Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (Dublin, 1854 – October 16, Paris, 30 november 1900) was a writer, poet and Aesthete of Irish descent that a large part of his life in England has lived.
Content[]
Life Course[Edit][]
Jong and revolutionary[Edit][]
Oscar Wilde was born as the youngest son of Sir William and Lady Jane Wilde. His mother, Jane Francesca Elgee (1826-1896), was in Ireland known as a very nationalistic writer under the pen name Speranza. They also translated books from French and German. His father (1815-1876) was a prominent eye-and oorchirurg and wrote books on archaeology and folklore. The family wanted belonged to the Anglo-Irish Protestant surface layer of the Irish population.
Oscar Wilde studied classical languages at the Trinity College in Dublin, from 1871 to 1874. He was a brilliant student, and dragged at Trinity the coveted Berkeley Gold Medal waiting. He went to Magdalen College in Oxford (1874 - 1878). There he won the Newdigate Prize in 1878 for his poem Ravenna. In 1875 he undertook a trip to Italywith his former teacher at Trinity College John Pentland Mahaffy,, and two years later he went to the same Mahaffy to Greece, at a time when it is still by no means usual was that students traveled to the birthplace of their civilization.
During his time as a student in Oxford, he was known for his role in the aesthetic and decadent movement. He let his hair grow, publicly showed contempt for the ' male ' sports, and decorated his room with peacock feathers, lilies, sunflowers, Chinese porcelain and other objets d'art. He was impressed by the English writers John Ruskinand Walter Pater, which made the center of the art life. Oscar Wanted quickly became a champion of the aesthetic principle of ' art for art's sake ' (l'art pour l'art: art without ulterior motive, all is well as long as it's the art but serves). This statement by Théophile Gautier was revived by the American painter James McNeill Whistler, a friend of wanted. According to Whistler had to concentrate on art beauty in color and appearance, and not with the exact display of people and business, as recommended by the critic John Ruskin. Wanted embraced the ' l'art pour l'art'-principle with surrender (with perhaps the exception can be seen: The picture of Dorian Gray.).
After graduating in 1878, he began to write plays. The first was Vera, or the Nihilists (published in 1880). In 1879 went wanted to give lectures about aesthetic values in London. He used to live on big foot. After the death of his father provided for its maintenance by the yield of Wild partly in few belongings in Ireland.
[1][2]Advertising for cigars using a portrait of Wilde, retrieved from a picture of Napoleon Sarony===Aesthetician and dandy[Edit]===
The figure of Wilde and aestheticism were mild are mocked in the operetta Patience of William s. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan (1881). Because those operette also was a success in America, where nobody knew who was Oscar Wilde, organized the famous impresario a lecture tour of Richard D'Oyly Carte wanted by the United States andCanada, which lasted nine months. Oscar Wilde departed on 3 January 1882. This tour was a ' media event ' avant la lettre. Everywhere he was both reviled came Wanted if praised to the skies. By the great success of this tour, there was a veritable craze of aestheticism. With Wilde's portrait, and his caricature was advertised in Solitaire, cigars, health powder, cast iron teapot warmers and any other merchandise. Sunflowers and lilies were suddenly very popular. That the famous Aesthete by many critics the soil was lost, only made him more famous. In the illustrated magazines were included numerous caricatures of him. The resistance that are called geëffemineerde (effeminate) appearance also led to unpleasant scenes: in Oxford, his behavior on him a bath in the river Cherwell and an attack on his dorm room to stand. But by his aplomb knew Wanted to control and exploit such situations. With his long hair, extreme costumes, aesthetic gestures, exquisite objects and selected language therefore Wanted Oscar was the prototype of the dandy.
The aesthetic movement is also seen in the work of William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and had a lasting influence on English decorative art. As spokesperson for this movement was Oscar wanted to one of the most famous people of his time. In addition to the taunts, his paradoxes and affected his sharp, funny comments often cited.
Wilde married Constance Lloyd and had two sons, Cyril (1885) and Vyvyan (1886). In addition to giving lectures in the 1980s Wanted kept busy writing for and editing magazines. So he worked as a reviewer for the Pall Mall Gazette in the years 1887 to 1889 and was also in the same years editor of The woman's World. David also wrote a number of longer pieces and published those along with art criticisms in his book Intentions 1891.
[3][4]Caricature of wild in the American weekly magazine Wasp (1882)
In 1888, his first collection of fairy tales in The Happy Prince and Other Tales 1888, a luxurious Dutch book with illustrations of Walter Crane. Released three years later, his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. Critics have sometimes claimed that there were parallels between the main character of the book and its writer. It is a depressing book, in which the main character despite his depravity and poor lifestyle, young, beautiful and healthy, while his painted portrait from deteriorating still further saved in the closet and ages-to the creepy denouement.
Wild had already published a selection of his poems in 1881, which in a small circle called admiration. After The Happy Prince , he released a second bundle fairy tales fromThe House of Pomegranates by, in 1891, by the writer, in his own words not intended ' for the British child nor for the British public '. Also this book was beautifully cared for and illustrated by Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon.
Over the years more and more individualistic was wanted. He distanced himself increasingly open by the prevailing morality in Victorian England. As an artist he demanded complete freedom. In it he was influenced by the work of the Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi. Wanted felt strongly addressed by a philosopher who "lived in a time when everyone loved his virtues for itself and no one interfered with other people's life". Oscar Wilde was excited about Zhuangzi's "perfect man" who "leaves to itself all that outside of its range is not prevented, by the material. His mental balance makes him the master of his own world ". Wanted continues with admiring Zhuangzi ideals of "self development and adopt cultural values"[1] .
