The Happy Prince, and Other Tales

About the book

A decorated statue and a travelling swallow begin the title story by looking beyond civic admiration towards suffering in the city below. The other tales bring gardens, birds, friendships, and an extravagantly self-important firework into similarly pointed encounters between appearance and value. Wilde uses the apparent simplicity of fairy-tale forms to ask what generosity costs, how selfishness describes itself, and whether beauty guarantees understanding. The tone moves between tenderness and sharp comedy, allowing the stories to appeal differently on successive readings. Their endings do not always supply the comfortable rewards expected from moral instruction. As a collection, they invite attention to the difference between announcing a virtue and acting upon it, especially when the act brings no recognition from those who claim authority to judge.

• Generosity
• Beauty and value
• Selfishness

Why read it

For lyrical and sharply comic tales that make their moral questions more complicated than an easy lesson.

Fairy-tale collection · English text