignities and injustices of prison life, but this goes toward saying it much better than any ivory tower intellectual argument ever could. Wilde, winner of the infamous Newdigate Prize For Poetry at Oxford University, had long been an immaculate poet - an a born writer - but he practically anandoned the form after his marriage and the start of his career as a playwright in the early 1890's (aside from that strange amalgram of a poem, The Sphinx.) And yet, this is almost exclusively the only thing Wilde wrote after his release before his untimely death in 1900. Thankfully, the great artist went out with a bang. The Ballad fuses some of the best and clearest writing I have ever read in the English language with a poetic sensibility and a true and tragic sense of real suffering, thereby creating one of the great poems of all-time.

Many anthologies of Wilde's writings are available, and perhaps buying a book that simply includes this lone poem is questionable. I definitely suggest that you go for a Complete Works if you are new to the author; however, if you'd like a travel-worthy copy of certain smaller works - such as this poem - then editions such as this will serve you well. Besides, this edition has as well those beautiful paintings to go along with it - something I'm sure Oscar himself would've loved.

As a student of Wilde's life and works, I find this is essential reading. Who needs Shakespeare to outline tradgey? Wilde was imprisoned after a second trial (the first was a no decision). He was confined in the horrid English jails for two years. "The wretched prisoner is then left a prey to the most weakening, depressing and humiliating malady.... punished with the greatest severity and brutality. Each and all these things I had to transform into a spirtual experience." The ballad

outlines the horrors he and others endure who are prisoners of conscience. A terrible tragedy.

I greatly enjoyed both the thorough examination of many important Wilde critics of the 1990s and the sensible point of view. The author defends clear writing and makes a forceful defense of biographically and psychologically based criticism, enlisting Wilde's own remarks in her argument. Her criticism of literary jargon is occasionally biting, and justifiably so. This is a book not for the politically correct, but rather the openminded scholar or student of literature. It is safe to say that Wilde himself would have enjoyed it.

Professor Knox offers a splendid overview and critique of contemporary Oscar Wilde criticism. She illustrates how "-ism-guided" approaches tend to utilize Wilde for their own agendas rather than trying to come to terms with the contradictory and fascinating nature of his oeuvre. This book is a must read for any Wilde scholar as well as for advanced students pursuing work on Wilde or on approaches to literature.

Oscar Wilde is a fantastic writer and person. In this book he devolops his thinking about the world so extrememly good, that he deveserves 5stars. I read a lot of plays by Wilde and some of his short stories and I can only come to one conclusion: This is the best writer ever with Shelley, Keats and Fitzgerald. You have got to love this one.

I picked this book up in a used book store for [money] more than when it was purchased new in 1960. The pages literally crumbled as I turned them, but I couldn't put the book down. I was enthralled with the life of Oscar Wilde. Now, this biography isn't one written years after the subject's death from scraps of information. No. This is written by a very close friend of Wilde's, Frank Harris. In being written by someone of such closeness, it lends credence to the harsh words the author had to say of Wilde. Harris calls him lazy and slothenly. Of course, Wilde caused quite a sensation in his time. He was imprisoned under other pretenses, but mainly because he was a homosexual in a time period when this was not acceptable. Oscar was one who did not care what others thought of him. He was determined to live a life of pleasure and to make money doing things that he liked: writing and speaking. However, he did a great deal of leaching off of others. There's no denying Wilde's genius. I have yet to read any of his works except for a short essay entitled "The Soul of Man Under Socialism." To me, the thoughts seemed profound. But Harris says that Oscar never said or wrote anything original; he merely took other people's thoughts, meshed them together, and said them in a more profound way. This is a biography that reads like a fine story. Harris is a great writer and has more first-hand knowledge of his subject than any other biographer that I've read. I'd reccomend this book to others without reservation.

"The best life of Oscar Wilde", said George Bernard Shaw after reading this book. I cannot but agree with him utterly. No unnecesary data is wasted, no long reflexions bore us. It's just an Oscar's very close friend telling us with great elegance and delicacy the story of one he has admired and loved so much, but without fear of saying the truth. Amicus Plato, sed magis amica veritas. Of course, the reader has to know Mr Harris is the true "lead actor" in the story he's telling us, always supporting the Truth and the Right. But one can easily forgive him for that in reward for the great moments un Oscar's life he's saved from oblivion and darkness. A wonderful work of art itself, this biography must be read by every admirer of that Prince of Charm Oscar Wilde was. X. Careaga

Wilde's fairy tales prepare you for the personality of the spoiled child, Salome, who seems cursed like a fairy tale princess, into falling in love with a raving maniac religious fanatic, John the Baptist. Yet it is Herod's bargaining with Salome to release him from the promise of beheading the Baptist that transforms the story beyond cautionary folk tale. Herod has a strong inclination that the death of the Baptist will bring about his own death. Thus he bargains with Salome to release him from his oath to give her anything she wishes if she will dance for him. As he describes endless beautiful cascades of riches, he becomes more and more lost and resigned to his fate. The riches of the world become flimsy and fragile through the hypnotic repetition and description and Herod becomes more convinced of their temporal value as he sees his fate laid out before him. The tale of the spoiled fairy tale princess and the everyman declining king are tied together by Wilde in the final sentence of the play where Salome pays for her destructive passions while Herod makes one last power stoke before he falls.

