The Picture of Dorian Gray - Videos

 

 TOP TEN NOTES ON  THE NOVEL

 

ANIMATED SUMMARY 

AESTHETICISM AND DECADENCE: RIASSUNTO IN INGLESE 

Aestheticism. Aestheticismwas a literary movement which developed in whole Europe by the middle of the 19th century, as a reaction against the utilitarianism and the moral restrictions of the Victorian Society .

It originated in France  about 1835. Adopting  Gautier’s slogan “Art for Art’s sake”, the aestheticism broke with the conventions of the time and gave free rein to imagination and fantasy. The early members of the movement chose to live and extravagant “vie de Bohème”: a life spent in the pursuit of sensation and devoted to the cult of art and beauty, sometimes marked by excesses, but always rich in creative energy. 
In painting, the Aesthetic theories led (ha portato) to impressionism, where the artists chose what they called “pure painting” where sentiment or moral judge were subordinated to colour and the pattern (modello) of light and shadow.

In literature, Aestheticism was full of Hedonism and slowly became what is known (e lentamente divenne ciò  che è conosciuto) as Decadentism, between 1880 and 1890. After this period, in France was replaced by the term “Symbolism”.

Aesthetic Movement: riassunto in inglese

AESTHETICISM AND DECADENCE: SUMMARY

 

Decadentism was characterized by a sort of extremism, because the main traits (i tratti principali) of Aestheticism underwent a process of refinement (subirono un processo di raffinamento) which developed until it got into the absurd, the distasteful (nel cattivo gusto) and the futile. Decadentists felt totally different from the mass and were attracted by the unusual. They found an escape from the reality in their selves with the help of drugs which brought them into the so called “Paradis artificiels” where the illusions replaced reality. 
Decadentists found beauty even in evil and decay, according to the poems of Charles Baudelaire.

Decadentism and Aestheticism: riassunto in inglese

AESTHETICISM OSCAR WILDE

 

Oscar Wilde – Life and Works. Oscar Wilde was born (in 1854) and grew up in Dublin. He studied at first in Trinity College and then, he went to Oxford. He went to London where he had a beautiful social life with party and meeting and he was considered the best talker in London. So he became a popular and eccentric dandy and also a spokesman for the school of “Art for Art’s sake”. He spent several months in Paris where he met Zolà, Balzac, Hugo and Mallarné. In 1881 Wilde published his first volume on “Poems”. In 1882 he gave a lecture tour in America, on his arrival in New York, Wilde said: <>. In 1884  he married Constance Lloyd and had two children.

The Aesthetic movement: riassunto

AESTHETICISM AND DECADENCE: OSCAR WILDE

 

In 1891 he published “The Soul of Man under the Socialism”, the collection of “Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime and Other Stories” and the novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray”. In the spring of 1895 Wilde’s popularity declined because he was accused and arrested for homosexual offences and he was relased in 1897, in this period he wrote his confessions “The Profundis”. So Wilde emigrated to France, where he died in poverty and obscurity in 1900. Hisaestheticism had important influence on the work of others, including Gabriele D’Annunzio in Italy.