An Electronic Journal for the Exchange of Information

on Current Research, Publications and Productions

Concerning

Oscar Wilde and His Worlds

Issue no 46 : September / October 2008

oscholars@gmail.com

EDITORIAL PAGE

Navigating THE OSCHOLARS

Since November 2007 we have split this page into two sections.  SECTION I now contains our Editorial, short pieces that we hope will interest readers, and innovations.  SECTION II is a Guide or site-map to what will be found on other pages of THE OSCHOLARS with explanatory notes and links to those pages (formerly to be found on the Editorial page).  Each section is prefaced by a Table of Contents with hyper links to the Contents themselves.  For Section I, please read on. 

For Section II, please click

Clicking  takes you to a Table of Contents;

clicking  takes you to the hub page for our website;

clicking  takes you to the home page of THE OSCHOLARS .

The sunflower  navigates to other pages.

THE OSCHOLARS is composed in Bookman Old Style, chiefly 10 point.  You can adjust the size by using the text size command in the View menu of your browser. We do not usually publish e-mail addresses in full but the sign @ will bring up an e-mail form.

TABLE OF CONTENTS I: ITEMS ON THIS PAGE
I.  NEWS from the Editor; changes to our team; innovations on the website; our discussion forum.	5.  Work in Progress	XI.  OSCAR IN POPULAR CULTURE /WILDE AS UNPOPULAR CULTURE
II.  In the LIBRARY	6.  A Wilde Collection	XII.  VIDEO OF THE MONTH
III.   NEWS, NOTES & QUERIES	IV. OSCAR WILDE : THE POETIC LEGACY	XIII.  WEB FOOT NOTES
1. Lady Wilde	V. ON THE CURRICULUM: TEACHING AND RESEARCHING WILDE, THE FIN-DE-SIÈCLE, ÆSTHETICISM AND DECADENCE	XIV.  OGRAPHIES
2.  ‘Of Beauty’	VI.  THE CRITIC AS CRITIC: Reviews	XV.  NEVER SPEAKING DISRESPECTFULLY: THE OSCAR WILDE SOCIETIES
3. Audiobook	VII. DANDIES, DRESS AND FASHION	XVI. OUR FAMILY OF JOURNALS
4.   Cyril Holland	VIII. OSCAR WILDE AND THE KINEMATOGRAPH	XVII. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
5.  Oscar Wilde and the Oxford Companions (1)	IX. LETTERS FROM CANADA, GERMANY, IRELAND, SCOTLAND & SWEDEN.
6. Two broadcasts	X.  BEING TALKED ABOUT: CONFERENCES & CALLS FOR PAPERS

TABLE OF CONTENTS II : GUIDE TO ALL PAGES Click  for the Guide itself, or GO to reach the pages directly
Awards		Special Issues		Publications		Strange Webs
Being Talking About		Going Wilde		The Rack and The Press		The Sibyl
Bibliographies		Guidance for submissions		Reading Groups		Teleny Revisited
Conferences, Lectures		Library		Rue des Beaux Arts		Upstage
Editorial, News & Notes [previous issue]		Mad, Scarlet Music		Shavings		Visions
Editorial Team		May I Say Nothing?		Society News		Wilde Societies
The Eighth Lamp		Moorings		Some Sell & Others Buy		Appendices

Nothing in THE OSCHOLARS © is copyright to the Journal save its name (although it may be to individual contributors) unless indicated by ©, and the usual etiquette of attribution will doubtless be observed.  Please feel free to download it, re-format it, print it, store it electronically whole or in part, copy and paste parts of it, and (of course) forward it to colleagues.

As usual, names emboldened in the text are those of subscribers to THE OSCHOLARS, who may be contacted through oscholars@gmail.com.  Underlined text in blue can be clicked for navigation.

I. NEWS FROM THE EDITOR

Innovations

Since our last issue have again strengthened our Editorial team with many new appointments, reflecting and contributing to our ever-increasing coverage of period and topics. More information about them, and the rest of our team, can be found by clicking .

· Emily Alder of Napier University in Edinburgh has taken over from Michèle Mendelssohn as Scotland Editor, as Michèle's other commitments have proved too great to allow her to take an active part in our affairs.  Emily will be contributing a regular Letter from Scotland, as well contributing other articles of Scottish interest.

· Luca Caddia took a degree in Philosophy in 2002 and in 2008 a Doctorate in English Literature (both at the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’). With Elisa Bizzotto and Costanza Vettori he is co-editing the pages we will be publishing on fin-de-siècle Italy under the heading Ravenna. @

· Koenraad Claes of the University of Ghent succeeds Eva Thienpont as our Belgian Editor. Eva was one of our first associate editors and will we hope continue to contribute when the demands of her new, non-academic, job allow.

· Stefano-Maria Evangelista (Trinity College, Oxford, and co-ordinator of the Wilde Reception in Europe project) is now our Oxford Editor, replacing Dúnlaith Bird. His joining us further marks the co-operation between THE OSCHOLARS and the WRE, which we hope will form a pattern for other alliances and partnerships.

· Nevin Yildirim Koyuncu of Ege University in Izmir is our new Editor for Turkey, and we can look forward to her reports from a country whose engagement with Wilde and the fin-de-siècle receives little attention.

· Krisztina Lajosi, University of Amsterdam, is our new Editor for Hungary. She has already provided material for our BIBLIOGRAPHY and SCENOGRAPHY pages.

· Atsuko Ogane is our new Japan Editor.  Primarily a Flaubert scholar, Atsuko has recently published on Salome, and we will be publishing work by her in both French and English.

· B.J. Robinson (University of North Georgia) has taken over our regular survey of periodicals ‘The Rack & The Press’, and will be expanding it.

· Annabel Rutherford (York University, Toronto) is our new Dance Editor.  One striking aspect of the arts of the fin-de-siècle was the development in dance: think about Maud Allan, Isadora Duncan, Loïe Fuller, Mata Hari; think about dance all the way from the chahut, the cakewalk, the maxixe, the tango and the foxtrot, to the Ballets Russes – and think about the ballets based on Wilde, from Elena Firsova to Matthew Bourne.  Annabel will be reviewing and commissioning reviews, investigating articles and theses and generally enlarging the subject for us.

· Tijana Stasic of the University of Gothenburg (Göteborg) is our new Editor for Sweden, providing information from that country.  Our geographical spread thus continues. 

· Anna Vaninskaya of Cambridge has taken on the rôle of informing us about, and commissioning reviews on, anarchism and socialism at the fin-de-siècle. She is also compiling a bibliography of key texts. 

