Author
Irish · 1854-1900 · 47 quotes
Irish · 1854–1900
47 quotes in our collection
Oscar Wilde was the Irish playwright, novelist, and wit who transformed the comedy of manners into a precision instrument for exposing Victorian hypocrisy. His plays — The Importance of Being Earnest, An Ideal Husband, Lady Windermere's Fan — remain in continuous performance because their epigrams are as sharp as when he wrote them. His novel The Picture of Dorian Gray alarmed reviewers with its aestheticism and was used against him at his trial in 1895, when he was convicted of gross indecency and sentenced to two years hard labour. He died in Paris three years after his release, broke and largely deserted. His verbal legacy endures intact: Wilde made the paradox do more philosophical work than any aphorist before or since.
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