Tosh's review
Lady Windermere's Fan (Penguin Popular Classics)
by Oscar Wilde
Tosh: I like your question: "What's wrong with Wilde? Nothing. He's perfect." It seems useful to ask this question because there seems to be a kind of snobbery/contempt for him in academe. Why aren't his plays included more often in Comp & Lit textbooks?
Yeah. Why not?
Really? Because to me Wilde is the perfect writer in English. I don't understand academe world at all. It's so obvious Wilde is a heavy weight in literature - I mean these people have to get over it. He's great!
There are certain writers like Wilde and I would even put PG Wodehouse in that catagory that what they do is so perfect. I think every writer (at least in English) should study their text. Because what they do is quite remarkable. So boo on academe, because they're wrong!
I think he's so clever, so witty that he's distrusted. Sometimes his play, "The Importance of Being Earnest," is included, but not enough of anthologies include ANY of his work. I have a big beef with the drama that's included in these texts I teach from. Always the same g.d. ones! A Doll House, The Glass Menagerie, something by A. Miller...c'mon, good plays, all, but why does every single anthology have to include the same g.d. plays--these are the only ones fit to teach?!
I think it all comes down to Muriel saying "Why can't life be like an ABBA song?" Some people prefer the idealized world.
Others prefer the less factitious.
The anthologies tend to go for things which have more historical relevance and parallel societal/cultural change.
Admittedly, that's boring.
I liked Wilde when I was younger, but now it just seems so frothy. It's like meringue sometimes...sometimes I'm in the mood for meringue...
Just playing advocatus diaboli, Tosh...our loves are our loves and thank goodness they exist...
I'm happy he gives you such pleasure.
I really like his fairy tales. I think they are often perfect.
But I think I read too many plays a few years ago, and now certain dramatic ideas repel me...no one can deny he's damn funny and quotable...but whether the plays really speak to this age is another question...our brains process so differently now after a century of new media...
And Jessica, you're right...
Clever is a death-knell...especially if it emerges in a critical context.
It's almost as bad as "interesting." But "interesting" means brain death. "Clever" is more persistent vegetative state.
Don't ever let anyone tell you "clever" is a compliment.
Cuz they iz lying.
I think you're right, W.B. btw, did you see Oprah being written about in the newest N-Yorker? I's gona send you a link, as The Oprah of Goodreads....
:)
Gawd woman....you keep linking me to Oprah!
I have a whole pile of her magazines bound in twine someone gave me...WHY? Do I look like an Oprah mag reader?
I accepted them with grace but...they have sat bound in twine for a year or more...I guess I will EBAY them or something...
Now, Martha Stewart's LIVING mag...I will confess I will nab those...just love the photography and the food features...also the focus on antiques...like collecting flower frogs etc....
Where else can you find a great feature on old Parisian metal frogs?
Go Martha!
I love that Nazi Amish milkmaid bitch.
Sorry, W.B. just a joke...one that's worn thin I see!
Fake frustration, my dear.
I'm going there now.
After reading that article, I begin to realize you could live your entire life based on Oprah...she just needs to take over Wal-mart...which is soon opening medical centers...within the stores??? and you can be born, live and die in Oprahland...
The show sounds like it has good intentions...probably not savage enough for Americans...probably will tank....
glad to see she put cute Nate Berkus in charge of it...
I hear she now has cardboard cut-outs of Steadman that she puts in various windows of her houses like Norman Bates did with his mother...
No way? (last comment you made) you can't be serious?
'ello darlin....
xoxox....i gave as good as i got...copied the x's and o's exactly...that's too much like an accountant...
my mom would say...no, always give MORE....
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Admit it, Tracy...if you had to be stuck on a desert island and it had to be a female with you...you know she'd be a good pick....i'd sit on my ass and watch her write the survival manual in her head....
when we got rescued she'd have a top ten bestseller in a week with a book called SURVIVAL: MY YEAR ON A DESERT ISLE WITH A SCHLOMO....
yeah wal-mart is going medical...scary stuff huh?
think they'll get all the doctors from china cut-rate?
and glad to see the New Yorker cartoons are as unfunny as they ever were....
MARTHA AND BILL ON A DESERT ISLE TOGETHER...
MARTHA sits to an elaborate meal she has prepared on a table she built without any power tools whatsoever...it looks nicer than anything you'll find in the Garden Department of a reputable store.
BILL: My God! Are those....petit-fours?
MARTHA: You weren't interested in what they were when I was grinding coconuts in my mortar...why the sudden interest, Bill? Hmmm?
BILL: They look really good.
