IN PERSON: One of the most beloved playwrights in English theater, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) is best remembered for “The Importance of Being Earnest” (1895). This brilliant comedy of manners is subtitled “A Trivial Comedy for Serious People,” which belies the profound subversiveness underlying the epigrammatic wit of Wilde’s play and his comedic sensibility in general. Students in this course will read the five masterpieces of Wilde’s maturity, starting with the Symbolist experiment “Salome,” then moving to the comedies of society “Lady Windermere’s Fan,” “A Woman of No Importance,” and “An Ideal Husband,” and ending with “Earnest.” While historical, theatrical, and biographical (e.g., sexual) contexts and Wilde’s myriad afterlives in contemporary culture will be discussed, like serious people, we will focus on the wisdom at the heart of the plays and the penetrating social, aesthetic, and moral critique that they pose, not to blunt but to better appreciate the razor-sharp edge of Wilde’s wit. | Lecture + Q&A, Facilitated discussion.
Max enrollment: 16.
Location: Judea Reform Congregation, 1933 W. Cornwallis Rd, Durham NC 27705
