art is individualism

"In effect, the world will be populated by artists, each striving after perfection in the way that seems best to him."

Oscar Wilde

English playwright

"Art is individualism, and individualism is a disturbing and disintegrating force. There lies its immense value. For what it seeks is to disturb monotony of type, slavery of custom, tyranny of habit, and the reduction of man to the level of a machine."
1891
“There are two great tragedies in life. One is not getting what you want. The other is getting it.”

  1. The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)
  2. Intentions: "The Decay of Lying: an Observation"
  3. Intentions: "Pen, Pencil and Poison a Study in Green"
  4. Intentions: "The Critic as Artist with some remarks upon the importance of discussing everything"
  5. Intentions: "The Truth of Masks a Note on Illusion"

25 notes · after 24 · from 2 · both 1

  1. change predictable human qualityafter

    For Oscar Wilde, change is the one quality we can predicate of human nature.

  2. community and authority over artafter

    Oscar Wilde calls Public Opinion a monstrous, ignorant thing, born of a community corrupted by authority and blind to individualism.

  3. journalism supplies insatiable curiosityafter

    The public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything except what is worth knowing, and journalism, with tradesman-like habits, supplies it.

  4. pain provisional mode of realisationafter

    Pain is a mode of self-realization, but a provisional one: a protest against unjust surroundings that will vanish once they are removed.

  5. philosophy in interpretative symbolic fictionafter

    Oscar Wilde praises a writer of fiction whose people not merely live but live in thought, with soul in them and around them.

  6. progress is the realisation of Utopiasafter

    A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth glancing at, for it leaves out the one country where Humanity always lands.

  7. russia perfection by painafter

    No one in modern Russia, Oscar Wilde writes, could realize his perfection except by pain.

  8. tyrannies over body and soulafter

    The Prince tyrannizes over the body, the Pope over the soul, and the People over soul and body alike.

  9. be thyself and the ideas of Jesusfrom

    “Know thyself” stood over the portal of the antique world; for Oscar Wilde, “Be thyself,” Christ’s message, belongs over the new one.

  10. change conformity, disobedience, and noveltyafter
  11. confusion of private propertyafter

    Private property harms individualism by confusing a man with what he possesses, so he thinks the important thing is to have, not to be.

  12. create for the artistic joyboth

    To create for the amusement of people rather than for artistic joy is to suppress individualism and surrender everything valuable.

  13. exaggerated altruistic virtuesafter

    Charity does not cure poverty but prolongs it; for Oscar Wilde, the proper aim is to rebuild society so that poverty becomes impossible.

  14. individualism and family lifeafter

    For Oscar Wilde, socialism would free us from the sordid necessity of living for others.

  15. individualism realisation receptivity and imaginationafter
  16. original virtue through disobedienceafter

    Progress has been made through disobedience and rebellion, and for Oscar Wilde the best among the poor are quite right to be rebellious.

  17. perfections charity and conformityafter

    To charity a man may yield and stay free, but to conformity no man may yield and remain free at all, writes Oscar Wilde.

  18. public beauty and noveltyafter

    The one thing the public dislike is novelty, because it frightens them as an assertion of the artist’s individualism.

  19. selfishness is to make claims upon othersafter

    Selfishness is not living as one wishes but asking others to live as one wishes; unselfishness is letting other people’s lives alone.

  20. social classes partial realisationafter

    No class is ever really conscious of its own suffering; it has to be told by others, and often disbelieves them.

  21. sympathy with joy is naturally rareafter

    Sympathy with suffering is apt to become morbid; one should sympathize with all of life, its joy, beauty, energy, health and freedom.

  22. the slavery of the machineafter

    To sweep the streets with joy would be appalling: all monotonous, dull, unintellectual labor must be done by machinery.

  23. the state as a voluntary associationafter

    All modes of government are failures; democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people.

  24. to sympathise with a friend’s successafter

    Anybody can sympathize with a friend’s suffering, but it takes a fine nature, a true individualist, to sympathize with a friend’s success.

  25. true artist and amusing craftsmanafter

    The moment an artist takes notice of what other people want, he ceases to be an artist and becomes a dull or an amusing craftsman.