008.

hullooo. right, alas, i've been ill all week &, due to school, the only thing i've worn lately that's been even mildly exciting was what i wore to london on tuesday - but i didn't take pictures, because of the general awfulness of my camera. anyway.

i felt i owed you all a post but this lack of photos, new & general excitement prevented me from doing one in my usual style. thusss, i figured, now was as good a time as any to talk about my love, my idol, my favourite, my inspiration, my sort of everything - oscar wilde. and i'm going to try to be very very good and not use wikipedia or anything like that, so, let inaccuracy ensue!

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was born on the 16th November 1856, son of Jane Francesca Wilde (writer) and Sir Williams Wilde (surgeon). He was born at 21 Westland Row, Dublin, and between the years 1871 and 1874 Oscar attended Trinity College, Dublin, studying Classics. An outstanding student, whose classical Greek was equally as good as his new testament Greek, Oscar was awarded a scholarship to Magdalen College, Oxford. Whilst here he won numerous prizes for his poetry, his fluent Greek, and created quite the reputation for himself. His attitude, his wit, his frivolity, his fashions (which we'll come to later) and, frankly, his 'camp'-ness revolted Victorian society at the time - particularly a large majority of Oxford scholars.

One of my favourite Oscar Wilde anecdotes occured a few months into his time at Oxford, when he was asked to do an oral exam, where he would be tested on his New Testemant Greek. The piece he was given to read was the Passion (the crucifixtion). As I've already written, he was absolutely fantastic at this, and so read it as well as anybody could - however, when asked to stop, he didn't. "Mr Wilde, stop," they said, and yet he continued. "Mr Wilde, stop," they pressed - and it was only then that he responded. "Oh please let me go on," he said, "I'm dying to see how it all turns out." As you might imagine, a remark such as this was the very epitome of everything that Victorian society loathed.

Perhaps more importantly than the reputation he created for himself (a reputation already famous all over Britain, even though he was just an undergraduate) and perhaps even more importantly than the double first he eventually achieved, is the fact that it was here that he became involved in the Aesthetic Movement.

Perhaps, if I was a clever sort of human being, I would have some sort of plan to this. Perhaps I would decide to do an introduction to Decadance, then Aesthetisicm, before leading onto Oscar Wilde's role in it. However, this is my blog, and I am not a clever sort of human being, and thus we will commence - and I'll leave you to pick up the pieces if you so wish, or to brand me a fool & ne'er return, if you'd prefer. Anyway.

A very loose sort of time, the Aesthetic Movement generally occured in the late 19th century - though, of course, the idea of 'art for arts sake' and living towards and ideal of beauty (defining things by whether they are beautiful or not beautiful rather than right or wrong) had been around as early as the Ancient Grecian times, and has reared its lovely head all throughout history - the Reneissance and Decadance in France being perhaps the most obvious. I won't bore you with the ins and outs of the Aesthetic Movement, perhaps I'll do another post on it at a later date, at some other time when I've got bloody nothing to write about, and maybe one day I'll write about Dante Gabriel Roseletti or John Keats or Evelyn Waugh (who was a man) - or something like that. But not today; so, moving back to Wilde.

From his interest in Interior Design (he often lectured on 'The House Beautiful') to his interest in the beautiful Lord Alfred Douglas, beauty itself and beauty for beauties sake played a huge role in Oscar's life - and this was reflected, of course, in the way he chose to present himself. Whilst the rest of Victorian society was dressing in their outdated black puritan robes, all very conservative, all very 'don't-mention-the-radicals', Oscar would prance the streets in pale-pink suits, velvet trousers, fur shawls, silk britches, long flowing hair, expensive jewels, shiny shoes and well-tailored coats. All very decadant, all very elaborate, all very aesthetic.

Oscar Wilde was undoubtedly an incredible man. When I first heard of him it was probably through Stephen Fry (as most of my favourite things are), and then I read the picture of dorian gray -- in which Wilde's ideas of aesthetisicm remain extremely prelevelant; it is, after all, a tale about beauty (and sin and the faces we wear as masks and other things too, of course).

If you haven't read any Wilde, read Wilde. If you'd read more Wilde, read more Wilde. Although he has has a profound effect on my life in huge ways, this has become something of a fashion blog (though I never really intended it to be) and thus I figured I should link it to aesthetisicm and, yes, fashion. And I can sum up everything I'm trying to convey about Wilde and fashion and aesthetisicm in this handy little quote:

"From the artistic point of view, it is usually a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months."

And there you have it. If Wilde has taught me anything in his aesthetism, his books, his way of life, his way of dress, it is to ignore fashion magazines. They will only make you feel fat, ugly, unfashionable and hopeless. Now, yes, I read Vogue/ID/Nylon as much as the rest of you. I like looking at Lily Donaldson's cheekbones and it looks pretty cool on my bedroom floor. But since Wilde has been introduced to my life it has become incredible clear how incredibly unimportant it is. Now when I buy clothes, I don't wonder if it looks like something from Vogue, if I'll look trendy in it -- I buy the clothes that make me smile, clothes that are beautiful; no matter what I look like in them, no matter if it costs thousands of pounds, or just pounds. I don't always succeed, but when I do, my wardrobe is better for it, and I am happier for it. I try to play with colours and textures, I embrace the decedant and the ridiculous - and whenever I put on my clothes I feel decedant and ridiculous, I am a character, an aesthete, wearing the things that I feel are beautiful, wearing clothes that make me feel beautiful; regardless of how many catwalks it might have been on last month.

anyway. i do hope you'll forgive that mindless ramble about something that i really know nothing about - but as is the case with such a lot, i can only talk about how i feel, not really what i know. i have no doubt that many of you will disagree with this man, deem him pretentious and absurd, and deem me pretentious and absurd for liking him. good. great. :D i want to hear everything that you have to say, i really do! talk to me, let me know what you think! if i've achieved anything, which i highly doubt, it's that next time you go into a bookshop, you might try and find a book about oscar wilde, or maybe a picture of dorian gray - or something like that.

anyway. sorry about that! won't happen again! & i'll try to get back to posting things a little bit more regular, and not so ridiculously inaccurate, now. :)