The Relationship Between Aestheticism And Morality In The Comedies Of Oscar Wilde

The thesis aims to study the relationship between Wilde's aestheticism and the conventional Victorian morality as manifested in his social comedies, by placing Wilde's comedies against the theoretical framework of his aestheticism. It explains how Wilde's aesthetic theory is used as the weapon to subvert the conventional Victorian morality and then explores Wilde's new aesthetic ethics.Research literature involved includes Oscar Wilde's critical writings Intentions, The Soul of Man under Socialism, his letters, the biographies on Wilde and other scholars' comments. The comedies are the most significant works of Oscar Wilde, mainly including Lady Windermere's Fan (1892), A Woman of No Importance (1893), An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895).This thesis firstly explains Oscar Wilde's aesthetic theories, focusing on the autonomy of art, the aestheticism incarnation - the dandiacal image, individualism and hedonism.It then analyzes Wilde's contradictory attitude toward art and morality. He claims "Art for Art's Sake" and the independence of art from morality in his aesthetic theory. However, art in Wilde's works is never detached from morality; but closely bound up with it instead.On the basis of this analysis, the thesis explores how Oscar Wilde's aestheticism rebels against the conventional Victorian morality, analyzing four aspects of it. Firstly, the transformation of life into art reflected in the comedies is the satire of the hypocrisy of Victorian morality; secondly, the dandiacal image that Wilde portrays suggests a rebellion against the Victorian philistinism; Thirdly, Wilde's individualism functions as the redemption of the repressive Victorian humanity; Fourthly, Oscar Wilde's hedonism provides a way of escape from Victorian utilitarianism.By canvassing both Wilde's aesthetic theories and the comedies, the thesis analyses the relationship between art and morality embodied in his comedies, demonstrating how Wilde's aestheticism subverts and rebels against the conventional Victorian morality. Wilde absorbs and inherits the previous aesthetic theories and develops his own systematic theory of aestheticism, eventually forms his aesthetic "New Ethics", namely the aesthetic ethics internalized in the people's own thoughts:the pursuing for the emancipation of humanity and individual freedom.