Of the other journals associated with us at www.oscholars.com, our proposed journal of New Woman Studies, THE LATCHKEY, is taking shape. Its editorial group has been joined by Lisa Hager, Georgia Institute of Technology, who comes in as Bibliographer, an important role, recording new publications on the subject and tracing earlier ones. Sarah Townley of the University of Nottingham joins THE LATCHKEY group as Picture Editor, completing the team.  VISIONS, our journal covering art, craft and design at the fin-de-siècle has been joined by Anne Anderson, a research fellow at the Huntington and at Exeter, who is now Arts & Crafts Editor.

Our other newcomer is Shelley Salamensky, out of Harvard and the Normal Supe, who has proposed, and will work on, a special supplement on Wilde and Jews, although this may be widened to how Jews influenced the fin-de-siècle, and how the fin-de-siècle influenced Jews.  This is for autumn 2009. 

There has also been one further loss. After months of trying to square reviving NOCTURNE with a demanding job at the Royal Bank of Scotland, Elaine Saniter has had to admit defeat.  We will therefore absorb NOCTURNE into VISIONS, and all matter to do with Whistler and his circle will appear as a section there. Should any Whistler scholar appear who would like to develop this, it can be done under the VISIONS umbrella, and I think this will strengthen VISIONS.

· To see all our team, click

Work continues on the reconstruction of the website, with improvements in accessibility and design, so that it becomes a fully-searchable and easily navigated resource. 

Our special supplement on Teleny, was published in October 2008.  This was guest edited by Professor John McRae of the University of Nottingham, whose edition of Teleny was the first scholarly unexpurgated one to be published.  Teleny Revistied now becomes a major on-line resource and further articles will be considered for publication. Contact Professor McRae @; see Teleny Revisited .

Readers will have noticed a new colophon at our masthead. While the existing colophon, designed for us long ago by Betsy Norris, will remain that of www.oscholars.com, the new one, designed by Steven Halliwell, will signal the pages that belong to THE OSCHOLARS itself. We have also changed the name of our essays section from AND I? MAY I SAY NOTHING? to the less cumbersome MAY I SAY NOTHING?. This month, MAY I SAY NOTHING? contains work by Helen Davies, Elisa Gray, Irena Grubica, Ranald Macdonald, Jeremiah Mercurio, Brian Morris and Tijana Stasic.

So many chances and changes have necessitated constant revisions in our publishing schedules, with only RUE DES BEAUX ARTS under Danielle Guérin’s editorship maintaining its intended two-monthly appearance on time, although THE OSCHOLARS seems back on track with an intended appearance in two-monthly instalments (the last was July/August). This has been balanced by our publishing new content on our website nearly every day, and announcing this in weekly reports on our ‘yahoo’ subsidiary. The number of our readers who have joined this has been growing, and it is increasingly our medium for making announcements in the place of mass mailings, which more and more fall foul of anti-spam traps either at the sending or receiving end. We do urge readers to sign up to this group. Our NOTICEBOARD also serves all our journals. Here we publish short term announcements of lectures, publications, papers and other items of interest submitted by readers.  This does not replace notice in any of the journals, but is intended to be of value between issues.  The ‘yahoo’ forum and NOTICEBOARD can be reached via their icons:

II. THE OSCHOLARS LIBRARY

From time to time, we have invited readers and others who have published articles on Wilde in anthologies or journals that are only readily accessible in university libraries (and not always then) to republish them (amended if desired) on THE OSCHOLARS website. We also republish older articles on Wilde from anthologies and festchriften, made obsolete by the march of scholarship, but which may still have some value in charting how he was viewed by earlier writers.

In September 2007, we began a year-long project of putting such articles on line at the rate of one a week, and have been very happy with the response. This systematic project has now come to an end, but we will continue to put articles up on an ad hoc basis. These appear in our section called LIBRARY.  Its logo, which can be clicked for access, is

This will bring you to a Table of Contents, arranged thematically, from which you can link to each article.  A subsection, IN OTHER BOOKCASES, is similarly arranged but gives links to articles that appear elsewhere on the internet.

We also link to French language articles similarly republished in rue des beaux-arts.

These articles are copyright to their authors, and thus usual rules for citation and against further publication apply.

---

New postings are announced on our discussion forum

III. FREQUENTING THE SOCIETY OF THE AGED AND WELL-INFORMED: NEWS, NOTES, QUERIES.

Lady Wilde

I'm looking for any critical studies done on Meinhold's work - The Amber Witch and Sidonia the Sorceress. I'm aware only of the Diana Basham book The Trial of Woman – which briefly covers Amber Witch - and a few mentionsin more recent articles. Is there anything written on these works at all? I'm also very interested to find any comments - correspondence etc – from the two translators of the novels – Duff-Gordon for the Amber Witch, and Lady Wilde on Sidonia. Any
help would be greatly appreciated.

n Jodi Gallagher @

‘Of Beauty’

Some time ago I solved a query on Oscholars over who did a certain portrait of Oscar Wilde:  Thomas Maitland Cleland. Now I hope your Oscholars might take a look at my query with regard to an aesthetic booklet.

Here's the query: I remain TOTALLY STUMPED on this one. A while back I purchased a moderate
archive of material relating to the Mosher Press which as many of you know I write about and collect. Included in the files was a slender booklet entitled OF BEAUTY (images supplied below) ascribed to the Mosher Press by The Bodley Book Shop. It's a slim ten pages in length, printed on Japan vellum paper and bound with a red silk cord. It contains selections from Arthur Symons, Fiona Macleod, Plato, D. G. Rossetti, Joseph T. Keiley and Ethna Carberry. I've searched everywhere (OCLC, WorldCat, RLIN, Union Nat'l Cat., Brit. Museum Cat., and on-line catalogues) and contacted a few 1890's/early 1900s literary authorities, but nobody has ever seen this publication of only 40 copies, this being copy No. 27 from Mosher's library. Anybody ‘out there’ have the slightest clue? Any help will be greatly appreciated.

– Philip Bishop @

Audiobook

Klaus Kinski reads two Oscar Wilde classics (in German) on this Deutsche Gramophon CD, released in 2003: ‘Der Gluckliche Prinz’ (‘The Happy Prince’) and ‘Der Junge Konig’ (‘The Young King’).

Cyril Holland

Danielle Guérin supplies the following, courtesy of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission:

Casualty Details

Name:	HOLLAND, CYRIL
Initials:	C
Nationality:	United Kingdom
Rank:	Captain
Regiment/Service:	Royal Field Artillery
Date of Death:	09/05/1915
Additional information:	Eldest son of playwright and poet Oscar Wilde, and Constance Lloyd Wilde, later Holland.
Casualty Type:	Commonwealth War Dead
Grave/Memorial Reference:	I. A. 1.
Cemetery:	ST. VAAST POST MILITARY CEMETERY, RICHEBOURG-L'AVOUE

.

