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Contemporary Literature Press
Press Release
Bucharest, Tuesday 16 October 2012

Online Publication

Contemporary Literature Press,
under The University of Bucharest, in conjunction with The British Council, and The Romanian Cultural Institute,

Announces the publication of

Wilde's Salomé — 120 years old!
edited by C. George Sandulescu.

(ISBN 978-606-8366-35-7, 387 pages)


Wilde's Saloméso very French — 120 years old!


So round a number on Oscar's birthday claims European celebration in the New Millennium! ("Wilde finished Salomé in Torquay in January 1892," writes biographer Dick Ellmann, a scholar of remote Romanian origin.)

The point is that Samuel Beckett was a very meticulous man. Oscar Wilde was not. All the texts, or most, written by Samuel Beckett are to be found in French and English. Translated by himself. The great, famous, celebrated Oscar Wilde did one single book in French, and, out of kindness, or negligence, or God knows what, he passed the text on to somebody else, whoever that was, to have it translated into English. Which indeed was his cherished language. The result was a disaster, in the sense that we are today faced in this case with a text of the play Salomé by a great English language writer without an English original at all. And that is why languages are important. Whether they are important with Joyce, or whether they are important with Beckett, or whether they are important with Oscar Wilde is another matter. But what Oscar Wilde proves without any doubt is that, even in his case, language is all important. And proof of that is the fact that the famous Richard Strauss was faithful from start to finish to Oscar Wilde's French original for his opera. And that is why, and that is how, an age-old Biblical story of semi-necrophilia becomes PanEuropean. And another very important PanEuropean book it is, standing by the side of James Joyce's Finnegans Wake.

In my opinion, therefore, PanEuropean literature may be said to have started under the pen of these two, or three, or even four great Irish writers, who were too great to stay at home! And they all knew several languages well, and the very difficult ones at that. Like Latin. And Greek. And German.

Do look at this book in the light of the very simple fact that the dance of languages of European literature is gradually acquiring the same dramatic value the Dance of the Seven Veils had not only for Salomé, but also for Saint John the Baptist. In these days of ours, when politicians keep mentioning Jesus Christ, quite needlessly in most cases, we are on the very safe side in dealing with Saint John the Baptist. And with Herod.

This book of sources is loosely structured on the following four issues: who started the myth, who continued the legend — in words and in pictures... who climaxed it, and how... Last but not least, how significant is the French-language play Salomé in assessing Oscar Wilde's literary achievement as a whole. This book contains the texts, and their sources — the Bible, Mallarmé, Flaubert — in several languages. It also carries the PREPRINTS of the very first Oscar Wilde World Congress.

There will be a massive Oscar Wilde Festival in Paris in June 2014 to beat all previous records (for information about it, contact THE OSCHOLARS [oscholars@gmail.com] ).

16 October 2012

C. George Sandulescu



Wilde's Salomé — 120 years old!, edited by C. George Sandulescu, is formally launched on Tuesday 16 October 2012. But it is available for consultation and downloading on receipt of this Press Release, at the following internet address:

http://editura.mttlc.ro/sandulescu-oscar-wilde-salome.html


You are kindly invited to visit the Contemporary Literature Press Website at http://editura.mttlc.ro/. For comments or suggestions, please contact the publisher lidia.vianu@g.unibuc.ro.

 

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