The Salome legend has its beginnings in the Gospels of Matthew (14:3-11) and Mark (6:17-28), which tells of the beheading of John the Baptist at the instigation of Herodias, wife of Herod. The queen was angered by John's denunciation of her marriage as incestuous (she had been married to Herod's brother). In both accounts, Herodias uses her daughter (unnamed in scripture but known to tradition, through Josephus, as Salome) as the instrument of the prophet's destruction by having her dance for Herod. The story of Salome was prominent in both literature and the visual arts until the end of the Renaissance, and was revived in the nineteenth century by Heinrich Herne, and explored by such divergent authors as Gustave Flaubert, Stephane Mallarme, Joris-Karil Huysmans, and Oscar Wilde.

Wilde wrote "Salome" in French in 1893 for the famous actress Sarah Bernhardt. The play was performed once in Paris in 1904, and today is much better known as the libretto for Richard Strauss' operetta. In large part Wilde ignores the idea that Heroidas is the prime mover behind John death, focusing instead on the eroticism of Salome's passions for the Baptist. In this version of the story, John rejects the princess who then dances the infamous Dance of the Seven Veils for Herod to achieve her revenge. Of course, fans of Wilde, or at least those who know the highlights of his life's story, will recognize the name of Lord Alfred Douglass, the translator of the play into English. However, whatever the merits of the play, the chief attraction of this volume remains the illustrations.

Aubrey Beardsley was an important artist in the Esoteric Art movement of the "fin du siecle" (end of the 19th-century). A close friend of Oscar Wilde, he did both the illustrations and stage designs for Wilde's play "Salome." Obviously Beardsley represents the "Art Nouveau" school, but he also showed an affinity with the Symbolists and Pre-Raphaelite schools as well, all of which explored the rich symbolism of Judeo-Christian and pre-Judeo-Christian Pagan mythos. In this context the story of Salome is ideal. However, Beardsley remains the most controversial artist of the Art Nouveau era, renowned for his dark and perverse images and the grotesque erotic themes which he explored in his later work. Beardsley was not interested in creation any illusion of reality, but like the Eastern artists he studied, was concerned with making a beautiful design within a given space. His work on "Salome" is considered some of his finest examples of decadent erotica. This volume has 20 such illustrations, including those originally suppressed when the book was first published in 1905.

This play takes a psychotic murderer from the bible who used her beauty and sex appeal to get her way...and turns her into a wholly sympathetic character. The star of this play is charged with life and vitality and a kind of beautiful, moving viciousness, and Oscar Wilde reminds us that Salome was not the [person] portrayed in the Bible and most Christian literature. She was an old-fashioned fairytale princess, albeit one capable of murder, and she had never truly loved a man before Iokanaan.

As for Iokanaan (the exotic Hebrew name given to John the Baptist), he is arrogant, vicious, and cold, and his emotional brutality toward Salome makes him literally impossible to like--an interesting portrayal of this so-called "Holy Man" and a reminder that John the Baptist was not a Christian, but an old-fashioned, "law of Moses", stone-casting Hebrew of the time.

Still, above and beyond the characters is the trademark beauty of Wilde's word-play, which in my opinion has never quite equaled this anywhere else. From the ironic wit of Herodias ("There are others who look too much at her"), to the sappy, empty-headed, yet still beautiful pomposity of Herod, to the pitiable misery of Narraboth, a young Syrian guard who loves Salome, to the religious rants and prophecies of Iokanaan (mostly re-written Bible verses), every word of the play is a treasure.

However, none of these things can equal Salome's adoring eloquence when describing Iokanaan's beauty. Every word of that speech is a treasure. The fact that she loves him is, in fact, the only thing that makes Iokanaan likeable to any degree. This play proves that Oscar Wilde can actually write serious literature as well as or better than he can write witty banter.

Of all the stage plays I have ever had the privilege of experiencing, this one is by far the most dear to me. You haven't lived until you have at least read it. Get this manuscript; it is the most precious you will ever buy.