Bluebirds by Catulle Mendès (1841-1909), here delightfully translated for the first time into English by Brian Stableford, is fascinating, not only because it illustrates a particular evolution within the pattern of the author's own works, but because that pattern reflects a more general one associated with the evolution from the French Romanticism of the first half of the nineteenth century to the Decadent and Symbolist Movements of the fin-de-siècle. Mendès was one of the key figures in the latter phases of that process of development, launching his literary career in the 1860s under the patronage of Théophile Gautier, whose daughter Judith he married--much against her father's wishes--in 1866, and then becoming a leading figure among the "Parnassians" who attempted a renewal and revivification of Romantic ideals, before he entered wholeheartedly into the Decadent Movement launched in the 1880s. The stories in the present collection extend over a linear spectrum, moving by degrees from the affected sentimentality of Romanticism to a darker and somewhat jaundiced world-view that illustrates the Decadent sensibility very well, although all the stories were written in advance of the enormous fashionability that the sensibility in question achieved in the late 1880s.

Review In this adventure story for the entire family anything does! It is a story of childhood innocence and world peace. -- Ladybug PressThis book is an innovative Masterpiece for young and old. -- New WavesThis is a still more revolutionary contribution to children's literature than Harry Popper... -- Mariv Product Description Peace Flower is a story which can be read from the age of ten to a hundred and ten. It is an imaginative tale of fantastic adventures in space, to find the Peace Flower in the Future and bring it back to earth as it does not exist in our present. Lee and Ronni two brave children face the terrible nuclear giant Nuki, who tries to stop them from bringing peace on earth, and they triumph. The book has been adopted by many schools and colleges to teach peace education. It is available in English, in Hebrew, and in Arabic. It is also available on tape, from Ladybug Press, Ca. About the Author Ada Aharoni is an Israeli poet, writer, and lecturer. She writes in English and Hebrew and has published twenty two books to date that have been translated into several languages. She believes that culture and literature can help in healing the urgent ailments of our global village, such as war and conflict, and the themes of peace and conflict resolution are major ones throughout her works. She studied at London University, where she earned an M. Phil. Degree on Henry Fielding, and at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where she was awarded a Ph.D. on: Saul Bellow, the Nobel Prize laureate. Her first novel, The Second Exodus, was published in 1983, and To Alexandria, Jerusalem and Freedom appeared in 1985. Her historical novel From The Nile to The Jordan, was published in 1994; and in 1996 she published The Peace Flower, a fantasy for young and old, which has been compared to St. Exupery's Little Prince. She is likewise one of the editors of the book: Saul Bellow: A Mosaic, that covers the First International Saul Bellow Conference, which she initiated and chaired at Haifa University. Among her published books are eight collections of poems in Hebrew, English, French and Arabic, and two books of translations of Israeli poetry, including Shin Shalom's New Poems. She is the Editor of the Anthology: A Song to Life and to World Peace, as well as of Waves of Peace (1997), dedicated to the memory of Yitzhak Rabin. She is the founder and editor of the Literary Magazine Galim: Waves (1987-1997), and the electronic journals internet Horizon: Pave Peace, and Poetry Israel: Lirit, featuring Israeli poets in English translation. Her latest published book is: You and I Can Change the World (Jan. 2000). Among her many prizes and awards are: The British Council Award, the Keren Amos President Award, the Haifa and Bremen Prize, The World Academy of Arts and Culture Award, the Korean Gold Crown of World Poets Award, the Shin Shalom Prize, the Yunus Emre Award, the Rachel Prize, and she was chosen as one the Hundred Global Heroines in Rochester, N.Y, in 1998. She was also awarded the Honorary Award of HSJE: The World Historical Society of the Jews from Egypt, for her "devoted and unmatched efforts to promote the history of the Jews from Egypt, through her visionary literature and poetry proclaiming peace in the world." She is President of the XIII World Congress of Poets (Haifa, Israel, 1992), and the founder and President of IFLAC: the International Forum for the Culture and Literature of Peace, and convener of PTLC the "Pave Peace Through Literature and Culture" commission of IPRA: the International Peace Research Association. She is also the founder and General Director of "The Bridge: Jewish and Arab Women for Peace in the Middle East." Ada Aharoni has taught literature and sociology at the University of Haifa, and sociology and Conflict Resolution, in the general studies department of the Technion in Haifa. She has been a guest lecturer and visiting professor at several American and European universities,