Oscar Wilde and the Oxford Companions (1)

There is no entry for Wilde under his own name in Humphrey Carpenter & Mari Prichard: The Oxford Companion to Children’s Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1984), but there is an entry under ‘The Happy Prince’. This contains summaries of ‘The Happy Prince’ and ‘The Selfish Giant’: ‘the stories show a marked influence of Hans Andersen’ and cites Wilde’s view that they were ‘not for children, but for childlike people from eighteen to eighty’. The authors add ‘In 1891, he published a second volume of Fairy Stories, The House of Pomegranates, which made no pretence of being for children’.

Two broadcasts

‘The Importance of Being a Hellenist’ was broadcast on Wednesday 15^th October on BBC Radio 3. Iain Ross explored how Wilde's lifelong interest in the archaeology and literature of ancient Greece influenced even his most
popular work. Lord Arthur Savile's Crime was broadcast in three episodes on the wireless station BBC7 on Monday 20th, Tuesday 21st and Wednesday 22nd October. We announced this at the time on our forum, and hope that we can extend these notifications about broadcasts with the help of readers.

Work in Progress

In December 2006 we published a list of fin-de-siècle doctoral theses being undertaken at Birkbeck College, University of London, and a similar list in December 2007.  We should very much like to hear from readers at other universities with news of similar theses they are supervising or undertaking.  We welcome all news of research being undertaken on any aspect of the fin de siècle. There is a list of dissertations on Irish literature held on the Princess Grace Irish Library website (http://www.pgil-eirdata.org/html/pgil_gazette/disserts/a/) but it seems to be impossible to gain access.

A Wilde Collection

There is no universal handbook or vade mecum to the various Wilde Collections, and we have made a start here with an occasional article.  Sometimes where a collection’s contents are published in detail on-line we will simply give an URL; or we may be able to give more details ourselves.  We will then to be able to bring these together as a new Appendix. We would be very interested in publishing account of privately held collections, suppressing the owner’s name if that is preferred.

IV. OSCAR WILDE : THE POETIC LEGACY

To coincide with the publication of a new edition of our sister journal Moorings, edited by Mark Llewellyn, we republish this poem by George Moore’s brother, from The Irish Monthly, Vol. VI, No. 65.

These poems are now being collected into an Appendix.

To Oscar Wilde

Author of ‘Ravenna’

By Augustus M. Moore.

No Marsyas am I, who singing came

To challenge King Apollo at a Test,

But a love-wearied singer at the best.

The myrtle leaves are all that I can claim,

While on thy brow there burns a crown of flame,

Upon thy shield Italia’s eagle crest;

Content am I with Lesbian leaves to rest,

Guard thy thou laurels and thy mother’s name.

I buried Love within the rose I meant

To deck the fillet of the Muse’s hair;

I take this wild-flower, grown against her feet,

And kissing its half-open lips I swear,

Frail though it be and widowed of its scent,

I plucked it for your sake and find it sweet.

Moore Hall,

September, 1878.

V. on the Curriculum : Teaching Wilde, Æstheticism and Decadence.

We are always anxious to publicise the teaching of Wilde at both second and third level, and welcome news of Wilde on curricula.  Similarly, news of the other subjects on whom we are publishing (Whistler, Shaw, Ruskin, George Moore and Vernon Lee) is also welcome. Andrew Eastham is developing a study of the teaching of Wilde, which we hope will be helpful to others who have Wilde on their courses; in tandem Tiffany Thomas is looking at undergraduate response. Andrew Eastham presented his introductory declaration in our July/August issue . To participate in this, contact THE OSCHOLARS at oscholars@gmail.com or Andrew Eastham at @.

Programs & Initiatives – Moments of Change – 2008-09: The Turn of the 20th Century (1889-1914). This is a course at Penn State University. Consult http://iah.psu.edu/programs/early20thCentury.shtml. The course co-ordinator is Martina Kolb, Assistant Professor of German and Comparative Literature.

A list of Doctoral Students in Sweden and their research topics (literature in English) can be found on the GABLE website.

The Plays Online project of the Victoria and Albert Museum’s theatre collection provides education resources to support the teaching of Drama and English in schools. Created by the V&A Theatre Collections education team, the Plays Online resources are designed to meet the needs of the English and Drama curricula from Key Stage 3 and above, drawing on the V&A's unique collections relating to theatre in the United Kingdom. Each section offers teachers and students access to resources focussing on a single text. The information presented covers specific themes within the play, alongside support information, original source material, commentary on the historical and theatrical contexts of the play and information on notable revivals. The first in the series: The Importance of Being Earnest is available.

The following is copied from the invaluable VICTORIA RESEARCH WEB: Teaching Resources

Nineteenth-Century History

The Victorian Novel

Special Topics in Victorian Culture

Victorian Literature Surveys

Victorian Poetry

Few things are more helpful in planning a course than seeing how others have laid out similar courses. Sharing syllabi is one of the most fruitful uses of the Web, and a number of Victorianists have made course plans available online for the benefit of both students and colleagues. If you would like to contribute a syllabus for posting here, either as a link to a website or as a text file, please contact the webmaster.

A variety of additional materials, many of which are especially suited for use by primary and secondary school teachers, can be found below under Other Teaching Resources. Again, if you'd like to contribute additional materials like these we'd be glad to have them. A handy place to search the Web for syllabi on particular topics is the Syllabus Finder at the Center for History and New Media.

CRITIC AS CRITIC

This issue’s review section contains reviews by Aoife Leahy on An Ideal Husband in Dublin; Mathilde Mazau on Dorian Gray in Edinburgh; Gwen Orel on The Selfish Giant in New York; Ruth Kinna on David Goodway on Anarchism; Lucia Krämer on Angela Kingston on Oscar Wilde; John S. Partington on Ruth Livesey on Socialism and Æstheticism; Kathleen Riley on Christopher Stray on Gilbert Murray; Annabel Rutherford on Mary Fleischer on Symbolist Dance; Eva Thienpont on André Capiteyn on Maeterlinck; Jessica Wardhaugh on Sébastien Rutés on Oscar Wilde and French Anarchism.

These can be seen by clicking .

Last issue’s review section contained reviews by Ann M. Bogle on Thomas Kilroy on Constance Wilde; Richard Fantina on Adrian Wisnicki on Conspiracy; Tina Gray on Joy Melville on Ellen Terry; Christine Huguet on divers hands on Michael Field; Yvonne Ivory on Lucia Krämer on Oscar Wilde; Sondeep Kandola on Corin Redgrave on Oscar Wilde; Ruth Kinna on Brian Morris on Peter Kropotkin; Mireille Naturel on Evelyne Bloch-Dano on Jeanne Proust; Maureen O’Connor on Jarlath Killeen on Oscar Wilde; Gwen Orel on the Pearl Company on Earnest; Virginie Pouzet-Duzer on Rhonda Garelick on Loïe Fuller.

These can be seen by clicking .

Clicking    will take you to a Table of Contents for all our reviews, which we are updating.  We welcome offers to review from readers.

VII. DANDIES, DRESS AND FASHION

Editor for this section: Elizabeth McCollum

‘Swann & Oscar’ pairs Proust’s Charles Swann with Oscar Wilde as the name of a gentleman’s outfitter at 19 rue d'Anjou in the fashionable eighth arrondissement of Paris, adding an echo of London’s Swan & Edgar. Click their banner.

VIII. OSCAR WILDE AND THE KINEMATOGRAPH

Mike Barker’s excellent adaptation of Lady Windermere’s Fan – A Good Woman – now has a website.

Posters

After appearing here, these are posted on their own page, called POSTERWALL, gradually building up a gallery that will make the images more accessible than by searching the Internet.  This can be found by clicking the icon.

This month’s posters were found for us by Danielle Guérin, and are of Jules Dassin’s film of The Canterville Ghost. 

IX. LETTERS FROM OUR EDITORS

LETTER FROM CANADA

Kirsten MacLeod

‘So this is Winnipeg, I can tell it’s not Paris.’

Oscar Wilde, on his arrival in Winnipeg, Canada.

Greetings OSCHOLARS,

Paris it may not be, but Canada has it share of Wilde and fin-de-siècle related activity this season – even in Winnipeg! – where the Victorian Studies Association of Western Canada hosted its annual conference from the 16th to the 18th of October. The theme this year was ‘Victorian Rules and Regulations,’ and keynote speakers included Lynne Vallone (Rutgers) and Christopher Otter (Ohio State University). On other conference fronts, papers on Wilde have been on the programme of ‘Continuities and Innovations: Popular Print Cultures—Past and Present, Local and Global,’ held at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, August 27th-30th. Paul Fortunato (University of Houston, Downtown) presented a paper entitled ‘Oscar Wilde’s Journalism: The Aesthetics of Lying in the Pall Mall Gazette and the Woman’s World.’ Also, Miles Tittle (University of Ottawa) spoke on P. Craig Russell’s graphic novel adaptation of Salome. Meanwhile, Wilde’s contemporary, Arthur Conan Doyle, is the subject of a symposium – ‘Re-examining Conan Doyle’ – at the University of Regina in Regina, Saskatchewan from 7th-9th November. More information about this event will be appearing on the HRI website at http://www.uregina.ca/hri/Conferences/conan_doyle_2008.shtml.

Shavians will be interested to know about the Shaw Festival (Niagara-on-the-Lake, Canada) productions of Mrs. Warren’s Profession and Getting Married running until 1st November. More information, including video previews, can be viewed at http://www.shawfest.com/.

Meanwhile, in Cavendish, Prince Edward Island, land of Anne of Green Gables, a new theatre has opened in the Church at Avonlea Village. It will present playwrights who inspired or were influenced by Lucy Maud Montgomery. Its first season for the summer of 2008 includes Oscar Wilde’s Importance of Being Earnest, George Bernard Shaw’s Village Wooing, and a new adaptation of Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows.

On the other side of the country, the Canadian-based Trio Verlaine performed at festival Vancouver on 15th August. They have just released their cd, Fin de Siècle: The Music of Debussy and Ravel, which features Debussy’s ‘Sonata for flute, viola, and harp,’ as well as a specially commissioned arrangement of Ravel’s ‘Tombeau de Couperin.’ Also in Vancouver, the Vancouver Opera has just announced its 2008-2009 season, which includes a modern production of Richard Strauss’s Salomé, directed by Joseph McLain and conducted by Jonathan Darlington. It features Mlada Khudoley as Salomé, Greer Grimsley as Jokanaan, and John Mac Master as Herod. It runs 2nd, 5th, 7th, and 9th May at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

In Calgary, Theatre Calgary has just announced its season, which will include a production of A Woman of No Importance, scheduled to run from 3rd–22nd March 2009 and directed by Marti Maraden.

Other forthcoming fin-de-siècle related theatrical events include a production of Linda Griffiths’ Age of Arousal, directed by Sarah Stanley at the Centaur Theatre in Montreal, a play that centres on five Victorian New Women at a school for secretaries (24th March – 19th April 2009); the National Ballet (Toronto) production of Anton Chekov’s The Seagull, running from 14th-23rd November; and a Pacific Opera (Victoria, British Columbia) production of Mozart’s Magic Flute, with a fin-de-siècle Vienna setting (16th, 18th, 21st, 23rd, 25th April 2009).

In Ottawa, Library and Archives Canada, in collaboration with the National Library of Ireland, is hosting an exhibition called ‘Dubliners: Photos from the National Library of Ireland.’ The exhibition features images of fin-de-siècle Dublin by photographer John J. Clarke (1879-1961). The exhibition runs from 16th September 2008 – 5th January 2009.

LETTER FROM GERMANY

Lucia Krämer

Since my last bulletin, which covered January and February 2008, there have been a number of new publications and theatrical productions of fin-de-siècle authors in Germany that may be of interest to visitors of the OSCHOLARS websites. The German reception has, unsurprisingly, concentrated on Oscar Wilde, while his contemporaries have played a smaller role both on the German book market and in the theatres.

Books:

The most striking aspect about the most recent German Wilde editions, which is, however, representative of his presence on the local book market in general, is a preponderance of Wilde’s shorter pieces. Salome, with the illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley, has seen its 19th edition by Insel publishing house, and there were several new editions of stories by Wilde: Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime was published both in a bound book version by the Edition Büchergilde (trans. Josef Thanner), as well as in an audiobook recording read by respected German actress Katharina Thalbach (Argon Verlag). Reclam published a further edition of The Canterville Ghost (trans. Ernst Sander), and Langenscheidt publishing house now offers an illustrated school edition for young (German) learners of English of The Happy Prince and the Selfish Giant edited by Elizabeth A. Moore with illustrations by Gianni DeConno. The only German edition of a long piece by Wilde in the past six months is the 12th edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray (trans. H. Lachmann and G. Landauer) by Insel.

Concerning recent German books on Wilde, the most remarkable one seems to be a new paperback on Wilde’s American lecture tour:

Eilers, Alexander. Im Auftrag der Schönheit: Oscar Wildes Amerika-Tournee. Heidelberg: Leibfried, 2008.

Moreover, several short studies have been published due to the efforts of two publishing houses which specialise in printing theses by university students, Vdm Verlag Dr. Müller and Grin Verlag:

Clauß, Corinna, Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray in drei deutschen Übersetzungen: Analyse und Vergleich der Werke von Gaulke, Greve und Wolf. [Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray in Three German Translations: An Analysis and Comparison of the Works by Gaulke, Greve and Wolf]. Saarbrücken: Vdm Verlag Dr. Müller, 2008. (80 pages).

