Oscar Wilde and Aestheticism

8/13/2019 Oscar Wilde and Aestheticism

1/8

-E110

- - -.. - ...

Autliors ana textsIE-~ f>.. ,i.>i~ .;.. . Oscar Wilde

Life and worksOscar Wilde, the son of a surgeon and ofI an ambitious literarv woman, was born in:Dublin in 1854.Aft~r attending TrinityI College (Dublin), he was sent to Oxfordwhere he gained a first class degree inClassics and distinguished himseIf for hiseccentricity. He became a disciple ofWaIter Pater, the theorist of Aesthericismin England (@ 9.9) accepring the theory

~ Ma>


2/8

Il:::; 11I

beautiful Lord Alfred Douglas, whosenickname was Bosie, and with whomWilde had a homosexual affair. The boy sfather, the Marquess of Queensbury,forced a public trial and Wilde wasconvicted of homosexual practices andsentenced to two-years of hard labour.While in prison he wrote De Profundis along letter to Bosie publishedposthumously in 1905.v lhen he was released, he was abroken man; his wife refused to see him,and he went into exile in France, wherehe lived his last years in poverty. TheBallad oJReading GaoI (1898), originaJlypublished under his prison identity,G 3 3 was his last work. He died ofmeningitis in Paris in 1900.The rebel and tbe dandyWilde adopted the aesthetic ideaI , as heaffirmed in one of his famousconversations: My life is like a work ofart . He lived in the double role of rebeland dandy. The dandy must bedistinguished from the bohemian: whilethe bohemian allies himself to the ruralor urban proletariat, the dandy is abourgeois artist, who, in spite of hisblatant unconventionality, remains amember of his class. The Wildean dandyis an aristocrat whose elegance is asymbol of the superiority of his spirit; heuses his wit to shock, and is anindividualist who demands abso]utefreedom. Since life was meant forpleasure, and pleasure was an indulgencein the beautiful, Wilde s interest in beauty- clothes, words or bovs - had no moralstance. He affirmed in the Preface (@t111) of his novel There is no such thingas a moral or immoral book. Books areweHwritten or badly written. That is ali .In this way he rejected the didacticismthat had characterised the Victorian novelin the first half of the century.

Art for Art s SakeThe concept of Art for Art s Sake was tohim a moral imperative and not merely anaesthetic one. He believed that only Artas the cult of Beauty couId prevent themurder of the souI. Wilde perceived theartist as an alien in a materialistic worId,he wrate onIy to please himself and wasnot concerned in communicating histheories to bis fellow-beings. His pursuitof beauty and fulfment was tfie tragic actof a superior being inevitably turned intoan outcast.

OscarWilde and hislover, the English author.poet and trans la tor LordAIf.. . d Douglas. inthe 1890s.


3/8


4/8

l-{:_..

E112

A Uiliorsana textsI The Picture ofDorian Gray 189:

CI>ODccot);>CI>LI-

PiotThe novei is set inLondon at the end ofthe 19th century. Theprotagonist is DorianGray, a young manwhose beautyfascinates a painter,BasiIHallward, whopaints his portrait(@ t112). While theyoung man's desires aresatisfied, including thatof eternaI youth, thesigns of age, e).. perienceand \'ice appear on theportrait. Dorian livesonly for pleasure(@ t113). making useof everybody andIetting peopie diebecause of hisinsensitivity. W'hen the4.Theatreprogramme painter sees the corrupted image of the

for a performance or 1he

I

portrait Dorian kilis him. Later DorianPicturerDorionGray, '. .Vaudevilleheatre,20 wants to free himself of the portralt,August1913, witness to his spirituaI corruption, and~ stabs it, but he mysteriously kilIs himself.~ At the very moment of death the pictureText bank returns to its originaI purity, and Dorian's70 face becomes withered, wrinkled, andgui Ioathsome (@ t114).nu~z- _~r:.- Answer the following questions about Oscar Wilde and his novel

The icture or orian Gray1. What ideai did Oscar \N ce adopt l: ,roughOL;tlis ./e?2. What sthe differerce Detv/eer: the darc) 2'd D1ebohe''1i2n?3. Who is the Wiice2' c2ncy?4. What does he rejec: :,...ne Preface d' hs nove,?5. What isart 2ccordirg te Oscar \Ni:ce?6. Who is the an:,sc?7. Where andwr.er coe5T~e;::ic:~re Oonc nGrcytake DI2ce:8. Who is Dona,., Gray?9. What does tre plcture symbe:ise?10. What isthe f Or'alo'-the 'leve ?11. What narrative techique;5 e; ':DiO)'ec?

