The Birthday Of The Infanta

Wilde's tales are adapted into a comic book format and use fairy tale elements and Christian symbolism.

The master of wit and irony Published here alongside their evocative original illustrations, these fairy tales, as Oscar Wilde himself explained, were written “partly for children, and partly for those who have kept the childlike faculties of wonder and joy.”

Taking its cue from Baudelaire’s important essay "The Painter of Modern Life," in which Baudelaire imagines the modern artist as a "man of the world," this collection of essays presents Oscar Wilde as a "man of the world" who eschewed provincial concerns, cultural conventions, and narrow national interests in favor of the wider world and other worlds—both real and imaginary, geographical and historical, physical and intellectual—which provided alternative sites for exploration and experience, often including alternative gender expression or sexual alterity. Wilde had an unlimited curiosity and a cosmopolitan spirit of inquiry that traveled widely across borders, ranging freely over space and time. He entered easily and wholly into other countries, other cultures, other national literatures, other periods, other mythologies, other religions, other disciplines, and other modes of representation, and was able to fully inhabit and navigate them, quickly apprehending the conventions by which they operate. The fourteen essays in this volume offer fresh critical-theoretical and historical perspectives not just on key connections and aspects of Wilde’s oeuvre itself, but on the development of Wilde’s remarkable worldliness in dialogue with many other worlds: contemporary developments in art, science and culture, as well as with other national literatures and cultures. Perhaps as a direct result of this cosmopolitan spirit, Wilde and Wilde’s works have been taken up across the globe, as the essays on Wilde’s reception in India, Japan and Hollywood illustrate. Many of the essays gathered here are based on groundbreaking archival research, including some never-seen-before illustrations. Together, they have the potential to open up important new comparative, transnational, and historical perspectives on Wilde that can shape and sharpen our future understanding of his work and impact.

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.

Oscar Wilde's two collections of children's literature, The Happy Prince and Other Stories (1888) and A House of Pomegranates (1891), have often been marginalised in critical accounts as their apparently conservative didacticism appears at odds with the characterisation of Wilde as an amoral aesthete. In this, the first full-length study of Wilde's fairy tales for children, Jarlath Killeen argues that Wilde's stories are neither uniformly conservative nor subversive, but a blend of both. Killeen contends that while they should be read in relation to a literary tradition of fairy tales that emerged in nineteenth century Europe; Irish issues heavily influenced the work. These issues were powerfully shaped by the 'folk Catholicism' Wilde encountered in the west of Ireland. By resituating the fairy tales in a complex nexus of theological, political, social, and national concerns, Killeen restores the tales to their proper place in the Wilde canon.

The birthday of the infanta -- The selfish giant -- The nightingale and the rose -- The young king -- The happy prince.

With brilliant illustrations by a master of comic art, the lyrical prose of this fairy tale by Oscar Wilde is brought to life. A hideous dwarf is captured in the woods and brought in to the court of the beautiful royal infanta for her amusement. He is full of good humor and tricks and becomes quite popular but remains quite unaware of his looks. She has him perform in front of her friends for her birthday. He is very touched and quite proud to receive such attention, until he sees himself in the mirror and realizes their entertainment may be at his expense. Perfect for middle school students as an introduction to the world-famous author, the dazzling illustrations in this book suit the timeless writings of Wilde.