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Oscar Wilde Quotes

1854–1900

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900) was an Irish dramatist, essayist, novelist and poet.

Also known as: Oscar Wild, Wilde, Wilde, Oscar, The Nightingale and the Rose

Random Oscar Wilde quote

353 quotes

In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing.

It is immoral to use private property in order to alleviate the horrible evils that result from the institution of private property.

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

The note of the perfect personality is not rebellion, but peace.

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name of common sense.

The number of women in London who flirt with their own husbands is perfectly scandalous. It looks so bad. It is simply washing one's clean linen in public.

The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

People who count their chickens before they are hatched act very wisely because chickens run about so absurdly that it's impossible to count them accurately.

Where there is sorrow there is holy ground.

De Profundis (1897)

I hope, Cecily, I shall not offend you if I state quite frankly and openly that you seem to me to be in every way the visible personification of absolute perfection.

The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us to do something for them.

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890)

Nowadays we are all of us so hard up that the only pleasant things to pay are compliments. They're the only things we can pay.

Lady Windermere's Fan (1892)

Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891)

The more we study Art, the less we care for Nature. What Art really reveals to us is Nature's lack of design, her curious crudities, her extraordinary monotony, her absolutely unfinished condition.

Intentions (1891)

Tell me, when you are alone with him [Max Beerbohm] Sphinx, does he take off his face and reveal his mask?

Criticism will annihilate race-prejudices by insisting upon the unity of the human mind in the variety of its forms.

The Critic as Artist (1891)

It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and live with her too little.

De Profundis (1897)

A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can you want?

I put all my genius into my life; I put only my talent into my works.

When a voice behind me whispered low,
"That fellow's got to swing."

The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898)

For he who lives more lives than one
More deaths than one must die.

The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898)

But you can read the Hieroglyphs on the great sandstone obelisks,
And you have talked with Basilisks, and you have looked on Hippogriffs.

The Sphinx (1894)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Oscar Wilde (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.