Narrative techniqueThis stor)' istoid by an unobtrusive third-person narratori the perspective adopted isinternaI which allo\\'s a process ofidentification between the reader and thecharacter. The settings are vividlydescribed \\ith words appeaIing to thesenses (@ t112), the characters revealthemseives through what they say or whatother people sayof them, according to arechnique which is typicai of drama.Allegorica meaningThis story is profoundly allegoricaI; it is a19th-century version of the myth of Faustthe stor)' of a man who sells his souI to thedeviI so that alIhis desires might besatisfied. This soul becomes the picture,which records the signs of experience, thecorruption, the horror and the sinsconceaIed under the mask of Dorian'stimeless beauty. Wilde pIays on theRenaissance idea of the correspondencebetween the physicai and spirituai realms:beautifui peopie are moraI peopIe; ugIypeople are immorai people. His variationon this theme is in his use of the magicalportrait. The picture is not an autonomousseIf:it stands for the dark side of Dorian'spersonaIity, his double, which he tries toforget by locking it in a reom.The morai of this noveI is that everye..\. cessust be punished and reaIity cannotbe escaped; when Dorian destroys thepicture, he cannot avoid the punishmentfor all his sins, that is, death. The horrible,corrupting picture could be seen as asymboi of the immorality and badconscience of the Victorian middle class,while Dorian and his pure, innocentappearance are symbois ofbourgeoishypocrisy. FinaII)'the picture, restored toits originaI beauty, illustrates Wilde'stheories of art: art survives people, art iseterna .

---

VAUDEVIL.LETHEATRE.

LOII 1UlGEI SSEASOITHE PIOTURE OFDORIAN GRAY

OSOAR WILDE


5/8

u

Wl ~

---

11IH

~.

- .. - --

(1837-1901)

iterarycontextThe estheticMovementinliteratureThe line of developmenr of the AesmeticMovemem can be rraced back IOthe Renaissancepoet Edmund Spenser. But cenainly irsmoSIsig-nificanr forerunner was the romantic poer JohnKe'dts.wirh his cult of beauty and the awarenessof the contrast art-Iife.

In the middle of the 19thcentury John Ruskinprorested against the indifference of me mareri-alisric Victorian socierv IOan and rhe beautiful.Ruskin worshipped beauty. bUt also insisred onthe idea that a wock:of art is an expression of thespirit, hence the imponance of the virrues of rheman who creares il, ,-irrues Iike a religious pur-pose and creari'-e jo)'.Ruskin supporred the Pfe-Raphaelites, agroup of anists and men of letters who rejectedacademic arr in favour of the spontanei )- andspiritualit)- of Italian painters before RaphaeI.They adopted sentimemal archaisms and atone of evangelical mysticism. bUt soon feHimosensuousness and the cult of derail. Themediaevar poems of John Kears becameimponam sources of inspiration for rhem.A.C. Swinbume, who was not one of thegroup bUt~vasinfluenced by the Pre-Raphaelites,glorified the beaUtiful with a reckless and bJas-phemous ardouc . He openly spoke of. or evenexaIred, the unmemionable1-. rhus shockingbourgeois moraHsm. and offered many hints IOGabriele D'Annunzio. Swinbume was greatlyinfluenced by French writers like GaUtier andBaudelaire. Thophile Gaurier (1811-18-2)firsr supponed rhe Romamic ~lovemem, andthen comributed to rransform ir imo aesrheri-cism. He advocated -.\rt for .\rt's sake-. disre-garded moraliry. and believed in rhe sovereigmyof beaury, Charles Baudelaire 0821-186-).author of the famous Les Fleurs du 1Ial crearedanalogies ber\\'een colours. sounds andperfumes, so thar the Symbolist ;\lovement foundirs source in him, Baudelaire also translatedand admired Edgar A]]an Poe. \\'hom he foundspiritualIy and anistically akin.

244

..

.. PortraitofohnRuskinby ohnverettMillais

Walter Pater is regarded as the high priest ofthe Aesrheric Movemem. The conclusion of hisStudies in tbe HistOtJ of tbe Renaissance is tharthe secret of happiness is the absorption of beauty,so as 1:0 bum always with a hard, gem-like flame,to maimain ecstasy . He also proclaimed the ideaof rreating life itself in the spirit of arr , ThiscuIr of deep and noble emotions in a Iife meantas a work of art rendered him a soft of ascetichedonist2. Pater was an historical relativist, andrejected alI established doctlines or rheories, inthe conviction that life is fleeting and elusive. Theonl)' reali)'is that of impressions and sensations,so no ponion of experience should be sacrificedin this passionate search after sensations. Thefmest sensations afe to be found in art. He main-tained thar in art, as in music, form and matterafe indistinguishable. Both Pater and Swinbumeasserted the aUtonomy of art against thosewho valued a poem, a painting or a sculpturesimply by the moral quality of the sentiments itexpressed.The reasons \\'hy the aesthetic trend spreadso largely are not difficult IOdetect. The cravingfor excess. the fondness of irresponsibility andthe interest in exoticism represented the reac-tion to the repression of the instincts imposedby the'VicIOrianmentaIit},.The principle that arthas no moral implications was the re olt againstrhe heavy moraI standards which were only ~

;


6/8

literary contextexterior observances. The individuaI rebeJIedagainst the tyranny of an m'erpo\\'ering pub-lic opinion and demanded to assert himselfunrestrainedly. induIging in every capri ce ofimagination. Moreover. the aesthetes pouredcontempt on the obruse bourgeoisie bent onwork, money and procreation. and were proudof their difference from the average mano