Kast, Oliver. Ironie als ein Mittel der sprachlichen Indirektheit dargestellt an Oscar Wildes „The Importance of Being Earnest“. [Irony as a means of linguistic indirectness in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest]. München: Grin Verlag, 2008. (24 pages)

Lieb, Martin. Lord Arthur Goring – Oscar Wilde’s Dandy: Seminar Paper. München: Grin Verlag, 2008.

Rüther, Constanze. Oscar Wilde: Ein Vorläufer der Postmoderne? [Oscar Wilde: A Precursor of Postmodernism?]. Saarbrücken: Vdm Verlag Dr. Müller. (68 pages)

Grin Verlag has also published one student thesis on a Shaw topic:

Mauter, Eva Maria. Pygmalien [sic!] von George Bernard Shaw – My Fair Lady von Alan Jay Lerner: ein Vergleich. [Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw – My Fair Lady by Alan Jay Lerner: A Comparison] (24 pages)

The only author who comes close to Wilde in terms of new editions is Stevenson, whose The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde alone has seen three editions for the German market in the past months: one audiobook edition, one bi-lingual edition, and one illustrated adaptation for pupils (again published by Langenscheidt). Treasure Island, too, has been published both as an audiobook and as a bound copy.

Two new editions, of essays by George Moore and of Walter Pater’s Renaissance, complete the list of German publications of the past months on the British fin-de-siècle:

Moore, George Edward. Ausgewählte Schriften: Die frühen Essays (vol. 3). Trans. Björn Bordon. Heusenstamm: Ontos, 2008.

Pater, Walter. Die Renaissance: Studien in Kunst und Poesie. Ed. Sven Brömsel, Viktor Otto. Trans. Wilhelm Schölermann. Berlin: Weidler Buchverlag, 2008.

Theatre:

The theatrical season 2007/08 in Germany has been a very successful one for Wilde, with four new productions of The Importance of Being Earnest, which remains Wilde’s most popular play in Germany, and one new production of An Ideal Husband (beside occasional performances of Bunbury in repertory in Bremen and at the Deutsches Theater Berlin). Most of the new productions premiered in the first half of the season, and details about their cast and crew have therefore already been presented in earlier editions of THE OSCHOLARS. Some of the plays are worth mentioning again, however, since they continued strongly throughout the second half of the season. (Only the Heilbronn production of Earnest ended already in March 2008). The productions of Earnest in Augsburg (in Rainer Kohlmayer’s translation) and in Heidelberg (based on Elfriede Jelinek’s version), which premiered in November and December 2007 respectively, as well as the Leipzig production of An Ideal Husband from December 2007, were great successes with the audience. The Augsburg production in particular, whose relatively broad humour (with slapstick elements and parforce delivery of Wilde’s bon mnts) was, according to the Augsburger Allgemeine, obviously designed to provide pleasure for the allegedly conservative and entertainment-seeking audience segment of season-ticket holders, succeeded in attracting an exceptionally large audience well beyond this target group. The rather shrill and ostentatiously artificial Heidelberg production, which set the play in a building-site symbolising both decay and transitoriness, was a greater critical success. Frank Barsch from Darmstädter Echo, for example, considered it a perfectly tuned production (“perfekt abgestimmte Aufführung”), and Martin Vögele from I praised the director’s achievement of keeping the awareness of the vanity of life constantly present underneath the humour of his temperamental production. The production continued strongly throughout the second half of the season. Heidelberg also saw the reprise of the show Wilde at Heart, which had premiered in January 2008, for two performances in April and May.

There was also one new production of a Wilde play in Germany in the second half of the theatrical season 2007/08, namely Ernst ist das Leben (Bunbury), based on Jelinek’s version of Earnest, which premiered at the Theater am Domhof in Osnabrück on 17th May.

Apart from Earnest, Wilde was mostly present on German stages via Strauss’ Salome. Since my last bulletin, there have been no less than four new productions of this opera in Germany, alongside repertory performances of the piece in Munich, Meiningen and Hamburg.

All new productions of Salome received a lot of praise, especially for the singers in the title roles as well as for the overall musical designs created by the musical directors and their orchestras. One of the four productions, however, made negative news. The Wiesbaden production by Manfred Beilharz, the opening premiere of the Wiesbaden International May Festival, had so many unacknowledged similarities to an earlier production of Salome which Carlos Wagner had directed in Montpellier, that Beilharz was accused of plagiarism by Wagner and the Wiesbaden press, which pointed out the similarities between the two productions in convincing detail. Beilharz, who ironically had written a PhD thesis in 1970 on copyright in the theatre, was unable to defuse the accusations. His production bears the double blame of not only containing stolen ideas, but also of being a qualitatively minor imitation of a superior original.

For more details about these plays, see GOING WILDE.

A look beyond Wilde at other fin-de-siècle authors on German stages leads us, unsurprisingly, to Shaw and, more surprisingly, to Stevenson. Through an adaptation of Treasure Island by Rainer Brand, which premiered at Gerhart-Hauptmann-Theater in Zittau on 5 July 2008, the latter found his way onto a German stage with a new production (dir. Anette Straube, opened 5 July) in the second half of the season. Shaw, in contrast, was only, if consistently, present in repertory performances of Androcles and the Lion at the Residenz Theater in Munich, and of My Fair Lady in Chemnitz, Dortmund and at the Staatstheater am Gärtnerplatz in Munich.

The already impressive number of productions of Ibsen that are currently played on German stages has once again increased due to a new production of Peer Gynt at the Volkstheater in Munich (dir. Christian Stückl, opened 25 March). The second half of the season moreover saw new productions of Strindberg’s Miss Julie in Neuss (dir. Inken Böhack, opened 7 March 2008) and of Gerhart Hauptmann’s Die Ratten in Oberhausen (opened 7 March 2008), a safe choice of text since Die Ratten is still a favourite school text. The pupils will just flock to the theatre (even if only pushed by their teachers).

So far, my report from Germany for the period from March to July 2008. I’ll be back with information on new books and theatre productions in the autumn.

LETTER FROM IRELAND

Aoife Leahy

Greetings from Ireland to all of the Oscholars.

My summer holiday this year took me to the University of Aarhus, Denmark, for the European Society for the Study of English (ESSE) annual conference. Looking over the conference programme in The European English Messenger 17.1: (Spring 2008), I was also pleased to find an interview with the Irish author Anne Enright by Prof Hedwig Schwall (pages 16-22). Enright includes Wilde as one of the influences on her writing and talks about her enjoyment of his fairy tales and plays at different points of her life. She was also delighted to discover that she had won the Man Booker Prize for her novel The Gathering on Wilde’s birthday, October 16th 2007.

