Frederick S. Roden is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Conneticut. He is the author of Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture (Palgrave Macmillan). He teaches courses on Oscar Wilde, has published essays and reviews in Wilde studies, and in 1995 cocurated an exhibition at New York University commemorating the centenary of the trials.

'...gives lucid and thorough accounts of the developments of Wilde criticism from Wilde's day to our own, with particular and appropriate emphasis on the explosion of Wilde studies over the last decade...One comes away from this volume feeling enormously heartened by the sheer breadth and catholicity of Wilde studies and of late-nineteenth century studies across the board.' - Jonathan Freedman, Professor of English, University of Michigan, USA'...The ten chapters that make up this informative and stimulating volume, each written by an established specialist, go to the heart of current Wilde scholarship...An extensive chronology and select bibliography are included for good measure. Readers, viewers, Wildean devotees, students of literary tradition and popular culture alike will find here suitable amplification of the reasons Wilde stands apart from all other late-19th-century writers...Highly recommended.' - Choice

• List of Illustrations Acknowledgements Notes on Contributors Chronology; D.C.Rose Introduction; F.S.Roden Biographies; J.Bristow Wilde the Writer; A.M.Daniel Performance Theory and Performativity; F.Coppa Aestheticism and Aesthetic Theory; A.Pease Oscar Wilde, Commodity, Culture; D.Denisoff Philosophical Approaches to Interpretation of Oscar Wilde; P.Smith Religion; P.R.O'Malley Gay Studies/Queer Theory and Oscar Wilde; R.A.Kaye Oscar Wilde and Feminist Criticism; M.D.Stetz Oscar Wilde: Nation and Empire; N.Doody Selected Bibliography Index