It is also true that the increased prosperi )'and leisure had refmed and improved asre; peo-,,( ple felt the limits of insulari )' and were fond ofthe exotic, the rare, the strange.In England the Aesthetic Movemem reachedirs height in rhe 1890s. Oscar Wilde was':.undoubredlyrhe mO$ famouspersonaIit),of rheAesthetic Movement, bur rhe leader was rhe art-

fj; istAubrey Beardsley (1872-1898), whose st)'1ised.siouous. somewhat morbid and pen'erse.drawiogs gave expression to rhe -decadent.,.mood-. The Aesrheres pubIished a re\'ie\\'. Ybe Yellow Book (1894-189 : ).llusrrared by Beardsle~'.;~jr reflected decadent tastes and irs daring

; . $ubjects often made a sensarion.The scandal in which Oscar Wilde wasinvolved crushed aIso rhe Aesrheric Jlm'ementwhich 5000 losr populari )' aod carne to an end.However, decadence and symbolism were des-. t:iined to mark the 20th centu1J' search for newj ;i'tormsof expression known as .Nlodemism.

,. Aubrey Vincent Beardsley. La Dame aux Camelias1894. ink and watercofor on paper

l . unmentionable: i .e . eroIicism: Ihe pursuir of pleasure,paganism. and wharever challenged \ iaorian pruderie,

J hedonism: doarine rhar rhe chief good of man is pleasure.In che novellI Piacere Gabriele D'Annunzio echoesParer. 'Bisogna faI< la propr ia \i ra, come si fa un 'operad'me-o

...top nd check

fomplete the statements in column A by choosing the appropriate items in column 8.A-1Asignificantorerunnerof the AestheticMovement

was John Keats. He : ;,,2 Thedoctrinewas. i


7/8

, (183 '-1901)

The cult of beaut:' n Wilde,Huysmansand '\' A unz~J,/

-~

Ipllt alt my genius i11tO111)'ife; I put 011/)'my tale11t i11tOmy works.TheeadingpersonalityftheAesthetieMovement,scarWildeinsistedonthesovereigntyfbeautyandconsideredestheticaluessuperiortomoralorsocialissues.Healsochallengedheconventionsf histimewithhisextravagantifestyle,ntheideathatanartistmustconstantlyearchaftersensation.HispopularityxtendedeyondEngland,ndhefoundaffinitiesbetweenhimselfandtheexponentsfthedecadentmovements.Twonovelsare otten assoeiatedwith The

Picture of Dorian Gray. One is A ReboursControcorrente ,rittenin 1884bytheFrenchnovelistK. Huysmans1848-1907);theotheris Il Piacere,writtenn 1889bythe ltalianpoet,novelistanddramatistGabrieleD Annunzio1863-1938).80thHuysmansandD Annunzio,ikeWilde,sawartandbeautyasthe highestdeaIto

. pursuendtheultimateimoflite.Litetselfwasviewedsa workofartwhichstoodaboveeverythinglse,includingmorals.

--

TheheroofARebours,DesEsseintes,eomestroma riehnoblefamily.Heis disgustedbythesocietyof histimeandchooseso livealonein anisolatedhouseandsurroundshimselfwithvariousobjectswhichrepresentohimthebest that arthasereated.nthe end,thelifehehaschoseneadshimto neurosis,and

theonlysolutionforhimis to retumto theverysocietythathe hadrejected.Quesra volta si propose di perdersi in un sorprendente e mutevole

paesaggio; ed esord con una frase sonora, che gli dischiu:se di colpo unaimmensa lontananza di campagne,Grazie ai suoi vaporizza tori, sprigion nella camera essenza d'ambrosia,di lavanda di :\Iitcham. di pisello odoroso fusi insieme: una essenza che.ove sia stata distillata da un arrista, non usurpa il nome che le vien datodi ,essenza di prato in fior~; poi. in quel prato. insinu un bel riuscitoaccordo di tuberosa, di fior d'arancio e di mandorla e. d'incanto, fittizi lillfiorirono, mentre tigli stomlivano al vento. impregnando il suolo dei lorotenui effluvi, simulati dall'estratto di UNa londinese.

In questo sfondo tracciato a grandi linee, fuggente a perdita d'occhiosotto le sue palpebre chiuse. insuffI una spruzzatura di sentori umani equasi felini: evocanti la donna, annunzianti la femmina incipriata e rruccata:lo stefanoris. l'ayapana, l'opoponax, il cipro, lo sciampaca, il sarcanto.sO\Tappose ad essi un accenno di siringa, per introdurre nel mondo fittizioe rruccato che essi creavano, un sentore naturale di esulranze accaldate. 'di gioia che si disfrena in pieno sole.

Poscia. con l'ausilio di un ventilatore, lasc che si disperdessero questeonde odorose: e serb solo la campagna che rinnov, costringendola atornare nel suo poema come ritornello,

[from].K. Huysmans, Cont/'Ocol7r nte,Gemile, 1944]


8/8

rL.

.~ ._r -

-~ ~ ,-

. :jf.

-

Oscar Wilde and Aestheticism

Documents

Transcript of Oscar Wilde and Aestheticism