The annual conference of The Society for the Study of the Nineteenth Century in Ireland (SSNCI) was held in the University of Limerick on June 26th-27th. As might well be expected, several papers were given on Oscar Wilde. Dr Tina O’Toole gave a paper entitled ‘George Egerton, Oscar Wilde and the Beardsley Woman,’ refuting the idea that there was conflict or competition between Beardsley and Wilde that found expression in Beardsley’s illustrations. Dr Maureen O’Connor’s paper ‘White Negroes, the Dandiacal, and the Fin-de-Siècle’ revealed the many links that were made between Wilde as an Irishman and ‘Negroes’ in racist cartoons of the 1880s and 1890s. Bernie McCarthy’s ‘Wilde at the Outset: Yeats’ Early Vision’ talked about the influence of Wilde on the young William Butler Yeats. Some or hopefully all of these fascinating papers may appear in the SSNCI conference proceedings. Detailed abstracts of all the SSNCI papers were also provided in delegates’ conference packs. I have held on to my programme since it includes much more information than the version that is accessible online. Oscholars who would like a copy (hardcopy only) may contact me at aoife.leahy@ireland.com

Previews of Neil Bartlett’s eagerly anticipated production of An Ideal Husband began in The Abbey on August 11th. I went along on the 16th to see the first Saturday night performance. Dublin theatres have been busy this summer despite the talk of an economic recession and it was good to see that An Ideal Husband was very well attended. The production runs until September. My review appears [insert].

Oscholars will remember our interview with Neil Bartlett in the July issue. Another recent interview can be found in the August 2008 issue of GCN (Gay Community News), a good quality free magazine that is available in Dublin bookshops such as Books Upstairs. Talking with Brian Finnegan, Bartlett discusses why he and The Abbey Director Fiach MacConghail decided to stage An Ideal Husband rather than any other Wilde play. The same issue of GCN contains the full text of an interesting speech given by Colm Tóibín on June 16th to mark the donation of the Irish Queer Archive to the National Library of Ireland. Tóibín includes biographies of Oscar Wilde in his overview of documentary evidence of real-life Irish gay experiences. Past issues of GCN are accessible online at http://www.gcn.ie/archive.aspx and the August issue will be added later in the year.

On my return from Aarhus, I happily have another play in Dublin to attend. Bewley’s Café Theatre is showing a stage adaptation of Wilde’s short story ‘The Happy Prince’ from 25th August to 6th September. Directed by Bairbre Ní Chaoimh, the play shows at lunchtime (doors open at 12.50pm, show starts at 1.10pm) from Mondays-Saturdays. The entrance fee of 15 euro includes a light lunch. See http://www.bewleyscafetheatre.com/upcoming.php

Intriguingly, a walking tour around Dublin currently includes Oscar Wilde’s ‘Dublin Murders’ as one of the highlights! The Ghost Walk Macabre begins at the main gates of Stephen’s Green Park at 7.30pm in the evenings during the tourist season and lasts for 90 minutes. The tour guides are members of The Trapeze Theatre Company. Booking is by telephone only, at 00353-1-6771512.

Oscar Wilde is rapidly colonising my book in progress on Dorothy L. Sayers. The Victorian Approach to Modernism in the Fiction of Dorothy L. Sayers is forthcoming with Cambridge Scholars Publishing in late 2009. The book examines Sayers’ use of key Victorian authors to explain modern times and modern literature to her readers. Wilde took over much of Chapter 2, which focuses on the underrated Sayers novel The Documents in the Case. Now Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 are also giving way to even more Wilde references than I had expected…

LETTER FROM SCOTLAND

Emily Alder

Greeting to the Oscholars from Scotland. I’m delighted to be making my first report giving you a flavour of the fin-de-siècle and Wildean scene in Scotland in recent and forthcoming months.

The stages were lively in Edinburgh in August with both the Edinburgh International Festival and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe busy with Wilde productions and adaptations.

In the EIF, Dorian Gray, Matthew Bourne’s sell-out dance version of A Picture of Dorian Gray ran at the King’s Theatre. In this darkly modernised production, Basil Hallward becomes a fashion photographer, Lord Henry becomes Lady H, and Sybil Vane becomes Cyril. Dorian Gray had mixed reviews, with its music, stylised choreography, and its adaptation of Dorian’s descent into corruption as a satire on celebrity life all drawing attacks, while its excellent performers and set design drew commendations. A more measured review by The Guardian (9th September) goes so far as to say that ‘Bourne gives a more compelling account of Dorian's downfall than Wilde was ever able to do. Free of the censorship laws that cramped Wilde's style, Bourne can be far more explicit in revealing the emotional alienation and moral drift that are endemic to Dorian's world of narcissism and self-gratification’.

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe offered a further array, including more Dorian Gray through dance: Helix Dance’s Damned Beautiful, a ‘dance/physical theatre male duet’ based on Wilde’s novel; and a new adaptation by Emily Jones which was staged under the production of Darren Tunstall with an all-female cast, a musical score, and puppets. More Lives Than One - Oscar Wilde and the Black Douglas, written and performed by Leslie Clack, was presented by Dear Conjunction Theatre Co. ‘Beautiful and literate from end to end, Wilde himself would appreciate this exquisite biography’, according to the Fringe review website, Hairline. And the Alton Fringe Theatre put on a production of Salome in Edinburgh’s eighteenth century St Patrick’s Church.

From Salome, to children’s theatre: a theatrical adaptation of Wilde’s short story ‘The Happy Prince’, with music and dance, was performed by the Peculius Stage Company. It was described by the British Theatre Guide as ‘a delightful flight into the imagination’.

The Journal of Irish and Scottish Studies was launched earlier in 2008 by the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies based at the University of Aberdeen in partnership with Queen’s, Belfast, and Trinity, Dublin. Titles in the first issue included: ‘Away with the Faeries (or, It’s Grimm up North): Yeats and Scotland’, by Willy Maley; ‘“Crossing Swords with W. B. Yeats”: Twentieth Century Scottish Nationalist Encounters With Ireland’ by Bob Purdie; and ‘Relations and Comparisons between Irish and Scottish Poetry: 1890 to the Present Day’ by Edna Longley. More details at www.abdn.ac.uk/riiss/issjournal.shtml.

Back in Edinburgh, meetings of the Edinburgh University Decadence Reading Group are due to resume this autumn under Dr Michèle Mendelssohn, beginning with George MacDonald’s Lilith (1895).

Finally, the Universities of Edinburgh and St Andrews are holding an interdisciplinary conference, Sex/ualities In and Out of Time, in Edinburgh on 28th– 29th November 2008, with Professors Clare Colebrook and Judith Halberstam as keynote speakers. More details at www.sexualitiesconference.co.uk.

LETTER FROM SWEDEN

Tijana Stajic

Greetings from Sweden to all of the Oscholars! I am delighted to have an opportunity to communicate news on our common passion for Oscar Wilde and related matters. Although summer usually brings a reduction of cultural activity in Sweden there were still some events of interest for us.

