Kim Wilde

“The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim” (Wilde 1). However, on occasion art begins beautiful and then alters negatively. This is the case in both Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray and Percival Everett’s Erasure. Although the stories within each are very different in nature, they are interconnected in the way that the work of art within each alters and changes. Plato stated in Phaedrus, “writing has one grave fault in common with…

In the novel, The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde, Wilde criticizes many aspects of the Victorian lifestyle. The constant criticism in the comedy is present through constant witty remarks and absurdity throughout the play. One aspect of the Victorian lifestyle that Wilde refers to frequently is writing and writers. Wilde conveys the message by using diaries and three volume novels frequently throughout the play that those individuals have dreams and secrets that they find dear to them,…

People)” is a play written by Oscar Wilde in the late 1890's. Although it is comedy, it is also a social satire and it has some serious themes hidden in its lines. The themes here address Victorian social issues. In in the late 19th century, in the Victorian society, the life was not very easy. People were divided in social classes and there was a strict code of morals which people from the upper class had to keep, otherwise they were highly criticized. In this play Wilde criticizes the…

Is Machiavelli’s The Prince an amoral book, an immoral book, or neither? Fully discuss, illustrating your answer with ideas from the book. Machiavelli has gained a reputation of a cold-hearted, ruthless and cynical man mainly based on his famous book: “The prince”. The book itself is generally considered either immoral or amoral. May my audacious affirmation be excused, but I think that these statements have been made by a superficial approach. I strongly insist that this book is neither…

In Victorian London, playwright Oscar Wilde was a prominent social figure, and he was recognized as one of the most unorthodox people of his time. During this period, the upper class established a very rigid code of conduct concerning appearance and behavior to promote the idea that social status was the only matter of true significance. Deriving from the code or being true to oneself was considered blasphemous. Despite this fact, but mostly because of it, Wilde continued to express…

Superfluous man is a concept, a group of people that appeared frequently mid-nineteenth century Russian literature, further they symbolizes Russian culture at that time. This group of people can from different social classes, but they are all well educated, arrogant and delicate. In the meantime of having their great ambitions, they failed to really fulfill their dream and contribute to the society. And in the meantime of wishing being loved by others, they are marginalized by the society. In…

A Man of No Importance is a play dedicated to showing that while we are of no importance to society as a whole, we are important to those who are closest to us. One should never keep their true selves from the truth. The book written by Terrence McNally shows the audience a very real struggle of those that are a bit peculiar in today’s society as well as the past. They lyrics by Lynn Ahrens will captivate the listener. No matter which scene you sit in you can relate in some fashion to the…

In growing from youth to maturity, literary characters often develop a new worldly perspective resulting from their own experiences; scholars classify these works that focus on a single event defining a character’s life philosophy as bildungsromans. Set in nineteenth-century England, Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray recounts Dorian Gray’s growth from a young man to an adult in the midst of the growing aesthetic movement, with his friend Lord Henry Wotton introducing him to its morality.…

ugly. Even though people say they are not judgmental, subconsciously people are more likely to trust the faces they like. However, the attractiveness of the physical appearance does not represent one’s soul. In The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, the protagonist Dorian Gray’s excess obsession with beauty, easily influenced nature, and irresponsibility for himself ultimately trigger his downfall in the end of the novel. The superficial and excessive desire for beauty of Dorian Gray…

Extreme fascination, passion, lust and beauty can be tempting, but admitting to them was a struggle facing people in 19th century or Victorian Era and this is evident in the novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” When Oscar Wilde wrote, “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, he was critiquing a cultural moment in time. He was attempting to make his Victorian audience think about their inability to admit to their true desires and fear of temptation. A British journalist by the name W. T. Stead committed the…