Why was Paris so popular as a place of both innovation and exile in the late nineteenth century? Using French, English and American sources, this first volume of a trilogy provides a possible answer with a detailed exploration of both the city and its communities, who, forming a varied cast of colourful characters from duchesses to telephonists, artists to beggars, and dancers to diplomats, crowd the stage. Through the throng moves Oscar Wilde as the connecting thread: Wilde exploratory, Wilde triumphant, Wilde ruined. This use of Wilde as a central figure provides both a cultural history of Paris and a view of how he assimilated himself there. By interweaving fictional representations of Paris and Parisians with historical narrative, Paris of the imagination is blended with the topography of the city described by Victor Hugo as ‘this great phantom composed of darkness and light’. This original treatment of the belle époque is couched in language accessible to all who wish to explore Paris on foot or from an armchair.

Utilizing Wilde’s own characters “Vivian” and “Cyril,” this critique in play format begins by discussing the playwright’s ideas on the relation of Art to Life, exploring his pronouncements on the artist’s true purpose. Wilde’s statement about the artist as a “creator of beauty”, found in his “Preface to the Picture of Dorian Gray”, is then examined with regard to his last and most popular play, The Importance of Being Earnest. Discussing …Earnest in extensis, this book discovers whether the elegant artificiality and epigrammatic conceits of contemporary farce prevail as beauty per Wilde’s earlier theories as expressed in The Decay of Lying. The consequence of Wilde’s assault on Victorian values is considered in terms of its social contribution to perceptions of beauty and the way in which we might appreciate both the playwright and …Earnest now.

Readers of Adam Silvera (They Both Die at the End) and Elizabeth Acevedo (The Poet X) will pull out the tissues for this tender, quirky story of one seventeen-year-old boy's journey through first love and first heartbreak, guided by his personal hero, Oscar Wilde. Words have always been more than enough for Ken Z, but when he meets Ran at the mall food court, everything changes. Beautiful, mysterious Ran opens the door to a number of firsts for Ken: first kiss, first love. But as quickly as he enters Ken's life, Ran disappears, and Ken Z is left wondering: Why love at all, if this is where it leads? Letting it end there would be tragic. So, with the help of his best friends, the comfort of his haikus and lists, and even strange, surreal appearances by his hero, Oscar Wilde, Ken will find that love is worth more than the price of heartbreak. "An unabashed love letter to Oscar Wilde, Cole Porter, and the arts' ability to give voice to human emotion." --Kirkus "Linmark's novel is definitely offbeat and wild(e)ly imaginative...and a rich reading experience that would make the ineffable Oscar proud." --Booklist "A big-hearted book that...always keeps love in its heart." --Abdi Nazemian author of Like a Love Story and The Authentics "As surreal as it is real, as beautiful as it is painful, as playful as it is wise. --Randy Ribay, author of Patron Saints of Nothing

Concise and illuminating articles explore Oscar Wilde's life and work in the context of the turbulent landscape of his time.