MARTHA: They are. They're my dessert. Isn't this your nap time? I mean your fourth daily nap time?
BILL: Ummm....where did you get that roast? Omigod that looks so succulent...
MARTHA: It's a native boar...unlike a native boor (cough)...I killed it with an electrical device I made using the components in my hair dryer that was shattered in the plane crash....I had to make batteries first...
BILL: You made batteries?
MARTHA: Yes. Have you seen my Morse Code handbook? I need it for a signaling device I'm developing...
BILL: Remember when I said we were out of toilet paper?
MARTHA: Yeeess? And I told you to use some leaves.
BILL: Umm. Well, I didn't like the leaves idea.
MARTHA: Ohmigod...you didn't...
BILL: I'm afraid I did...
MARTHA: If you were a producer,I would...
BILL: What, Martha?
MARTHA: Just don't touch that bottle over there...i'm making a new sort of wine...i'ts mollusk-based....I plan on makreting it when we get back stateside...it will bury Shiraz...
BILL: Okay...can I have one of those yams in the molasses type stuff....
MARTHA: No. Go back to sleep.
BILL: Okay. Wake me if there's leftovers.
MARTHA: Sure I will. I saw some crabs down there. Maybe you could make a nice crabcake after your nap.
BILL: Yeah. Maybe.
MARTHA: Beaux reves. Fuck. This is worse than Nutley.
Bill: this is hysterical....! can't you publish this somewhere?
umm it was just meant for your amusement...don't think it merits publication..glad you likey...she scares me...but i do find it seductive to watch her work on t.v....
well you are a natural...damn funnier than 20 new yorker cartoons in one or one of their lame 'shouts & murmurs' pieces...I know--McSweeny's! they'd take it. though there's no $ I hear...unlike the g.d. new yorker..
Tosh's review
Lady Windermere's Fan (Penguin Popular Classics) by Oscar Wilde
Tosh's review
rating:
Reading an Oscar Wilde play is sort of like life being perfect. The structure of the work is faultless, the dialogue is uber-clever and fantastic. What's wrong with Wilde? Nothing. He's perfect. I can't imagine any writer who wrote so beautifully in his native language. There are some people who are born with 'it' and Wilde is one of them. Of course for someone so perfect he would have to get involved in some nasty social business via his decade. But when you look back at Wilde, one realizes that he is someone from the 19th Century who is saying goodbye to the Victorian era and culture. It's like he couldn't wait to jump into the 20th Century. Which makes it sad that we didn't accept Wilde with our open arms. We killed the thing that was so beautiful and right.
Wilde was born in 1854 and died in 1900. I was born in 1954 and was convinced I would be dead by the year 2000 - just because of Wilde. It's silly and egotistic on my part, yet it also shows how much I love Wil...more
Wilde was born in 1854 and died in 1900. I was born in 1954 and was convinced I would be dead by the year 2000 - just because of Wilde. It's silly and egotistic on my part, yet it also shows how much I love Wil...more
Tosh: I like your question: "What's wrong with Wilde? Nothing. He's perfect." It seems useful to ask this question because there seems to be a kind of snobbery/contempt for him in academe. Why aren't his plays included more often in Comp & Lit textbooks?
Yeah. Why not?
Really? Because to me Wilde is the perfect writer in English. I don't understand academe world at all. It's so obvious Wilde is a heavy weight in literature - I mean these people have to get over it. He's great! There are certain writers like Wilde and I would even put PG Wodehouse in that catagory that what they do is so perfect. I think every writer (at least in English) should study their text. Because what they do is quite remarkable. So boo on academe, because they're wrong!
I think he's so clever, so witty that he's distrusted. Sometimes his play, "The Importance of Being Earnest," is included, but not enough of anthologies include ANY of his work. I have a big beef with the drama that's included in these texts I teach from. Always the same g.d. ones! A Doll House, The Glass Menagerie, something by A. Miller...c'mon, good plays, all, but why does every single anthology have to include the same g.d. plays--these are the only ones fit to teach?!
I think it all comes down to Muriel saying "Why can't life be like an ABBA song?" Some people prefer the idealized world.
Others prefer the less factitious.
The anthologies tend to go for things which have more historical relevance and parallel societal/cultural change.
Admittedly, that's boring.
I liked Wilde when I was younger, but now it just seems so frothy. It's like meringue sometimes...sometimes I'm in the mood for meringue...
Just playing advocatus diaboli, Tosh...our loves are our loves and thank goodness they exist...
I'm happy he gives you such pleasure.
I really like his fairy tales. I think they are often perfect.