At the moment a conference entitled ‘Urban and Rural Landscapes: Language, Literature, and Culture in Modern Ireland’ is in preparation. The conference will be held November 6-7 2008 at DUCIS, Dalarna University, and it will offer at least one panel on Oscar Wilde. The primary focus of the panel is twofold: pastoral nostalgia and fairy tale, as well as folklore collecting and re-writing. Besides Wilde’s work the panel also invites papers on Lady Wilde and Sir William Wilde, Lady Gregory and W. B. Yeats. The deadline for abstracts was 1st September, so please free to get more information from Dr Florina Tufescu ftf@du.se or me tijana.stajic@eng.gu.se.

Meanwhile I will give a paper entitled ‘Fin de Siècle and Beyond: From Decadence Proper to Decadence Resolved’ at the conference ‘Century’s End. Re-Evaluating Literature, Art and Culture at the Fin de Siècle, (1880-1914)’, which is to be held at the School of English at Queen’s University, Belfast, 12-13 September 2008. Focusing on the treatment of death, the paper outlines the development of the genre of the Decadent novel, to include, besides The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), more recent texts such as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (1926), Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita (1955), and Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49 (1966). For more information, please see http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofEnglish/Research/Conferences/CenturysEnd/.

Another paper addressing the Decadent theme (recently written and made available at www.uppsatser.se) is Maja Matijevic's undergraduate essay from the Department of Classical Archeology and Ancient History at Lund University. ‘Den romerska elitens banketter and dryckenskap. In vino veritas?’ (‘The Banquets and Drinking of the Roman Elite. In Vino Veritas?’) discusses the habits of celebration in Ancient Rome and points to the discrepancy between the Roman standard of sobriety and piety and the Decadent morality of the rich. Matijevic's conclusion is that the ambiguity of the treatment of alcohol - and more broadly, parties in Ancient Rome lies in the fact that although extravagant drinking was considered immoral, the state of drunkenness also figures as an epitome of inspiration and freedom.

Known for its challenging and even controversial interpretations, GöteborgsOperan (Gothenburg Opera) prepares a dance performance entitled ‘Dekadens’. Thematically the dance addresses human urge for perfection as potentially destructive and shows the denigration of life as a result. ‘Dekadens’ brings together the Norwegian choreographer Jo Stromgren and the Belgian filmmaker Wim Vandkeybus. It opens on 28th February 2009, and is scheduled to run until 3rd April 2009. For more information, please see http://www.opera.se/item.aspx?id=5519.

The Skillinge Theatre performs a new production of the turn of the century play ‘Dödsdansen’ (‘The Dance of Death’) by August Strindberg. Strindberg was obviously affected by the French culture of the period and sometimes created a typically Decadent atmosphere. For example, Axel Borg, from the novel ‘I hafsbandet’ (1890) presents, as opposed to Strindberg’s typically Swedish characters, a Huysmanian figure and a product of the European fin de siècle. Also ‘Dödsdansen’ recounts Strindberg’s sense of pessimism and isolation and reveals apocalyptic views in the figure of Edgar’s and Alice’s endless marital games. The play is directed by Staffan Olzon and had its premier on Midsummer Eve, June 23. For more information, please see http://www.dn.se/DNet/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=2205&a=796649.

If you enter the words ‘Wilde’ and ‘dekadens’ or ‘dekadans’ (as the latter two terms are both current in Swedish), you will probably also be referred to a disturbing anarchist blog established by the author and publisher Bo I. Cavefors. In 2006 Cavefors published ‘Teater dekadens. Tre dramer’ (‘Theater Decadence. Three Dramatic Pieces’) including ‘Uppror i Kasban’ (‘Rebellion in Kasban’), ‘Sade and Japanen’ (‘De Sade and the Japanese’) and ‘Den spetälske i staden’ (‘The Leprous Man in the City’). In its insistence on ‘agere contra’ as an answer to the ‘norm terrorism’ Cadefors’ conception of Decadence seems to rely on Wilde. Cadefors then defines ‘agere contra’ as break from ‘the foundationalism of uniformity’ and the release of ‘the traditions from the ancient Greeks, from Romans of the Roman Empire, from the equestrians of Middle Ages and from the decadency of to-day’. However, rather than a political program, Cavefors’ blog offers its sadomasochistic discourse and iconography (‘sperm, blood, whips,’) as a conversion of abasement into ‘enjoyment’ and ‘sexual absolutism’, referring to the Roman pederast Heliogabalus and the medieval homosexual aesthete Gilles de Rais among others (for more information, please check http://valpen.blogspot.com/2006/03/teater-dekadens_08.html).

A google-search entry about the borzoi Oscar Wilde who is one of the twelve best dogs in Sweden in lure coursing - a chase of an artificial lure such as a white kitchen garbage bag which imitates the course of a hare or a rabbit – presents a rather different reminiscence of Wilde. For more information, please check http://arbetarbladet.se/nyheter/alvkarleby/1.72901.

X. BEING TALKED ABOUT: CONFERENCES & CALLS FOR PAPERS

Here we now only note Calls for Papers or articles specifically relating to Wilde or his immediate circles.  The more general list has its own page, updated every month; to reach it, please click .  We hope these Calls may attract Wildëans.

‘British Æstheticisms’ are the subject of a conference being organised by Bénédicte Coste and Cathérine Delyfer at the University of Montpellier in October 2009. The Call for Papers is published in English and French at www.esthetismes.com. Deadline 1st December. This would appear to offer a wonderful chance of a gathering of fin-de-siéclistes in the celebrated university town in the south of France.

The Société Française d'Etudes Victoriennes et Edouardiennes (http://www.sfeve.paris4.sorbonne.fr/) is inviting contributions for issue number 72 (October 2010) of its journal Les Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens (http://www.cervec.org/) devoted to the Theatre of Oscar Wilde.

Oscar Wilde has become a legend: an outstanding and witty dandy who was a real success in society dinners, but also a man whose image is tainted by scandal and provocation. The recent publication of several biographies, among which Richard Ellmann's is seen as a reference, as well as letters and the detailed account of his trial by his grandson Merlin Holland (A Life in Letters, 2003 and The Real Trial of Oscar Wilde, 2003), all seem to indicate a desire for historical truth to be eventually revealed in a world now freed from homophobia. But once more, the analyses shed light on a character, a man and the role he created for himself. They do not offer a thorough analysis of his work. Actually one of the numerous aphorisms which Oscar Wilde is famous for, according to which life imitates art, and which he developed in his dramatic monologue De Profundis must not overshadow the primary importance of his literary and artistic creation. This issue of the Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens devoted to Oscar Wilde's theatre aims at a return to the stylistic analysis of his plays, which were too often dismissed as trivial and considered as light entertainment for the higher classes of Victorian society. We will try to show how rich and creative his writing is, combining light comedy and poetic drama. Moreover, as a milestone and authoritative work of lasting significance, Wilde's theatre is very often performed today: how can one explain that plays so deeply- rooted in the Victorian era, representing outdated social and moral values, are still arousing the interest of stage directors and gathering a faithful audience? We will thus study how stage directors adapt his plays to find a new public. As a playwright, but also as a stage director of his own public and private life and as a performer of a variety of roles, Oscar Wilde is above all a man of the theatre. This issue of the Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens will thus try to avoid a mere biographical point of view to put his theatrical creation itself on the front stage.

