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A Intransigente Defesa da Arte
Quinta-feira, 14 de Fevereiro de 1895, acontece a triunfante estreia de The Importance of Being Earnest: é o zénite da carreira de Oscar Wilde. E menos de cem dias depois, era um preso comum condenado a dois anos de trabalhos forçados.
Pela primeira vez, em Portugal, e integrando a colecção Livros Negros, da Guerra e Paz Editores, este livro publica a quase totalidade da transcrição do julgamento mais sensacional do século XIX ou como da sordidez da exposição, na Londres vitoriana, da homossexualidade de Wilde nasce uma veemente e majestosa defesa da absoluta liberdade da criação artística.
Esta Intransigente Defesa da Arte é um esplêndido documento histórico e é um manifesto de intransigente defesa da independência da arte, permitindo aos leitores ouvir as reais palavras de Wilde no seu mais articulado e brilhante discurso, que faz de um texto que se presumiria perdido nos meandros da lei uma peça da mais sublime estética.
Pela primeira vez, em Portugal, e integrando a colecção Livros Negros, da Guerra e Paz Editores, este livro publica a quase totalidade da transcrição do julgamento mais sensacional do século XIX ou como da sordidez da exposição, na Londres vitoriana, da homossexualidade de Wilde nasce uma veemente e majestosa defesa da absoluta liberdade da criação artística.
Esta Intransigente Defesa da Arte é um esplêndido documento histórico e é um manifesto de intransigente defesa da independência da arte, permitindo aos leitores ouvir as reais palavras de Wilde no seu mais articulado e brilhante discurso, que faz de um texto que se presumiria perdido nos meandros da lei uma peça da mais sublime estética.
128 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2022
40 people want to read
About the author
Oscar Wilde
5,627 books39.2k followersOscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is best remembered for his epigrams and plays, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, and his criminal conviction for gross indecency for homosexual acts.
Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. In his youth, Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, he read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.
Wilde tried his hand at various literary activities: he wrote a play, published a book of poems, lectured in the United States and Canada on "The English Renaissance" in art and interior decoration, and then returned to London where he lectured on his American travels and wrote reviews for various periodicals. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversational skill, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day. At the turn of the 1890s, he refined his ideas about the supremacy of art in a series of dialogues and essays, and incorporated themes of decadence, duplicity, and beauty into what would be his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Wilde returned to drama, writing Salome (1891) in French while in Paris, but it was refused a licence for England due to an absolute prohibition on the portrayal of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Undiscouraged, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London.
At the height of his fame and success, while An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) were still being performed in London, Wilde issued a civil writ against John Sholto Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. The libel hearings unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest and criminal prosecution for gross indecency with other males. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and so a retrial was ordered. In the second trial Wilde was convicted and sentenced to two years' hard labour, the maximum penalty, and was jailed from 1895 to 1897. During his last year in prison he wrote De Profundis (published posthumously in abridged form in 1905), a long letter that discusses his spiritual journey through his trials and is a dark counterpoint to his earlier philosophy of pleasure. On the day of his release, he caught the overnight steamer to France, never to return to Britain or Ireland. In France and Italy, he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life.
Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. In his youth, Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, he read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.
Wilde tried his hand at various literary activities: he wrote a play, published a book of poems, lectured in the United States and Canada on "The English Renaissance" in art and interior decoration, and then returned to London where he lectured on his American travels and wrote reviews for various periodicals. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversational skill, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day. At the turn of the 1890s, he refined his ideas about the supremacy of art in a series of dialogues and essays, and incorporated themes of decadence, duplicity, and beauty into what would be his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Wilde returned to drama, writing Salome (1891) in French while in Paris, but it was refused a licence for England due to an absolute prohibition on the portrayal of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Undiscouraged, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London.
At the height of his fame and success, while An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) were still being performed in London, Wilde issued a civil writ against John Sholto Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. The libel hearings unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest and criminal prosecution for gross indecency with other males. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and so a retrial was ordered. In the second trial Wilde was convicted and sentenced to two years' hard labour, the maximum penalty, and was jailed from 1895 to 1897. During his last year in prison he wrote De Profundis (published posthumously in abridged form in 1905), a long letter that discusses his spiritual journey through his trials and is a dark counterpoint to his earlier philosophy of pleasure. On the day of his release, he caught the overnight steamer to France, never to return to Britain or Ireland. In France and Italy, he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
March 31, 2025
Interessante para nos dar uma ideia do carácter astuto e sarcástico de Wilde, a leitura proporciona-nos uma janela para a mente do autor, fora do âmbito da ficção. Apesar de o livro ser curto, a certa altura, torna-se um pouco fastidioso o registo de transcrição a de perguntas e respostas repetitivas, que acabam por se misturar numa amálgama confusa de nomes e datas.
February 9, 2022
Uma excelente introdução deixa-nos com água na boca para o que se segue: uma intransigente defesa da arte através dos depoimentos em tribunal de Oscar Wilde (num julgamento sórdido que se tornaria mais tarde num pesadelo para o próprio), equiparados a uma estética notável, ao nível do melhor das suas obras. Não é bem isso... Essa intransigente defesa da arte surge efectivamente, de forma elevada e com bastante humor até, mas apenas em breves momentos, em poucas das páginas deste livro. O resto limita-se, praticamente, à transcrição de perguntas desconfortáveis de um advogado que tenta demonstrar a imoralidade e homossexualidade de Wilde, às quais este se esquiva com elegância, astúcia e possivelmente inúmeras mentiras, como não poderia deixar de ser, tendo em conta o obscurantismo da época no que toca a orientações sexuais.
Para os curiosos e fãs de Oscar Wilde, poderá ser interessante ficar a conhecer este episódio. No entanto, não mais do que isso. As expectativas anunciadas de se encontrar por aqui resquícios do que o artista produziu ao longo da sua carreira são, a meu ver, apenas uma boa estratégia de marketing para a venda do livro...
Para os curiosos e fãs de Oscar Wilde, poderá ser interessante ficar a conhecer este episódio. No entanto, não mais do que isso. As expectativas anunciadas de se encontrar por aqui resquícios do que o artista produziu ao longo da sua carreira são, a meu ver, apenas uma boa estratégia de marketing para a venda do livro...
November 9, 2025
Só queria ser uma mosca naquele tribunal para assistir este ✨divo✨ a testemunhar 👀
Um ícone, mesmo quando sabe que vai ser condenado 💅✨
Um ícone, mesmo quando sabe que vai ser condenado 💅✨
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews