A Culmination of a Life's Work

When one thinks of Oscar Wilde, normally the first pieces to come to mind are the wildly hilarious play, The Importance of Being Earnest or his only true novel, The Picture of Dorian Grey. A splendid satire on the ridiculous frivolity of the Victorian upper class and a complex piece describing inner moral conflict, these and many of Wilde's plays, short stories, and poems are not necessarily light-hearted, but are abstractly humorous enough to create a commentary on real social issues that is appeasing to those who would prefer not to be faced solely with the true negativity of the world. With a decades worth of pieces embracing this comedy of manners, it would logically be expected that the final culmination of Wilde's life's work would be a masterpiece of satiric humor or complex story line, full of deep metaphors and allusions that leave no social flaw criticized. In actuality, the final product is not a comedic masterpieces that would rival Voltaire or a suspenseful drama, but rather something quite the opposite: a master thesis that both reflects and predicts the social aspects of life and the importance of staying true to one's ideals.

This piece, known as De Profundis, is not a riveting four act play, but rather a solemn, regretful letter addressed to one Lord Alfred Douglas. It may be known that Oscar Wilde's tastes were not what would be considered mainstream in the height of Victorian England and that these specific preferences would land him in prison for "indecent behavior". While Wilde is now a cultural icon for many minority groups (specifically the LGBT community) as well as for those who favor aestheticism above all else, 19th Century England demanded he serve two years in the dreary Reading Gaol for his ideals, forever altering the rather snarky personality of the Irishman into something more solemn, more profound (hence the title, De Profundis). 

De Profundis reads like a woeful break up letter, addressed to the long lost lover of Wilde, Lord Douglas, or "Bosie". Like any typical airing of grievances, the piece is an endless lists of wrongs that were committed by Wilde's partner both against Wilde directly and against himself, as Wilde accuses him of tainting his ideals with excessive vanity and frivolity. However, coupled with these pages and pages of remorse and love lost come also , in true Wilde fashion, a complex analysis of Wilde's past and how his hardship forever changes his perspective of the world.

While pointing out what seems like an infinite number of wrongdoings, Wilde also describes his own flaws, recounting how he lost his aesthetic ideals throughout his fatal dalliance with Douglas, portraying in great detail the difficulty with which it took him to complete even simple writings with the man around. He criticizes himself on his straying from embracing art for its true beauty and separating it from the trials of a corrupt society. In doing this, Wilde firmly makes the point that had previously appeared in most of his writings: that one must appreciate and separate art to achieve true beauty, that one must value true this beauty above all else, and that vanity is the downfall of those who seek the truly morally beautiful.

Exceptionally raw and well rounded, Wilde's final publication reflects on the progression of his perspective as he goes through struggle after struggle: a personal testimony to sway others from straying from the path of true idealism. De Profundis acts as a near scripture, telling the intended audience of the wrongs committed against him on account of this vainly corrupt society and how, if he had embraced the virtues that he captured in his many works, he would most likely not have been subjected to such a shameful downfall. Truly a culmination is this letter that captures all of Wilde's life views, using his own experiences as the plot, and his own mistakes as the action meant to convey a theme. In this way, Wilde's own life is used similarly to the plots of his plays, showing an audience the evidence proving how a society obsessed with the self will ruin a person morally.

Compared to all of Wilde's previous works, De Profundis takes elements from each, forming a deeply complex analysis of life. It is as extensive of a farewell as an author can give: a beautiful summing up of a life's worth of exploration into the deep world of morally right vs. morally wrong. It isn't happy, light, or warming, and should be explored only when one has a strong, stable mind prepared for an eternity of reflection. However, as morose as it may seem, there are few other pieces of literature so inclusive of all of one author's true ideals and feelings as this letter written by a shamed man from the cold confines of a prison cell manages to achieve.