A CV and an abstract in English (no more than 300 words) should be sent by 30th March 2009 to Marianne Drugeon, special editor of this issue. Marianne.drugeon@univ-montp3.fr The article should follow the presentation of the M.L.A.Handbook.

Notes for contributors: Articles submitted for consideration. Length: 30 to 40,000 characters (6000 to 7000 words). Two hard-copies of the article should be sent along with the e-mail copy to Marianne Drugeon.

M.L.A. Style Sheet Specifications; Rich Text Format (RTF). Use footnotes, not endnotes. Illustrations are welcome but the author is responsible for obtaining all necessary copyright permissions before publication. The bibliography should come at the end of the article. For more details and to send your submission, please contact: Marianne.drugeon@univ-montp3.fr

Marianne Drugeon, MCF, Special Editor of the CVE, Université Montpellier 3, Route de Mende, 34199 Montpellier Cedex 5 FRANCE.

XI.  OSCAR IN POPULAR CULTURE / WILDE AS UNPOPULAR CULTURE

Playing cards with Wilde: Wilde is not known to have played cards, but a card pack has been designed in his honour. The cards themselves are black and white hand drawings with small splashes of colour and gold illumination. The artwork is of high quality, though stylized, and is intended to deliver a real feel for Wilde's life and the environment he lived and worked in. It doesn't try to present a narrative of either himself or his works, but rather it is the progressive development of themes, images and events encapsulated into the cards. Click the illustration for the website.

The following note appeared on VICTORIA on 10th September:

‘I am currently teaching Wilde's “A Woman of no Importance”, and was wondering if anyone would have any idea of how the “Victorian” audience would have received and perceived this play.  Does anyone know if it was a popular play?’

This clearly was thought to have strayed in from 1st April, as it received only one reply.

XII. OSCAR WILDE: THE VIDEO

Our video this month is an animated cartoon life of Wilde. We have tried without success to contact Lucy Knisley, the animateur; should she chance upon this note we would be glad to hear from her. Highly recommended.

XIII. Web Foot Notes

A look at websites of possible interest.  Contributions welcome here as elsewhere. 

All the material that we had thus far published in the 'Web Foot Notes' was brought together in June 2003 in one list called 'Trafficking for Strange Webs'.  New websites continue to be reviewed here, after which they are filed on the Trafficking for Strange Webs page, which was last updated in May 2008. A Table of Contents was added for ease of access. ‘Trafficking for Strange Webs’ surveys 48 websites devoted to Oscar Wilde. The Société Oscar Wilde is also publishing on its webpages two lists (‘Liens’ and ‘Liaisons’) of recommendations.  To see ‘Liens’, click here. To see ‘Liaisons’, click here.

To see ‘Trafficking for Strange Webs’, click  .

Meagan Timney’s Victorian Working-Class Women Poets Archive is now up and running and can be found at
http://wcwp.english.dal.ca.  The project is still in its beginning stages, but Ms Timney adding new poems regularly.  An important project with a well organised website. Last updated 10/04/2008.

Florina Tufescu sends us the following

Scandinavia

Nordic Irish Studies Network (NISN)

http://www.du.se/Templates/InfoPage____5339.aspx?epslanguage=EN

Nordic Association for Comparative Literature

http://www.norlit.org/

Sweden

Dalarna Irish Studies Centre (DUCIS)

http://www.du.se/Templates/InfoPage____1281.aspx?epslanguage=EN

Graduate Advisory Board for Literature in English (GABLE)

http://gablewiki.wikispaces.com (includes developing database of experts, research news etc.)

XIV. OGRAPHIES

We continue to expand our sections of BIBLIOGRAPHIES, DISCOGRAPHIES and SCENOGRAPHIES and this is now a major component of our work. Click the appropriate icons. Updates are announced regularly on our forum.

XV. NEVER SPEAKING DISRESPECTFULLY: THE OSCAR WILDE SOCIETIES & ASSOCIATIONS

Readers accustomed to checking here for news of the Wilde Societies are advised that these now have their own page. To reach it, please click

XVI. OUR FAMILY OF JOURNALS

All our journals appear on our website www.oscholars.com. Each has a mailing list for alerts to new issues or special announcements. To be included on the list for any or all of them, contact oscholars@gmail.com.

The Eighth Lamp

The second issue of this journal of Ruskin studies has been published on our website, under the vigorous editorship of Anuradha Chatterjee (University of South Australia) and Carmen Casaliggi (University of Limerick). Dr Chatterjee has produced a splendid first issue, and issued a Call for Papers for the second. THE EIGHTH LAMP: Ruskin Studies To-day will shed much light in new places, and places Ruskin studies firmly in conjugation with Wilde studies.

Rue des Beaux Arts

The seventeenth issue of our French language journal under the dedicated editorship of Danielle Guérin will be published before the end of November. It continues to reflect and encourage Wilde studies in France and the Francophone countries.

Shavings, Moorings and The Sibyl

New issues of these journals devoted to George Bernard Shaw (co-edited by Barbara Pfeifer), George Moore (edited by Mark Llewellyn) and Vernon Lee (edited by Sophie Geoffroy) are planned for this autumn.

Visions and Nocturne

In the spring of 2008 we gathered together all the visual arts information that was scattered through different section of THE OSCHOLARS into a section called VISIONS. This was consolidated in the summer, and a new edition is planned for the autumn. Subsequently we will be calling for papers. VISIONS is co-edited by Anne Anderson, Isa Bickman, Síghle Bhreathnach-Lynch, Nicola Gauld and Sarah Turner. NOCTURNE, our journal devoted to Whistler and his circle, remains in abeyance for the time being but will be incorporated into VISIONS.

The Latchkey

We will shortly be launching THE LATCHKEY, a journal devoted to reporting and creating scholarship on The New Woman. The co-editors are Jessica Cox, Petra Dierkes-Thrun, Sophie Geoffroy, Lisa Hager, Christine Huguet, and Alison Laurie.

XVII. Acknowledgements

THE OSCHOLARS website continues to be provided and constructed by Steven Halliwell of The Rivendale Press, a publishing house with a special interest in the fin-de-siècle.  Mr Halliwell joins Dr John Phelps of Goldsmiths College, University of London, and Mr Patrick O’Sullivan of the Irish Diaspora Net as one of the godfathers without whom THE OSCHOLARS could not have appeared on the web in any useful form.

Return to Table of Contents | Return to hub page | Return to THE OSCHOLARS home page