But I think I read too many plays a few years ago, and now certain dramatic ideas repel me...no one can deny he's damn funny and quotable...but whether the plays really speak to this age is another question...our brains process so differently now after a century of new media...
And Jessica, you're right...
Clever is a death-knell...especially if it emerges in a critical context.
It's almost as bad as "interesting." But "interesting" means brain death. "Clever" is more persistent vegetative state.
Don't ever let anyone tell you "clever" is a compliment.
Cuz they iz lying.
I think you're right, W.B. btw, did you see Oprah being written about in the newest N-Yorker? I's gona send you a link, as The Oprah of Goodreads....:)
Gawd woman....you keep linking me to Oprah!
I have a whole pile of her magazines bound in twine someone gave me...WHY? Do I look like an Oprah mag reader?
I accepted them with grace but...they have sat bound in twine for a year or more...I guess I will EBAY them or something...
Now, Martha Stewart's LIVING mag...I will confess I will nab those...just love the photography and the food features...also the focus on antiques...like collecting flower frogs etc....
Where else can you find a great feature on old Parisian metal frogs?
Go Martha!
I love that Nazi Amish milkmaid bitch.
Sorry, W.B. just a joke...one that's worn thin I see!
Fake frustration, my dear.
I'm going there now.
After reading that article, I begin to realize you could live your entire life based on Oprah...she just needs to take over Wal-mart...which is soon opening medical centers...within the stores??? and you can be born, live and die in Oprahland...
The show sounds like it has good intentions...probably not savage enough for Americans...probably will tank....
glad to see she put cute Nate Berkus in charge of it...
I hear she now has cardboard cut-outs of Steadman that she puts in various windows of her houses like Norman Bates did with his mother...
No way? (last comment you made) you can't be serious?
'ello darlin....
xoxox....i gave as good as i got...copied the x's and o's exactly...that's too much like an accountant...
my mom would say...no, always give MORE....
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Admit it, Tracy...if you had to be stuck on a desert island and it had to be a female with you...you know she'd be a good pick....i'd sit on my ass and watch her write the survival manual in her head....
when we got rescued she'd have a top ten bestseller in a week with a book called SURVIVAL: MY YEAR ON A DESERT ISLE WITH A SCHLOMO....
yeah wal-mart is going medical...scary stuff huh?
think they'll get all the doctors from china cut-rate?
and glad to see the New Yorker cartoons are as unfunny as they ever were....
MARTHA AND BILL ON A DESERT ISLE TOGETHER...
MARTHA sits to an elaborate meal she has prepared on a table she built without any power tools whatsoever...it looks nicer than anything you'll find in the Garden Department of a reputable store.
BILL: My God! Are those....petit-fours?
MARTHA: You weren't interested in what they were when I was grinding coconuts in my mortar...why the sudden interest, Bill? Hmmm?
BILL: They look really good.
MARTHA: They are. They're my dessert. Isn't this your nap time? I mean your fourth daily nap time?
BILL: Ummm....where did you get that roast? Omigod that looks so succulent...
MARTHA: It's a native boar...unlike a native boor (cough)...I killed it with an electrical device I made using the components in my hair dryer that was shattered in the plane crash....I had to make batteries first...
BILL: You made batteries?
MARTHA: Yes. Have you seen my Morse Code handbook? I need it for a signaling device I'm developing...
BILL: Remember when I said we were out of toilet paper?
MARTHA: Yeeess? And I told you to use some leaves.
BILL: Umm. Well, I didn't like the leaves idea.
MARTHA: Ohmigod...you didn't...
BILL: I'm afraid I did...
MARTHA: If you were a producer,I would...
BILL: What, Martha?
MARTHA: Just don't touch that bottle over there...i'm making a new sort of wine...i'ts mollusk-based....I plan on makreting it when we get back stateside...it will bury Shiraz...
BILL: Okay...can I have one of those yams in the molasses type stuff....
MARTHA: No. Go back to sleep.
BILL: Okay. Wake me if there's leftovers.
MARTHA: Sure I will. I saw some crabs down there. Maybe you could make a nice crabcake after your nap.
BILL: Yeah. Maybe.
MARTHA: Beaux reves. Fuck. This is worse than Nutley.
Bill: this is hysterical....! can't you publish this somewhere?
umm it was just meant for your amusement...don't think it merits publication..glad you likey...she scares me...but i do find it seductive to watch her work on t.v....
well you are a natural...damn funnier than 20 new yorker cartoons in one or one of their lame 'shouts & murmurs' pieces...I know--McSweeny's! they'd take it. though there's no $ I hear...unlike the g.d. new yorker..