Sunday Feature

Oscar in America

Sunday 30 December 2007 22:15-23:00 (Radio 3)

One hundred and twenty five years ago this month, a flamboyant young man sailed for England after a visit to America that proved seminal towards his development into one of the literary greats.

Owen Dudley Edwards recounts how a trip to promote a comic opera turned into a year-long tour that educated America about aesthetic ideas, and about its educator, the Apostle of Aestheticism, Oscar Wilde.

On this tour, Oscar gave no less than 140 lectures over 260 days, met leading figures from government, arts and culture, and created a legacy both for an emerging nation and for himself as an emerging writer.

Mingling epigrams, history and literary lore are Oscar's grandson Merlin Holland, tour guide John Cooper, historian Mary Warner Blanchard and critic Declan Kiberd

Duration:

45 minutes

Sunday Feature

Episode and Playlist Information

• 10 Feb 08 Edgardo Cozarinsky
• 3 Feb 08 Columbia
• 27 Jan 08 Le Morte Darthur
• 20 Jan 08 Missing Moscow
• 13 Jan 08 Rules of Engagement
• 6 Jan 08 Bosphorous Battles
• 30 Dec 07 Oscar in America
• 23 Dec 07 A Cloud...
• 16 Dec 07 RAND
• 9 Dec 07 The origins of music

Sunday Feature pages