A Study of Aestheticism in Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales
Abstract: Oscar Wilde is an important writer and representative of the aesthetic movement of the late Victorian period in the nineteenth century. Wilde is chiefly renowned as a novelist and playwright, and in particular for his contribution to the development to the aesthetic movement. Wilde was also a poet and good at writing fairy tales. Wilde wrote nine fairy tales in all. Each of them is a perfect reflection of his aestheticism views. To be both beautiful and educational is the most distinguishing features in his fairy tales.
This thesis is to focus on aestheticism in Oscar Wilde’s nine fairy tales collected in his two books The Happy Prince and Other Stories and The House of Pomegranates. The aestheticism in Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales is mainly embodied in the following aspects: the vocabulary Wilde used in writing the stories, the personality of characters in the stories, the dialogues of the characters or the description of them, and the plot and theme of the stories. This thesis consists of three parts: a brief introduction of aestheticism and the major works of Oscar Wilde; aestheticism in Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales, in which the aestheticism will be examined in two aspects divided by the two books; and a conclusion about the nine fairy tales.
Keywords: aestheticism, beauty, Oscar Wilde, fairy tale
奥斯卡王尔德童话的唯美主义研究
摘 要 奥斯卡·王尔德是十九世纪维多利亚晚期最重要而且最杰出的唯美主义作代表之一。王尔德主要因其唯美主义小说及剧本而闻名于世。他在唯美主义思想的形成和发展过程中也做出了非凡的贡献。除此以外王尔德不仅写诗还创作了童话故事。终其一生，王尔德一共写了九篇童话故事，每一篇都是其唯美主义思想的完美体现。具有教育意义的同时又十分具有美感是王尔德的童话区别于其他童话故事的最显著特征。本文主要论述王尔德两本童话故事集中所收录的九篇童话中的唯美主义思想。该思想主要蕴含于以下几个方面：王尔德童话故事中所采用的词汇、故事中人物的性格和对话、场景及景色描写、故事情节和中心思想。本文共分为三个部分：关于唯美主义思想和王尔德的简单概述、王尔德童话故事中的唯美主义以及九篇童话的概括总结。
关 键 词 唯美主义；奥斯卡·王尔德；童话故事
Contents
Abstract i
摘 要 i
Introduction 1
1. 1 A Brief Introduction of Aestheticism 1
1.2 Oscar Wilde and His Major Works 2
1.3 Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales 3
2 Aestheticism in Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales 5
2.1 The Happy Prince and other Stories 5
2.1.1 A Sketch of the Book 5
2.1.2 Aestheticism in ‘The Happy Prince’ 5
2.1.3 Aestheticism in ‘The Nightingale and the Rose’ 6
2.1.4 Aestheticism in the other three stories 8
2.2 The House of Pomegranates 9
2.2.1 A Sketch of the Book 9
2.2.2 Aestheticism in ‘The Young King’ and ‘The Star-Child’ 10
2.2.3 Aestheticism in ‘The Birthday of the Infanta’ 11
2.2.4 Aestheticism in ‘The Fisherman and His Soul’ 13
3 The Beautiful Sorrow in Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales 13
References 14
Acknowledgements 15
