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Victorian era literature
Oscar wilde list of homosexual works
Victorian era literature
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Oscar Wilde, world renowned author and playwright, had much darker roots than one might expect. Born on October 16th, 1854, in Dublin, Ireland, Oscar was an acclaimed figure in Victorian literature and culture. Known for his brilliance, and boldness in his homosexuality, Wilde faced the arduous task of escaping society’s feeling of an ignominious punishment upon himself. Despite being mostly known as a poet and playwright, he has a published book, which is the only novel he ever wrote, that is now considered a classic, The Picture of Dorian Gray. At it’s time of being published, it had gained copious negative critical views, due to its considered “lack of morality.” Despite it’s past of vehement hatred, the book has since been raised in …show more content…
Gwendolen had came to see Ernest, and talks of engagement, which causes an instantaneous discord throughout the group, for both women believed they were engaged to “Ernest”. When told the truth, the women had united in a shared abominable view upon the two men, but had later reconciled because the men said they were only under a fake identity to spend more time with their hopefully soon-to-be mistresses. The play is filled with the wit and satirical humor Oscar is recognized for. An Ideal Husband is seen to have themes representative of Oscar’s life. With similar situations, such as remorse of past sins, and ruining great lives through a societal hypocrisy, Oscar was almost certainly reflecting on his life, and focusing on repentance. An Ideal Husband is his secondly most popular produced show, following The Importance of Being Earnest. The show’s opening night was January 3, 1895, after which Wilde was arrested for “gross indecency” and had caused his name to be publicly omitted from the …show more content…
Little did he know, the consequences of that decision were what he expected, simply reversed. Yes, Oscar suffered from his suing, and during the trial, multiple lawyers provided evidence of his sodomism. The lawyers showed parts of his literature with homoerotic messages, and love letters he had sent to Douglas. The libel case was only a brief trial, for Oscar had been taken into custody. He was arrested shortly after for gross indecency. He served two years in prison, and was released in 1897. Drained in ways more than one, Wilde went into expulsion in France. He lived in and out of cheap hotels, and ephemerally reunited with his pre-jail lover, Alfred Douglas. Oscar did not write much in his last years, for his only remembered work from the period is, “The Ballad of Reading Gaol,” which told of his life in the
In 1890, Oscar Wilde published his only novel that would have a hostile reaction in the British press due to its controversial themes. With tinges of "immoral topics" such as homoeroticism, hedonism, and aestheticism, the novel turned heads and shocked readers. This novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, revealed Wilde's philosophy on these topics through the use of writer's style, narrative strategy, development of character, and setting. Oscar Wilde used the controversial topics that he was surrounded by during his life, such as homoeroticism and hedonism, as many of the the main themes in the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Gwendolen confesses to Jack, or his confidante Ernest, “The moment Algernon first mentioned to me that he had a friend called Ernest, I knew I was destined to love you” (10). That quote proved that Gwendolen’s drive to marry “Ernest” for him having the name Ernest, rather than marrying him for his character. Cecily also confesses something along the same lines as Gwendolen to Algernon, that even though she had never met him before she fell in love with him: “Well, ever since dear Uncle Jack first confessed to us that he had a younger brother who was very wicked and bad, you of course have formed the chief topic of conversation…a man who is much talked about is always very attractive…I daresay it was foolish of me, but I fell in love with you, Ernest” (32). She is led to believe that Algernon’s real name is Ernest. Cecily and Gwendolen are attracted to Jack and “Ernest” because of their histories. Gwendolen was excited to find o...
We begin another chapter in the life of Oscar Wilde, the year 1888, many things have taken place, Oscar has been married and bore two children, Vyvyan and Cyril and his touring of the United States and other countries have brought forth success to the literary giant. Some of his successful writings are "The Picture of Dorian Gray"(1891), "A Woman of No Importance"(1894) and his most resent essay known "The Decay of Lying".
In the Victorian era where vanity was the main attraction, Oscar Wilde’s. The picture of Dorian Gray gave insight into the true horrors that came of this sinful nature of life. Wilde was a very controversial figure and he meant to stir the pot when he wrote this disputed story. He believed that literature not only meant for the imagination, but for the moral mind as well.
The Picture of Dorian Gray is a rich story which can be viewed through many literary and cultural lenses. Oscar Wilde himself purposefully filled his novel with a great many direct and indirect allusions to the literary culture of his times, so it seems appropriate to look back at his story - both the novel and the 1945 film version - in this way.
In Oscar Wilde’s drama The Importance of Being Earnest, he uses light-hearted tones and humor to poke fun at British high society while handling the serious theme of truth and the true identity of who is really “Earnest.” Truth as theme is most significantly portrayed through the women characters, Gwendolen and Cecily but to present serious themes comically, Wilde portrays women to be the weaker sex of society, despite the seriousness of the subject—the identity of the men they want to marry.
Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Michael Patrick Gillespie, Editor. Norton Critical Edition. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2007.
Oscar Wilde uses satire to articulate a surprising dismantling of what he seems to deem as outdated Victorian ideals. For one, Wilde presents the performative qualities of the dandy (an aristocratic male) to bring real critique to social class and gender expectation. The figure of the dandy has effeminate qualities that are useful in identifying a man of great wealth and renown. Unlike the apparently vigorous and productive middle class male, the dandy is lackadaisical, idle, and conspicuous. It is the prime aesthetic for a man of high society and one that the women, namely Cecily Cardew and Gwendolen Fairfax admire.
Oscar Wilde had that one love that couldn’t let anyone know. He was homosexual and knew that it was illegal. This is why Oscar was popular because of his personal life. Oscar Wilde gains more popularity on his life style than his achievements. “... the author of the The Importance of Being Earnest and The Picture of Dorian Gray, has been gaining in popularity and academic respect for his literary achievements (Tucker 1).
"I turned half way around and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. I knew that I had come face to face with someone whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself" (7). During the Victorian era, this was a dangerous quote. The Victorian era was about progress. It was an attempt aimed at cleaning up the society and setting a moral standard. The Victorian era was a time of relative peace and economic stability (Marshall 783). Victorians did not want anything "unclean" or "unacceptable" to interfere with their idea of perfection. Therefore, this quote, taken from Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, brimming with homosexual undertones, was considered inappropriate. Due to the time period's standards, Oscar Wilde was forced to hide behind a thin layer of inference and parallel. Wilde was obsessed with the perfect image. Although he dressed more flamboyantly than the contemporary dress, it was to create an image of himself. Wilde was terrified of revealing his homosexuality because he knew that he would be alienated and ostracized from the society. Through his works, Oscar Wilde implicitly reflected his homosexual lifestyle because he feared the repercussions from the conservative Victorian era in which he lived.
The criticism to the society is evident in both authors; Wilde for his part expressed all through the comedy and masquerades all in a form of satire and Austen meanwhile criticized the position of women of her time and how society forces them to procure a good marriage to ensure its own stability. This screwball comedy and intrigue, developed in England in the Victorian era. Wilde shows off his expertise to ridicule the superficial English society, in an ironic way. That kind of society in which does not really matter who you are, as long apparent be someone aristocrat.
Oscar Wilde was born in October 16, 1854, in the mid era of the Victorian period—which was when Queen Victoria ruled. Queen Victoria reigned from 1837 to 1901.While she ruined Britain, the nation rise than never before, and no one thought that she was capable of doing that. “The Victorian era was both good and bad due to the rise and fall of the empires and many pointless wars were fought. During that time, culture and technology improved greatly” (Anne Shepherd, “Overview of the Victorian Era”). During this time period of English, England was facing countless major changes, in the way people lived and thought during this era. Today, Victorian society is mostly known as practicing strict religious or moral behavior, authoritarian, preoccupied with the way they look and being respectable. They were extremely harsh in discipline and order at all times. Determination became a usual Victorian quality, and was part of Victorian lifestyle such as religion, literature and human behavior. However, Victorian has its perks, for example they were biased, contradictory, pretense, they cared a lot of about what economic or social rank a person is, and people were not allowed to express their sexuality. Oscar Wilde was seen as an icon of the Victorian age. In his plays and writings, he uses wit, intelligence and humor. Because of his sexuality he suffered substantially the humiliation and embarrassment of imprisonment. He was married and had an affair with a man, which back then was an act of vulgarity and grossness. But, that was not what Oscar Wilde was only known for; he is remembered for criticizing the social life of the Victorian era, his wit and his amazing skills of writing. Oscar Wilde poem “The Ballad of Reading Gaol” typifies the Vi...
Oscar Wilde’s novel, Picture of Dorian Gray, portrays the dichotomy of the double life led by Dorian Gray.1 The contrast between the portrait and Dorian personifies the universal battle of sin versus morale and ultimately serves as a moral compass for society.2 Dorian’s development of a double life identifies with the results of sociological oppression leading to confinement.3 The development of this contrasting lifestyle inevitably influences a fatal deterioration of his soul and heart.4 Oscar Wilde’s exaggeration of the effects of the double life of Dorian Gray within his novel Picture of Dorian Gray ultimately conveys the degradation due to a confinement of the soul, and personifies the dualism between private and public lives.5
Set in the late 19th Century, Oscar Wilde wrote his only novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, which is a story about debauchery and corruption of innocence and well known as a "Gothic melodrama." Violent twists and a sneaky plot make this novel a distinct reflection of human pride and corrupt nature.
Wilde, Oscar, and Michael Patrick. Gillespie. The Picture of Dorian Gray: Authoritative Texts, Backgrounds, Reviews and Reactions, Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2007. Print.