The Importance of Being Oscar

I just finished reading The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, and I am just blown away by A) how I made it out of high school and college without reading him, and B) how totally amazing he is. I am in love with the wit of Oscar Wilde:

"I like hearing myself talk. It is one of my greatest pleasures. I often have long conversations all by myself and I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a word of what I'm saying."

"There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love."

"When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others."

"Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious."

And my favorite snarky exchange:

“When America was discovered,” said the Radical member, and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. The Duchess sighed, and exercised her privilege of interruption. “I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!” she exclaimed. “Really, our girls have no chance nowadays. It is most unfair.”

“Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered,” said Mr. Erskine; “I myself would say that it had merely been detected.”

“Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants,” answered the Duchess, vaguely. “I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same.”

“They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris,” chuckled Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour’s cast-off clothes.

“Really! And where do bad Americans go when they die?” inquired the Duchess.

“They go to America,” murmured Lord Henry.