The Complete Plays of Oscar Wilde

During his writing career, Oscar Wilde became known for his involvement in the rising philosophy of aestheticism. The opportunity to construct aesthetic details precisely, and combine them with larger social themes, drew Wilde to write drama. He started with philosophical dialogues and tragedies, and later moved on to comedies. Wilde produced several society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London. With these plays, he finally found a way to critique society on its own terms. Table of Contents: Vera The Duchess of Padua Lady Windermere's Fan A Woman of No Importance Salomé Salome (English Version) An Ideal Husband The Importance of Being Earnest La Sainte Courtisane A Florentine Tragedy For Love of the King The Decay of Lying (A Dialogue) The Critic as Artist (A Dialogue)

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) was an Irish writer, poet and dramatist. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s. Today he is remembered for his epigrams, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, his plays and poetry, and the circumstances of his imprisonment and early death. Wilde is a central figure in aesthetic writing. His controversial, open lifestyle was the reason he was charged and eventually convicted for the crime of sodomy.