Wilde, Oscar

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) was an Irish playwright, poet, and novelist whose wit and aestheticism made him Victorian London's most celebrated—and eventually most scandalized—literary figure. His comedies of manners, including Lady Windermere's Fan and An Ideal Husband, skewered upper-class hypocrisy with epigrammatic brilliance. The Importance of Being Earnest, his dramatic masterpiece, opened in 1895; within months, Wilde's conviction for 'gross indecency' destroyed his career and exiled him to France, where he died at forty-six.