Oscar Wilde Stories For Children

Six classic tales for children by Oscar Wilde, illustrated by P.J. Lynch-winner of the Kate Greenaway Award, the Mother Goose Award, and three-time winner of the Christopher Award-and illustrator of The Steadfast Tin Soldier. P.J. Lynch's atmospheric artwork perfectly captures the timeless quality of Oscar Wilde's much loved tales for young readers. This timeless collection includes The Selfish Giant, The Nightingale and the Rose, The Devoted Friend, The Happy Prince, The Remarkable Rocket, and The Young King.

A beautifully illustrated collection of Oscar Wilde's favourite children's tales known and loved throughout the world. It includes: - The Happy Prince - The Selfish Giant - The Nightingale and the Rose This gorgeous production brings Wilde's magical stories to a whole new generation.

One of the world’s best loved presenters meets one of the world’s greatest authors in this beautiful selection of timeless, haunting stories. Vividly brought to life through abundant illustrations and Stephen’s masterly introductions, Oscar Wilde’s short stories are here made accessible to an entirely new generation.

An innovative new edition of nine classic short stories from one of the greatest writers of the Victorian era. “I cannot think other than in stories,” Oscar Wilde once confessed to his friend André Gide. In this new selection of his short fiction, Wilde’s gifts as a storyteller are on full display, accompanied by informative facing-page annotations from Wilde biographer and scholar Nicholas Frankel. A wide-ranging introduction brings readers into the world from which the author drew inspiration. Each story in the collection brims with Wilde’s trademark wit, style, and sharp social criticism. Many are reputed to have been written for children, although Wilde insisted this was not true and that his stories would appeal to all “those who have kept the childlike faculties of wonder and joy.” “Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime” stands alongside Wilde’s comic masterpiece The Importance of Being Earnest, while other stories—including “The Happy Prince,” the tale of a young ruler who had never known sorrow, and “The Nightingale and the Rose,” the story of a nightingale who sacrifices herself for true love—embrace the theme of tragic, forbidden love and are driven by an undercurrent of seriousness, even despair, at the repressive social and sexual values of Wilde’s day. Like his later writings, Wilde’s stories are a sweeping indictment of the society that would imprison him for his homosexuality in 1895, five years before his death at the age of forty-six. Published here in the form in which Victorian readers first encountered them, Wilde’s short stories contain much that appeals to modern readers of vastly different ages and temperaments. They are the perfect distillation of one of the Victorian era’s most remarkable writers.

"The Selfish Giant" is a short fantasy story for children by the Irish author Oscar Wilde. The story's plot revolves around a giant who builds a wall to keep children out of his garden, but learns compassion from the innocence of the children. The short story contains significant religious imagery. The Selfish Giant owns a beautiful garden which has 12 peach trees and lovely fragrant flowers, in which children love to play after returning from the school. The Giant put a notice board "TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED". The garden falls into perpetual winter. One day, the giant is awakened by a linnet, and discovers that spring has returned to the garden, as the children have found a way in through a gap in the wall… It was first published in 1888 in the anthology The Happy Prince and Other Tales, which, in addition to its title story, also includes "The Nightingale and the Rose", “The Happy Prince”, "The Devoted Friend" and "The Remarkable Rocket".

This is the first collection of critical essays that explores Oscar Wilde’s interest in children’s culture, whether in relation to his famous fairy stories, his life as a caring father to two small boys, his place as a defender of children’s rights within the prison system, his fascination with youthful beauty, and his theological contemplation of what it means to be a child in the eyes of God. The collection also examines the ways in which Wilde’s works—not just his fairy stories—have been adapted for young audiences.

When the Selfish Giant decides to build a wall around his garden to prevent the children from playing in it, it becomes barren and stuck in perpetual winter. It takes a wonderful event and the heart of a young boy for him to realize the error of his ways. A classic tale for children, ‘The Selfish Giant’ is presented here with all of Oscar Wilde’s other fairy stories – ‘The Happy Prince’, ‘The Nightingale and the Rose’, ‘The Devoted Friend’, ‘The Remarkable Rocket’, ‘The Young King’, ‘The Birthday of the Infanta’, ‘The Fisherman and His Soul’ and ‘The Star-Child’ – brought to life by Philip Waechter’s bright and imaginative illustrations.

In a town where a lot of poor people suffer and where there are a lot of miseries, a swallow who was left behind after his flock flew off to Egypt for the winter, meets the statue of the late 'Happy Prince', who in reality has never experienced true sorrow, for he lived in a palace where sorrow isn't allowed to enter. Viewing various scenes of people suffering in poverty from his tall monument, the Happy Prince asks the swallow to take the ruby from his hilt, the sapphires from his eyes, and the golden leaf covering his body to give to the poor. As the winter comes and the Happy Prince is stripped of all of his beauty, his lead heart breaks when the swallow dies as a result of his selfless deeds and severe cold. The statue is then brought down from the pillar and melted in a furnace leaving behind the broken heart and the dead swallow and they are thrown in a dust heap. These are taken up to heaven by an angel that has deemed them the two most precious things in the city. This is affirmed by God and they live forever in his city of gold and garden of paradise.