Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde was quite the fellow to present unlikely topics. In “The Decay of Lying” he presents an interesting point that I feel many people would agree with: without lying, life would be boring. His characters Vivian and Cyril go back and forth throughout the piece, each one defending/explaining their view. Vivian is more interested in the ‘artistic’ side of life and actually enjoys the energy that comes with things besides the natural. Cyril, on the other hand, is more of a stick to the basics type of woman. The two characters are humorous to say the least, and are both typical figures for their time.
The dialogue in this piece was a little exhausting, but probably would have been better acted out. Although Vivian had a point, speaking of the bare facts all the time would be rather boring, lying causes problems. I’m a bit of a stick in the mud when it comes to these kinds of topics, but I value honesty as one of the most important things there are so I couldn’t fully enjoy this piece like every one else probably did. I think Wilde did an excellent job expressing his thoughts through his characters’ voices and he made some very strong observations when it comes to how the world functions (especially by social standards). But….because I feel that he is in fact promoting lies to be ‘ok’ and even considered as an art in certain lights, I can’t give him my support because I disagree with that aspect of the message he was trying to convey with this piece of work. I would enjoy it for its comedic purposes, but once I go any deeper than the surface I’d quickly lose interest in it. Wilde is still a phenomenal writer, but when comes to personal views, mine get in the way of being able to thoroughly appreciate him because of the topics we disagree on.
4 comments:
Wilde was certainly one of my favorite authors that we read. I didn't take quiet the same message from the reading as you and don't think that Vivian was actually promoting lying. I read it more as wink-wink, nod-nod position that he took simply to see if he could develop logical, believable arguments which people might actually accept as straight-forward. He was practicing the art of debate and playing somewhat of devil's advocate. Cyril gave just the expected reaction and provided the perfect sounding board for Vivian's supposed theories. Enjoyed your post.
LaDonna,
OK post on Wilde's dialog essay on lying, but the first part of your post seemed like a plot summary and the second part didn't go into as much depth as I would like.
LaDonna
I first want to point out that Vivian and Cyril were not women and if you notice their names are those of Wilde's two sons. I think this allows us to assume the two are brothers that are perhaps just having a silly argument. But reading more of the work I found it very interesting what Vivian argued and found that I agreed with some of his arguments.
It seems that most of our class mates are just bored with Wilde. I think it is because ususally an authors work repesents their life but in Wilde's case... there was not much connection in the two.
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