Today is the birthday of Oscar Wilde — playwright, novelist and author of a sizeable chunk of any worthwhile dictionary of quotations. It's a credit to Wilde's genius that his words continue to provide laughter and joy when his own life was marked by the tragedy of a monumental love that ended in betrayal.
I was glad to see Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray honored in The Observer's offbeat list of the 100 greatest novels of all time. (Such lists are always flawed, but also great fun to argue over.) In addition to the indelible metaphor at the core of that book, it also supplies one of my favorite Wilde quips: "Think with the Liberals, but eat with the Tories."
Wilde's play The Importance of Being Ernest was similarly honored as "the funniest play of the century" or some such thing. That may even be true. Although a trifle, it's a delightful trifle, and it's jokes are still funny. (My favorite joke from Ernest may be the one Wilde set up for stage managers, who for a century since have gleefully prepared overlarge piles of cucumber sandwiches, forcing generations of unlucky actors to scarf them down by the handful while exchanging witty, nonchalant banter with Lane the butler.)
For my money though, I'd rather see An Ideal Husband, in which Wilde forces his determinedly shallow protagonist to confront actual moral choices. If only the real Lord Alfred had displayed the courage of the fictional Sir Robert.
In honor of Oscar Wilde's birthday, I invite you to post your own favorite epigrams and Wilde-isms in the comments here.
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