Oscar Wilde: Trending quotes

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Oscar Wilde: 1624 quotes1011 likes

“Gwendolen, it is a terrible thing for a man to find out suddenly that all his life he has been speaking nothing but the truth. Can you forgive me?”

Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest

Source: The Importance of Being Earnest

“I think it's very healthy to spend time alone. You need to know how to be alone and not be defined by another person.”

Oscar Wilde

“What fire does not destroy, it hardens”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“[E]verybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching.”

Oscar Wilde book The Decay of Lying

Spoken by "Vivian."
The Decay of Lying (1889)

“Young people, nowadays, imagine that money is everything.

Yes, murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; and when they grow older they know it.”

Oscar Wilde

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Writings

“The great events of the world take place in the brain…”

Oscar Wilde

“Never met such a Gorgon… I don't really know what a Gorgon is like, but I am quite sure that Lady Bracknell is one. In any case, she is a monster, without being a myth, which is rather unfair.”

Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest

Source: The Importance of Being Earnest

“I have always been of opinion that a man who desires to get married should know either everything or nothing.”

Oscar Wilde

Lady Bracknell, Act I
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)
Source: The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays

“I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“I am one of those who are made for exceptions, not for laws.”

Oscar Wilde book De Profundis

Source: De Profundis

“The basis of action is lack of imagination. It is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.”

Oscar Wilde

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I
Variant: Action... is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.

“We can have in life but one great experience at best, and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as possible.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“A simile committing suicide is always a depressing spectacle.”

Oscar Wilde

"The Poets' Corner III," The Pall Mall Gazette http://www.online-literature.com/wilde/1307/ (May 30, 1887)

“Mere color, unspoiled by meaning, and unallied with definite form, can speak to the soul in a thousand different ways.”

Oscar Wilde

“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“The worst of having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one so unromantic.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

“If one doesn't talk about a thing, it has never happened. It is simply expression that gives reality to things.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray