Structure

“The Nightingale and the Rose” by Oscar Wilde is structured around the main event – the deadly sacrifice a nightingale makes for Love. The story respects the traditional plot line having an exposition, a rising action, a climax, a falling action and a resolution.

However, the short story is also constructed using numerous fairy-tale elements such as:

• The natural world (birds, animals, insects, trees, etc.), feelings and concepts are personified and given human traits.
• The allusion to the use of magic: the nightingale needs to perform a ritual for the tree to create a red rose.
• The use of the magical number three: the bird goes to three trees and sings three songs the night she dies.

Still, the story has an unconventional ending for a fairy-tale, as the protagonist’s sacrifice proves to be in vain because the rose she created at the cost of her life does not bring the two lovers together.

Title

The title of the short story indicates that the narrative may be a fable (fables are stories which have a moral and feature animals) or a fairy-tale, but also that there may be a hidden symbolism behind it. As the story reveals, the main character of the short story is a real nightingale,...

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Beginning

The short story begins directly, in media res (in the middle of events) with the intrigue: a young Student needs a red rose to be able to dance with the woman he loves:

“She said that she would dance with me if I brought her red roses,” cried the young Student; “but in all my garden there is no red rose.” From her nest in the holm-oak tree the Nightingale heard him, and she looked out through the leaves, and wondered.

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Middle

The middle of the short story includes the rising action which follows the Nightingale after she decides to help the Student get the red rose that the woman he loves required. The writer introduces the magical number three, as the Nightingale travels the garden until she reaches the third rose tree after the first and second do not make red roses but white and yellow ones.

Then, the test element is also introduced marking a tension point. The Nightingale’s devotement to the idea of love and to helping the Student...

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Ending

The story ends with a sad irony. In the falling action, the Student awakes, finds the rose and runs to offer it to the woman he loves without ever knowing about the Nightingale’s sacrifice. But the Professor’s daughter rejects both the...

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