Oscar Wilde: The Tragic Story Oscar Wilde was a distinguished author and playwright born in 1854. Wilde’s only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, was published in July 1890 in the Lippincott's Magazine and received a tremendous amount of criticism. Wilde’s novel was a reflection of Aesthetics and was sadly also a literary one-hit wonder. Oscar Wilde was a one-hit literary wonder with his book, The Picture of Dorian Gray, because of the fact he only wrote one novel, his homosexuality in the 1800’s, and his imprisonment and social fallout. Oscar Wilde was a man of many things, and was a very big follower of Aesthetics, but Oscar Wilde only wrote one novel, which is The Picture of Dorian Gray. Oscar Wilde was educated in various colleges …show more content…
In Britain, “Homosexuality was a criminal offense and serious societal taboo” (History.com). Due to this, Wilde’s affairs occurred secretly, but Wilde was not very secretive and soon was put to trial for his actions. Lord Alfred Douglas was “femininely beautiful, aristocratic, rich, homosexual, and poetic” (CliffsNotes), and was very involved with Wilde, intimately. Wilde soon began to be “infatuated, obsessed, and besotted” (CliffsNotes) with Douglas, and soon began to travel with Douglas internationally. As time went on, Wilde was not very discreet about his affairs, and the public did not care much about Wilde’s affairs, but Douglas’s father did. The Marquess of Queensbury, Douglas’s father, left a note after one of Wilde’s plays, accusing him of being a sodomite. Douglas, not taking a liking to his father, supported and urged on Wilde to put Queensberry to trial for “criminal libel” (ProQuest), but Wilde himself was soon put on trial for sodomy and had multiple male prostitutes whom he had had affairs with testifying against him. Although Wilde knew of the storm brewing, and was given the chance to flee to France and escape way from the charges, Wilde stayed. Wilde’s trial was very harshly executed and included many people testifying against him, including when “chambermaids testified that they had seen young men in Wilde’s bed and a hotel housekeeper stated that there were fecal stains on his bed sheets” (History.com). Due to many of these testaments, Wilde was imprisoned without bail, for two years. Wilde was found guilty under the “1885 Criminal Law Amendment Act, which prohibited acts of 'gross indecency' between men” (ProQuest). With Wilde in prison, Wilde was found with an inability to be writing much except letters, halting any process of him writing any other novel or literary
“Gross Indecency”, is a play about Oscar Wilde’s life which was written by Moises Kaufman. Kaufman wrote the play in 1997, however it was a two year process of writing. The play is a biography of Wilde’s court trials dealing with others trying to prove that he is gay.
Once denounced, he then turned around and sued for libel. According to Merriam-Webster, the definition of libel is “the act of publishing a false statement that causes people to have a bad opinion of someone.” While up on the stands, Wilde was asked to explain one of his most well-known quotes “The Love that dare not speak its name.” Wilde’s response explained that “’The Love that dare not speak its name’ in this century is such a great affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and Jonathan. . . .
He was imprisoned due to indecent acts of homosexuality with his partner at the time. On 20 May 1895, Oscar Wilde was convicted of “gross indecency” and sentenced to two years of hard labor at Reading Gaol (Varty 31).
Baselga, Mariano. “Oscar Wilde: The Satire of Social Habits.” In Rediscovering Oscar Wilde, England: Colin Smuthe, 1994: pp. 13-20.
Oscar Wilde is perhaps one of the most pretentious people to which I have ever been exposed. Like a lot of pretentious authors, he even uses a fake pen name. His book, The Picture of Dorian Gray, does not only contain homosexual undertones, but it also provides some pretty ostentatious quotes. My favorite in the novel so far is “all art is quite useless” (Wilde, 1890). This, coming from an artist, is an embodiment of pretension. Not only does this criticize his craft, but also anyone who has ever created
An unsigned review in Athenaeum, called the book “unmanly, sickening, vicious (although not exactly what is called ‘improper’), and tedious.” (Beckson 82) Charles Whibley, journalist and writer for the Scots Observer, wrote that "Mr. Oscar Wilde has again been writing stuff that were better unwritten" and went on with "...it is false to human nature-for its hero is a devil; it is false to morality-for it is not made sufficiently clear that the writer does not prefer a course of unnatural iniquity to a life of cleanliness, health, and sanity." He ends the article by saying ‘...he can write for none but outlawed noblemen and perverted telegraph boys, the sooner he takes to tailoring (or some other decent trade) the better for his own reputation and the public morals" (Beckson 75).
Ten years later, circumstances for homosexual males continued to look grim. On May 25, 1895, Oscar Wilde, a renowned playwright, was found guilty of engaging in homosexual activity and sentenced to the maximum punishment allowed: imprisonment for two years with hard labor. The judge, disgusted with Wilde, declared, "People who can do these things must be dead to all sense of shame," and he deemed the sentence inapt for such a vial criminal (Barger). In the years following, little change was made to ease the growing tension. When Edward Carpenter published his book The Intermediate Sex in 1909, he encouraged the acceptance and understanding of people with different sexual preferences and practices than those who found themselves in the majority.
Oscar Wilde is arguably one of the most intriguing and thought-provoking poets, writers, and playwrights of the Victorian Era. Oscar Wilde was born an exquisite and brilliantly creative person, who wrote some of the most well known plays and poems of the Victorian Era. Most of Wilde’s critically acclaimed works have been centered on certain pivotal principles he credited in his artistic ways, and in his personal life. The most important of these central views is, “the critical and cultured spirits…will seek to gain their impressions almost entirely from what Art has touched. For Life is terribly deficient in form” (Ericksen 8).
Pearson, Hesketh. Oscar Wilde: His Life and Wit. New York; Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1946
Around the time Oscar was enjoying his success from his book, Wilde was having an affair with a man named Alfred Douglas. Alfred’s father, the Marquis of Queensberry, got word about his son's affair with Oscar. He went over to Oscar's home and left a note saying "Oscar Wilde: Posing Somdomite", misspelling of sodomite. Oscar was upset by the note and tried to sue him for libel. That was the worst idea he could have done.
The novel when first published started to be known for a breathtaking amount of depressing criticism. Detractors condemn its homosexual undertones and apparent embrace of hedonistic values. The preface has written by the author in response to the unkind critics of the first edition, blaming them for failing to grasp Wilde's belief that art should be appreciated on purely aesthetic terms, without consideration of morality.
Wilde denied the connection between himself and his art, stating “Each man sees his own sin in Dorian Gray. What Dorian Gray’s sins are no one knows. He who finds them has brought them.”. He could make this statement due to the nature of fiction; as it is usually considered as false or imagined. This was also the intent of Orwell; using his allegorical novella to push his anti-communist views to highlight the clear manipulation in the class system. Composers can explore taboo topics behind the shield of fiction in literature; allowing them to protect their duality whilst having a mode of expression. Wilde was frustrated with the authoritative suppression of his sexuality and Orwell frustrated with the societal infiltration of Russian propaganda. Literature provided an influential method to express their condemned desires whilst protecting their image. It is in this way that literature is a powerful tool in challenging the status
Oscar Wilde liked to be right. Wait—no, no, that’s not right. Let’s try that again.
...ed to a bigger controversy. Instead he wrote about it and made everyone noticed the unfairness of the punitions in the prison life. The repetition in the poem is seen to show the harsh labor in the Reading Gaol. It is evident that Oscar Wilde hated the Victorian era and was against the cruelty of their morality.
Woodcock, George. The Paradox of Oscar Wilde. London-New York: T.V. Boardman and Co., Ltd., 1950.