Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

LIFE
Born in Dublin in 1854.
Chronologically he was a late Victorian, but actually, he
criticized the hypocrisies of Victorian age ad refused the
moralism of that time.

He was a rebel and a fashionable dandy.

A dandy is a man who has a cult of self: he gives particular
importance to his physical appearance, has a refined language, dresses in an
elegant way, is eccentric and out of schemes.

He was a Decadent just like D’annunzio.

He married Constance Llyod and had two sons He was
imprisoned for homosexual acts and condemned to two years
of hard labour.

He was a playwright novelist, essayist, and poet; he is also

known for his aphorisms about life and love.

He died of meningitis in Paris in 1900.

 A life out of
schemes
Similarly to D’Annunzio, Wilde had an irregular lifestyle, free
from conventions and rules and was one of the greatest
celebrities of his days.

He was famous for his irony, for his attitudes and his
posing. He used his wit (ingegno) to shock.

His presence was considered as a social event and his

remarks (osservazioni) appeared in fashionable London
magazines.
LIFE IS PLEASURE AND
FREEDOM
For Wilde life is pleasure and pleasure is beauty.

Beauty, in the sense of clothes, words, works of art or physical

beauty has no moral constraint, it is totally free.

In the Preface to his novel he wrote: ‘There is no such thing as a

moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written,
that’s all’.

So he totally rejected the didacticism of the Victorian novels.

Obviously, according to the Victorian moralists, his name was

associated with scandal, obscenity and intrigue.
 AESTHETICISM
Oscar Wilde was the outstanding representative of
Aetheticism, the artistic and literary movement whose motto
was

‘Art for Art’s Sake’

‘Arte per l’arte’
Walter Pater, the founder of the movement (together with John
Ruskin), stated: “the meaning of life is beauty and beauty is
reflected in art, a work of art is important for its beauty and
perfection”. So, art had no didactic or moralistic aim.

Wilde stated that Aestheticism was a search for beautiful , a

sort of science in which painting, sculpture, poetry, were
different forms of the same truth.
 Wilde’s Aestheticism
Oscar Wilde adopted the aesthetical ideal: he affirmed ‘my life is like a work
of art’.
His AESTHETICISM was in contrast with the didacticism and moralism of
Victorian novels.
Indeed, many of Wilde’s work were considered immoral by Victorian society.

the creator of beautiful things, a

• The artist superior being considered as an
outcast.
He writes just to please himself.
used only to celebrate beauty
and the sensorial pleasures.
• Art Art and the cult of beauty can
prevent the murder of the soul

employed by the artist

• Virtue and as raw material in his
vice art:
 APHORISMS
Wilde is known for his aphorisms.
Some of Wilde’s famous quotations are:
‘I have nothing to declare except my genius’
‘Experience is simply the name we give our
mistakes’

‘A man can be happy with any woman as long as he does not love her’
‘One should always be in love.
That is the reason why one should never marry’
‘Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known’
‘To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all’
‘Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to
time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught’
‘There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that
is not being talked about’