laugh‚ History would have been different.” -Oscar Wilde‚ The Picture of Dorian Gray The following research delves into the life and literature of Irish-born author and playwright‚ Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde. Overview Oscar Wilde started his writing career in the late 1870s when he explored different forms of writing. His poetry gained popularity in the 1890s and he became an important literary figure of late Victorian England. Oscar Wilde is the genius behind the novel The Picture of
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this sense the most significant moral of The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde is that the supreme task of the individual is to realize fully‚ and from within‚ one’s own identity. Dorian exemplifies the drama of his troubles on the rough journey to find his identity from influences of a conceited hedonistic friend‚ and in the sacrifices of morals seeking irrevocable pleasures through irrevocable sins. The impressionable young Dorian proves to be as interesting a thing to analyze in his youthful
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Oscar Wilde comments on the societal values of the Victorian era in his critically acclaimed play The Importance of Being Earnest. Through the use of the literary element of characterization‚ especially of Jack‚ Wilde portrays himself as a strong critic of the society he lived in. Throughout the play‚ Wilde uses characterization to reflect his criticism by emphasizing the major flaws of Jack. Firstly‚ Wilde criticizes the people of the Victorian era as being simple and insincere by embodying these
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The Conflict Between Aestheticism and Morality in Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray Oscar Wilde prefaces his novel‚ The Picture of Dorian Gray‚ with a reflection on art‚ the artist‚ and the utility of both. After careful scrutiny‚ he concludes: “All art is quite useless” (Wilde 4). In this one sentence‚ Wilde encapsulates the complete principles of the Aesthetic Movement popular in Victorian England. That is to say‚ real art takes no part in molding the social or moral identities
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Oscar Wilde in many ways was far ahead of the Victorian society that he found himself in. Wilde’s homosexual lifestyle and focus on sensuality were so frowned upon in the Victorian society that they were actually illegal‚ which led to his eventual imprisonment and downfall (Bastiat 2). It is almost as if Oscar Wilde’s life itself was a satire‚ because these aspects of himself that were illegal and frowned upon were what made his play The Importance of Being Earnest so successful. Wilde’s play was
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The Importance of Being Earnest By Oscar Wilde In The Importance of Being Earnest‚ Oscar Wilde uses word play in reference to the word “earnest.” Throughout his play‚ Wilde focuses on the matter of who is the most sincere or “earnest” and who is actually the person whose name is Ernest. The two main characters‚ Algernon Moncrieff and Jack Worthing‚ both claim to be Ernest for deceptive reasons. Wilde develops his characters Algernon and Jack in order to portray them as hypocritical to the definition
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evidence that Dorian only has a superficial interest in her and also can be linked to aestheticism because Dorian only looks at her outside beauty and talent and not into the meaning of the girl inside. By using a metaphor such as “joy of a caged bird” Wilde is able to conjure the image of Sibyl as the bird trapped in a cage‚ purely for the enjoyment of an onlooker such as Dorian‚ the cage is her stage for her to please her master. This is significant in understanding why their relationship breaks down
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promotion of virtue and reproach of vice. Sloughing off from such a hackneyed‚ yet widely used frame of thought‚ the novel ‘The Happy Prince’ (1888) by Oscar Wilde connects heroism with compassion. With a subconscious reminiscent between ‘courage’ and ‘hero’‚ compassion is generally not a primary association with a strong image of a hero. Oscar Wilde however‚ through utilization of ‘the happy prince’ as a mechanism‚ conveys the idea of compassion and sacrifice which consists of happiness and beauty
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Story ending with the two main characters had a long happy life forever in the heaven with God. This is the arrangement of Oscar Wilde-a christian writer‚ which we to call a " happy ending". Form the deadlock that the story went as swallow’s death and the condiction of Happy prince’s status melted‚ the religious belief of the writer has been imposed for satisfying the christian readers especially the poor. That’s also the short way-solution for him to end his story and its easy to be agreed by christian
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Clearly “The Importance of Being Earnest” by Oscar Wilde is a superb piece of satire. In the act‚ Wilde manages to humorize the daily lives of those in the victorian era‚ as well as the format in which they made vital decisions and how they were decided. Wilde most likely decided to focus on this topic to make people realize how ridiculous the system was‚ and why they should change it to realistic beliefs. Such as those of following love and how money and titles do not really make people any different
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