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Brief introduction to Oscar Wilde’s life and selected quotations from classics

Wilde - personal life introduction:

Wilde is a famous British playwright, essayist and poet. He was born in Dublin, Ireland, to a distinguished family. He is the second son of the family, and his full name is: Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde. His father, Sir William Wilde, was a surgeon, and his mother was a poet and writer.

After graduating from Trinity College in Dublin, Wilde received a scholarship and entered Magdalen College, Oxford University, in 1874. At Oxford, Wilde was influenced by the aesthetic concepts of Walter Pater and John Ruskin, and came into contact with neo-Hegelian philosophy, Darwinian evolution and the works of the Pre-Raphaelites, which paved the way for him to become a pioneer of aestheticism. The writer sets the direction.

After publishing his first "Collection of Poems", he began to emerge in the literary world and came to London to develop. Although the young Wilde had not yet won a literary award, he was already well-known in London social circles for his eye-catching clothes, witty conversation, and maverick style. Some magazines even published satirical articles about him.

In 1882, Wilde gave a wonderful lecture tour in the United States. Two years later, he married Constance Lloyd and had two sons, Cyril and Vivienne. (Vyvyan) were also born in 1885 and 1886 respectively.

In 1887, Wilde became the executive editor of a women's magazine, where he published some of his novels, reviews and poems. Wilde's works are famous for their beautiful words, novel ideas and clear opinions. His first novel "The Picture of Dorian Gray" was published in 1891, and later he published the essay "The Soul of Man Under Socialism", which Both works were very successful, but it was his plays that truly won Wilde his fame. It can be said that each of his dramatic works was warmly welcomed. At one time, three of his works were performed on the London stage at the same time. His masterpieces have been called the best comedies since Sheridan's "The School of Rumors."

In the Victorian era at the end of the 19th century, the conflict between old and new fashions in the British upper class was fierce. Wilde's liberal style and bold political style soon made him a victim of this conflict. In 1895, the Marquess of Queensberry caused a rift between his son, Lord Alfred Douglas (alias "Bosie") and Oscar Wilde, and openly denounced Wilde as a philistine. A sodomite (the term "homosexual" had not yet been coined).

In response, the angry Alfred asked Wilde to appeal immediately and sue the Marquis for ruining his reputation. As a result, Wilde's appeal failed, and he was even accused of "committing acts of gross indecency with other male persons." Wilde was found guilty under Part 11 of Britain's harsh Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1855 and served two years at hard labor in Reading and Pentonville prisons. In the past two years, Wilde stopped writing dramas and wrote the poem "Song of Reading Gaol" and the collection of letters "Letter from the Abyss" in prison. In these two works, his style has changed, and it is difficult to find the influence of aestheticism. While Wilde was serving his sentence, his wife Constance and their two children changed their surname to Holland and moved to Italy. Most of his friends in social and literary circles shunned him. Only a few people, such as the playwright Bernard Shaw, still stood up to defend him.

After his release in 1897, Wilde immediately set off for Paris. He was extremely disappointed with Britain and no longer had any nostalgia for it. Later, he tried to get back together with Constance for the sake of their two children, but Alfred also expressed his desire to get back together with Wilde. In the end, Wilde gave up the two children and chose Alfred. Wilde completed and published "The Ballad of Reading Gaol" while living in France under a pseudonym, and later traveled to Italy with Alfred.

But a few months later, the two broke up again.

In 1900, Wilde finally met his friend Robert. Converted to Catholicism with the help of Robert 'Robbie' Ross. He died of illness in the Alsace Hotel in Paris on November 30 of the same year at the age of 46. Only Robbie and another friend were with him when he died. His tomb in Paris was carved into a small sphinx based on the imagery in his collection of poems, The Sphinx.

At the end of the 20th century, after being vilified for nearly a century, Britain finally gave Oscar Wilde the honor of erecting a statue. On November 30, 1998, a statue of Oscar Wilde, sculpted by Maggie Hamlin, was unveiled on Adelaide Street near Trafalgar Square in London. The statue is titled "A Conversation with Oscar Wilde" and features Wilde's oft-quoted quote: "We are all in the ditch, but some of us are looking up at the stars." gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.)

Wilde's trial is one of the most high-profile cases in British judicial history and one of the most cited cases in the history of the gay rights movement. At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, when homosexuality was no longer considered heretical and was generally accepted, he became a cultural icon in the gay community.

Wilde's real literary career lasted only seven years from 1888 to 1894. In 1887, he became editor-in-chief of "Women's World" until his resignation in 1889. Wilde's first memorable book was "The Happy Prince" published in 1888. Remarkably, it appeals to both children and adults. In 1891, Wilde's only novel "The Picture of Dorian Gray" was published, and British newspapers almost unanimously condemned it. Wilde's most interesting collection of essays is his "Collection of Intentions". "The Critic as Artist", which accounts for more than half of the book, is subtitled "On the Importance of Doing Nothing."

Wilde's classic quotation:

We all live in the gutter, but there are still people who look up at the stars.

The essence of romance is that it is full of possibilities.

A person can always be kind to people he doesn't care about.

What a great artist sees is never the true face of the world. Once he sees through it, he is no longer an artist.

I like men with a future and women with a past.

I don’t want to make a living, I want to live.

There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what we want, and the other is getting what we want.

Real life is often a life beyond our control.

I admire simple joys, the last refuge of complexity.

Women are meant to be loved, not understood.

When I was young, I thought money was the most important thing, but now that I am older, I have discovered that this is indeed the case.

As long as a woman looks ten years younger than her daughter, she will be content.

There is no friendship between men and women, only love and hatred.

What the arguer loses is only intelligence.

Marriage is the victory of imagination over reason, and remarriage is the victory of hope over experience.

Men often hope that they are a woman's first love, while women hope that they will be a man's last romance.

Living is precious, most people just exist, nothing more.

A person’s soul and the feelings of his friends are the most charming things in life.