Alfred Douglas[Edit][]
In 1891 Wanted met Lord Alfred Douglas, a son of the Marquis of Queensberry. The two men were fond of each other, despite the fact that David was married. The father of Douglas wanted to end this relationship. In 1895, Queensberry accused savage of sodomy, which Wanted a process for libel in defence went and started against the Marquis. However, the Court ruling that Queensberry in the same. In the process, there was evidence that wild "grove immoral acts" had committed[2] with young men of lower descent, and now he had to act in the dock themselves. The prosecution did not attempt to make it much heavier rebuked offence "Sodomy" or anal intercourse at the expense or to prove. Although Wanted to flee to France has the chance he chose not to do so. Oscar Wilde was arrested and sentenced to two years ' hard labour in prison. His wife divorced him and took with her two sons to the surname "Holland". During his imprisonment wrote a long letter to Douglas, who Wanted only after his death, however, was published under the title De Profundis .
Exile and end[Edit][]
By his imprisonment was his health deteriorated and wanted to spent the last years of his life in exile in France where he in poverty by 46 succumbed to meningitis .
On his deathbed converted to the CatholicismWanted. Robert Ross mentions in his letter of 14 december 1900 to More Adey "He was conscious that people were in the room, and raised his hand when I asked him whether he understood. He pressed our hands. I then sent in search of a priest, and after great difficulty found Father Cuthbert Dunne ... who came with me at once and administered Baptism and Extreme Unction. -Oscar could not take the Eucharist". [3] wanted was fascinated by Catholicism since his student years. So he had met Pope Pius IX in 1877 and he described the Catholic Church "for saints and sinners alone – for respectable people, the Anglican Church will do". [4] during his imprisonment had wanted the works of Augustine, Dante and Cardinal Newman devoured.
Oscar Wilde is buried in the cemetery Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. The Tomb monument was designed by the British sculptor Jacob Epstein.
Work[Edit][]
Appeared In 1891 Wilde's only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, a classicgothichorror fairy tale with a ' Faustus ' theme, in which the aesthetic an important motive is.
Wilde is best known, however, and continued by his plays. From 1892 it was virtually an annual new play with him: Lady Windermere's Fan released (1892) was followed by A Woman of No Importance (1893), An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), his masterpiece, in which he takes the aristocracy on the heel.
The theatrical dialogues are laced with quote bare one-liners that even today are cited often in English. (For example, "There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about" and "I'm glad to hear you smoke. A man should always have an occupation of some kind ".) Incidentally also created precisely for these aphorisms Wanted there to attract attention; Sometimes he sent them as telegram to The Times .
Some of these plays is still played, especially The Importance of Being Earnest (also made into a film that is) and An Ideal Husband. Wanted was for ten years, an extremely popular playwright that at any time one or more plays in production, which he had in popularity was only surpassed by George Bernard Shaw.
Movies[Edit][]
His life is made into a film several times: The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960) starring Peter Finch and Wanted (1997) starring Stephen Fry. Also the actor Michael Gambon has portrayed him in a TV series.
Bibliography[Edit][]
[5][6]Picture of Oscar Wilde in front of his parents ' House
in Merrion Square, Dublin
Many well-known works, including:
Story Collections[Edit][]
- The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888) with the most famous stories The Happy Prince, The Nightingale and the Rose and The Selfish Giant .
- Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories (1891) containing the Lord Arthur Savile's Crimestories, The Canterville Ghost, The Sphinx Without a Secret and The Model Millionaire. A later addition was the story The Portrait of Mr. W.H. .
- A House of Pomegranates by (1891)
Roman[Edit][]
- The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891)
Stage[Edit][]
- Vera
- The Duchess of Padua
- Lady Windermere's Fan (1892)
- A Woman of No Importance (1893)
- An Ideal Husband (1894), made into a film in 1999 by Oliver Parker. Cate Blanchett, starring Minnie Driver, Rupert Everett and Julianne Moore in the lead roles.
- The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), made into a film in 2002 by Director Oliver Parker. With Rupert Everett, Colin Firth and Reese Witherspoon in the lead roles.
- Salomé
- La Sainte Courtisane
- A Florentine Tragedy
Poetry[Edit][]
- Poems (1881), with among others the poems Requiescat and Madonna Mia
- On the Sale by Auction of Keats ' Love Letters (1885)
- The Sphinx
- The Ballad of Reading Gaol
- Ravenna
Prose Poems[Edit][]
- Poems in Prose, a collection of six prose poems
Essay[Edit][]
Letters[Edit][]
- The complete letters of Oscar Wilde. Ed. by Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis. London, 2000 (contains also the De Profundisletter). [5]
Literature[Edit][]
- Ellmann, Richard, Oscar Wilde (London, Hamish Hamilton, 1987; this book is widely regarded as the biography)
- Holland, Merlin, Oscar Wilde Album (Paris, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1996)
- Hyde, Montgomery, Oscar Wilde. The Aftermath (London, Methuen & co., 1963)
- Hyde, Montgomery, Oscar Wilde. A biography (New York, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1975)
- Mason, Stuart (Christopher Sclater Millard), Bibliography or Oscar Wilde (London, t. Werner Laurie, 1914; enhanced reprint with introduction of Timothy d'Arch Smith, London, Bertram Rota, 1967)
- McKenna, Neil, The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde (London, Century Publishing, 2003)
- Johan Polak, Oscar Wilde in Netherlands (1988)