Term Papers on Biography Of Oscar Wilde

Term Paper Title	Biography Of Oscar Wilde
# of Words	1209
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	4.84

Biography of Oscar Wilde

     Oscar Wilde (real name Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde) was born on
October 16th, 1854 in Dublin.  His father, William Robert Wilde, was an eminent eye
doctor, with an interest in myths and folklore.  He was the founder of the first eye and ear
hospital in Great Britain, as well as the appointed Surgeon Occultist to the Queen, who
knighted him.  His mother, Jane Francesca Elgee Wilde, was a poet who wrote patriotic
Irish verse under the pen name Speranza, and had a considerable following.  As a
youngster, Wilde was exposed to the brilliant literary talk of the day at his mother's Dublin
salon.

     In 1864 Wilde entered the Portora Royal School at Enniskillen, and in 1871
entered Trinity College in Dublin.  In 1874 he left Ireland and went to England to attend
Magdalen College at Oxford.  As a student there, he excelled in classics, wrote poetry,
and incorporated the Bohemian life style of his youth into a unique way of life.  He came
under the influence of aesthetic innovators such as English writers Walter Pater and John
Ruskin.  He found the aesthetic movement's notions of "art for art's sake" and dedicating
one's life to art suitable to his temperament and talents.  As an aesthete, Wilde wore long
hair and velvet knee breeches, and became known  for his eccentricity as well as his
academic ability.  His rooms were filled with various objets d'art such as sunflowers,
peacock feathers, and blue china.  Wilde frequently confided that his greatest challenge at
University was learning to live up to the perfection of the china.  Wilde won numerous
academic prizes while studying there, including the Newdigate Prize, a coveted poetry
award, for his poem Ravenna.

     In 1879 Wilde moved to London to make himself famous.  He set about
establishing himself as the leader and model of the aesthetic movement.  Besides his hair
and breeches, he added loose-fitting wide-collared silk shirts with flowing ties and
lavender colored gloves.  He frequently carried a jewel-topped cane and was caricatured in
the press flamboyantly attired and holding an over-sized sunflower, an icon of the
movement.  Wilde quickly became well known despite having any substantial
achievements to build on.  His natural wit and good humor endeared him to the art and
theater world, and through his lover Frank Miles, he found it easy to become part of the
cliques that frequented London's theater circuit and drawing rooms.  He became a much
desired party guest, and eventually his popularity led to his being chosen as an advance
publicity man for a new Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, Patience, that spoofed aesthetes
like himself.

     In 1881,  Wilde's first book of poems, called Poems, was published.  In 1882, short
of money, he accepted an invitation to embark on a lecture tour of America.  He produced
his first play in New York City, called Vera, about nihilism in Russia.  According to some,
it was canceled at the last moment, probably for political reasons;  others say he saw it
performed there but that it ran unsuccessfully.  Throughout that year he lectured in 70
American cities as well as Ontario and Quebec in Canada on the arts and literature. The
tour was an unmitigated smash and Wilde returned to London in 1883 in triumph and
richer by several thousand pounds.

     By the time he returned from America he had already tired of being the Great
Aesthete and began dressing more conventionally.  He did a successful tour of the U.K.
He also wrote his second unsuccessful play, The Duchess Of Padua.  In 1884, he married
Constance Lloyd, the daughter of an Irish barrister.  They had two sons, Cyril and
Vyvyan.  The family moved into a house in Chelsea, an artist section of London.  In 1887,
he took a job at  Woman's World, a popular magazine for...

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