The Wicked Wit of Oscar Wilde

More than one hundred years after his death in exile, Oscar Wilde is one of the most quoted people of all time. We are all familiar with his sparkling satire and cutting epigrams. Wilde’s words still hold resonance in the modern day, with famous quotations such as ‘we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars’ or ‘criticism is the highest form of autobiography’ still remaining popular today.

Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854. He first gained attention as a student at Magdalen College, Oxford, and published his first volume of poems in 1881. He went on to write many essays, short stories and plays, such as The Importance of Being Earnest. However, his work often attracted controversy. For example, Salome was banned in Britain and his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, was condemned as ‘a poisonous book,’ to which Wilde responded, ‘those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming.’

Oscar Wilde is well-known for his homosexuality, but he married Constance Lloyd in 1884. Together they had two sons, Cyril and Vyvyan. In 1891, he first met Lord Alfred Douglas, and the pair began an intimate friendship.

Oscar Wilde was not always held in such high esteem as he is nowadays. After suing the Marques of Queensberry (Lord Alfred Douglas’ father) for libel, Wilde was brought before the Old Bailey in what would become one of the most infamous cases in British legal history. Wilde was convicted of committing ‘gross indecency’ and sentenced to two years’ hard labour. The judge who presided over the Wilde case, Justice Sir Alfred Wills, said that it was the worst case he had ever tried. A week earlier, he had tried a case of child murder.

The Victorian intolerance for homosexuality ruined Wilde. After his conviction, he was declared bankrupt, and was never to see his children again. Upon his release in 1897 he travelled to Europe, remarking that ‘If England treats her criminals the way she has treated me, she doesn't deserve to have any.’ By this time it seemed unlikely that Oscar Wilde, who had become anathema to Victorian Society, would ever be remembered by history.

Yet today, Wilde’s popularity is more resplendent than ever. His work is widely studied and performed; he has become a truly iconic figure and the subject of innumerable biographies. According to his famous maxim, ‘there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about,’ and Oscar Wilde is still as talked about as ever.

Oscar Wilde died in Paris, 1900. He is buried in Père Lachaise cemetery.