SOURCE: Nassaar, Christopher S. “Wilde's Salomé.” Explicator 57, no. 2 (winter 1999): 89-90.

In the following essay, Nassaar considers the symbolic significance of the fan in Wilde's Salomé.

Lady Windermere's Fan was Oscar Wilde's first mature play, and it established him overnight as a successful playwright. It also created in the minds of playgoers an association between Wilde and the fan. Soon afterward, Wilde wrote a second play, Salomé, and he included in it eight references to a fan. The references constitute Wilde's signature—his constant reminder to reader and audience that he is the author of this new play. But the fan in Salomé also serves a functional and symbolic purpose, much like the one in Lady Windermere's Fan.

In Salomé the fan is associated with all four main characters. The first association is with Salomé herself at the beginning of the play. When she emerges into the moonlight after...