Literature · Film · Media · 1854–1900
Born: 16 June 1854 · Died: 30 November 1900 · Age at death: 46
Oscar Wilde died aged 46. He was born on 16 June 1854 and died on 30 November 1900.
Irish playwright and wit who wrote The Importance of Being Earnest and The Picture of Dorian Gray before his imprisonment
Did you know?His final words were famously a joke about the poor quality of the wallpaper in his room.
Oscar Wilde was one of the wittiest writers in the English language, and many of his lines are still quoted daily. His comedy The Importance of Being Earnest is a masterpiece of clever wordplay and gentle mockery of Victorian manners. The Picture of Dorian Gray, the one novel he wrote, explores beauty, vanity and moral corruption. At the height of his fame he was convicted of 'gross indecency' because of his relationships with men and sentenced to two years' hard labour. He has since become a symbol of injustice, and in 2017 he was among thousands posthumously pardoned under the UK's so-called Alan Turing law.
Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900) was an Irish author, poet and playwright. After writing in different literary styles throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular and influential dramatists in London in the early 1890s.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”
“I can resist everything except temptation.”
Profile
Irish writer, born 1854
Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin on 16 June 1854.
He wrote The Picture of Dorian Gray.
His comedy The Importance of Being Earnest premiered in 1895.
He was jailed for gross indecency in 1895.
Career highlights
Did you know?He was posthumously pardoned under 'Turing's Law' in 2017.
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Last reviewed: October 2026