“To Be Said to Have Done It Is Everything”: The Theatrical Oscar Wilde and Possibilities for the (Re)Construction of Biography

Livingston, Lindsay Adamson

doi:10.1080/08989575.2009.10846786

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 10 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Instead of embracing more promiscuous sexuality, Housman "nursed a single, unrequited love for his class mate Moses Jackson" and "poured his stifled ardor into his poetry and scholarship." [19] Apparently, Housman runs away from the truth that would enable him to live a freer life. He chooses to neglect it and to repress his feelings as well.…”

Section: Chamberlian Nothing Which You'd Call Indecentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transgression: Human Desire and the Revelation of Homosexuality in Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love

Su¹

2017

IJCH

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Abstract-Staying in or coming out of the closet have been two oppositional dissidences sanctioned by each of their supporters to stigmatize the legitimacy of the opposing stance. With these two discourses confronting each other, the public awareness of acknowledging the existence of homosexuality leads to the exposure of sexual repression. Thus, homosexuality not only overthrows the univocal disposition of heterosexuality, but also invokes a rising voice to challenge the doctrine in a conservative society. A.E. Housman, Tom Stoppard's protagonist in The Invention of Love, constrained by social convention, experiences a concupiscent desire for his classmate, Moses Jackson. Triggered by his indulgence in Greek poetry, from youth to death, Housman goes on the path in search of his real self. In this regard, this paper will focus on three stages, awareness, denial and acceptance, which influence Housman's whole life and delineate his inner struggle as he faces condemnation from society. With Stoppard's delicate arrangement of having the dead Housman meet the young Housman, homosexuality is turned into a polemical topic that deserves complete scrutiny.

show abstract

Section: Chamberlian Nothing Which You'd Call Indecentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transgression: Human Desire and the Revelation of Homosexuality in Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love

Su¹

2017

IJCH

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

The Art of Creating a Great Sensation: Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

Mayer

2016

Celebrity Authorship and Afterlives in English and American Literature

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Traces of Wilde: Fact and Fiction inDorian: An ImitationandThe Picture of John Gray

Pulham

2019

Victoriographies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The life and art of Oscar Wilde are of enduring interest to contemporary readers and audiences who remain fascinated not only by his work, but also by his biography. The dramatic nature of the three trials that took place in 1895, and Wilde's spectacular fall from grace following imprisonment and exile, speak to our own period in which questions of gender and sexuality are topics of continuing tension and concern. This essay examines two examples of contemporary writing that are informed by Wilde's biography and oeuvre: Will Self's novel, Dorian: An Imitation (2002), and Craig Wilmann's drama, The Picture of John Gray (2014), and offers the first academic analysis of Wilmann's play. Exploring these works through the lens of neo-Victorianism, it considers the balance between history and fiction in each text. Drawing on Ricoeur's treatise The Reality of the Historical Past (1984), it proposes that Ricoeur's concept of the Analogue, which encompasses both the imaginative reconstruction of the past through the documentary trace and the adoption of the critical distance required to understand it, provides a new way in which neo-Victorian literature might be understood.

show abstract

“To Be Said to Have Done It Is Everything”: The Theatrical Oscar Wilde and Possibilities for the (Re)Construction of Biography

Cited by 3 publications

References 10 publications

Transgression: Human Desire and the Revelation of Homosexuality in Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love

Transgression: Human Desire and the Revelation of Homosexuality in Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love

The Art of Creating a Great Sensation: Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

Traces of Wilde: Fact and Fiction inDorian: An ImitationandThe Picture of John Gray

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About