The Happy Prince and Other Tales (or Stories) is a collection of bedtime stories for children by Oscar Wilde, first published in May 1888. It contains five stories that are highly popular among children and frequently read in schools: "The Happy Prince," "The Nightingale and the Rose," "The Selfish Giant," "The Devoted Friend," and "The Remarkable Rocket." The short stories are valued for their morals, and have been made into animated films. In 2003, the second through fourth stories were adapted by Lupus Films and Terraglyph Interactive Studios into the three-part series Wilde Stories for Channel 4. The stories are regarded as classics of children's literature.
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The Happy Prince and Other Tales in the context of Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900) was an Irish author, poet and playwright. After writing in different literary styles throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular and influential dramatists in London in the early 1890s. He was a key figure in the emerging Aestheticism movement of the late 19th century and is regarded by many as the greatest playwright of the Victorian era. Wilde is best known for his Gothic novel The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890), his epigrams, plays and bedtime stories for children, as well as his criminal conviction in 1895 for gross indecency for homosexual acts.
Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. In his youth, Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, he read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism during this time, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.