◎朱广春奥斯卡·王尔德：英国唯美主义先锋作家/人物志Life Style Track 4Oscar Wilde:The Pioneer Writer of British Aestheticism 他是著名的作家、诗人、戏剧家，是十九世纪与萧伯纳齐名的英国才子。
回顾他的一生，匆匆四十六年，在巅峰处跌落谷底，在病痛中走向人生的终点。
然而，他留下的妙言警句却仍然被后人征引，作品更是成为不朽的经典。
正如余光中所说，他的锦心绣口，微言大义，历经一百多年犹能令他的广大读者与观众惊喜甚至深思。
他就是英国唯美主义艺术运动的倡导者——奥斯卡·王尔德。
Oscar Wilde (1854–1900), was an advocate of the British aestheticism art movement, and a famous writer, poet and playwright. He has been regarded as one of the greatest British writers and artists of the 19th century.Wilde was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1854. His father was a surgeon and his mother was a writer. He received a good education in his childhood, and began to 1)emerge in the literary world after publishing his first book Poetry Anthology .Wilde entered Magdalen College, University of Oxford in 1874. During this period, he was influenced by the aesthetic concepts of Walter Pater and John Ruskin, and was exposed to the works of the Neo-Hegelian philosophy, Darwin’s theory of evolution, and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood movement, which laid the foundation for his later becoming a pioneer writer of aestheticism.In 1888, his first collection of fairy tales, The Happy Prince and Other Tales, was published, which included The Happy Prince, The Nightingale and the Rose, The Selfish Giant, The Devoted Friend, and The Remarkable Rocket , causing an immediate sensation. These works not only attracted children, but also stirred up a lot of waves in the/人物志Life Stylehearts of adults. They were deeply moved by its beautiful language and 2)exquisite beauty. Beauty has always been the theme of Wilde’s fairy tales, existing against 3)ugliness. In The Happy Prince, the prince and the little swallow, in The Nightingale and the Rose, the nightingale, are all 4)embodiments of beauty and carriers of beauty, and Wilde attributes the ultimate beauty of humannature to ultimate love.In 1891, his first novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray,was published. In the same year, another collectionof his fairy tales, A House of Pomegranates, wasreleased, which included The Young King, TheBirthday of the Infanta, The Fisherman andHis Soul, and The Star-child, bringing himgreat fame. However, what truly earned him areputation was his theatrical works. His threeworks were once 5)simultaneously performedon the London stage. The most famous one isThe Importance of Being Earnest, which is acomedy that satirizes the mainstream societyat that time. Therefore, he and GeorgeBernard Shaw are called the “two flags” ofmodern British drama.1) emerge v. 浮现；显露2) exquisite adj. 精美的3) ugliness n. 丑陋4) embodiment n. 化身5) simultaneously adv. 同时地/人物志Life Style Wilde’s life was full of ups and downs. In the Victorian era at the end of the 19th century, there was a fierce conflict between the old and new fashions in the British upper class, and Wilde’s free style quicklymade him a victim of this conflict. In May 1895, he was convicted and sentenced to 2 years in prison. In November 1900, he died of illness at a hotel in Paris at the age of 46.In November 1998, after nearly a century of disrepute, the United Kingdom finally erected a bronze statue in honor of Oscar Wilde in Adelaide Street near Trafalgar Square, London. Under the bronze statue is written what he said, “We’re all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”In October 2007, according to Reuters, a British television channel called UKTV announced the list of “Most Intelligent British People” selected by the public through voting. Wilde received over 20% of the votes and was elected as the most intelligent master in the hearts of the public.In October 2013, The Guardian reported that in the fifth edition of the Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations , Oscar Wilde became the writer with the most quoted quotations.Reading these words by Wilde,have you felt that he was too muchof a maverick in the history of Englishliterature?Disobedience is man’s original virtue.To love yourself is the beginning of lifelong romance.Be yourself; everyone else is already taken....奥斯卡·王尔德（1854—1900），英国唯美主义艺术运动的倡导者，著名的作家、诗人、戏剧家，被誉为19世纪英国最伟大的作家与艺术家之一。
