Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was one of the most famous Irish writers of the nineteenth century, the author of the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, the plays The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere’s Fan and numerous short stories and essays. An important stage in his development came during his years of study at Oxford University, where Wilde spent four years, from 1874 to 1878. It was here that he not only continued his serious study of classical literature, history and philosophy, but also began to develop his own aesthetic worldview and gained his first wide literary recognition.
Oscar Wilde was born in 1854 in Dublin. His father was the famous Irish surgeon William Robert Wills Wilde, and his mother was the writer Jane Wilde, known under the pseudonym Speranza. Before entering Oxford, Wilde had already received a serious classical education. He studied at Trinity College Dublin, where he studied classical subjects. His results were particularly strong in the study of Ancient Greek and classical literature. It was after studying at Trinity College that Wilde entered Magdalen College at Oxford in 1874. At Magdalen College Wilde studied under the Literae Humaniores programme, traditionally called Greats. This was one of Oxford’s main humanities programmes, focused on classical literature, ancient history and philosophy. Surviving student records demonstrate that Wilde devoted considerable attention to his studies. His philosophical notes are particularly important. Researcher Joseph Bristow in an academic study by Oxford University Press analyses Wilde’s so-called «Philosophy notebook», a notebook of approximately 350 pages that contains his notes while preparing for the Greats final examinations. In it Wilde worked with the works of Aristotle, John Stuart Mill, Alexander Bain and other philosophers. In 1878, in his final year of study, Wilde received the Newdigate Prize, a university award for English-language poetry. He won with the poem Ravenna, dedicated to the Italian city of the same name. The poem consists of 332 lines. In November 1875, his poem A Chorus of Cloud Maidens was published in the Dublin University Magazine. This is his earliest known published poem. In the publication he was signed as «Oscar O’F. Wills Wilde, Magdalen College». In 1876, another of his works, The Rose of Love, appeared in the magazine Kottabos.
The Oxford period was one of the key stages in the formation of Oscar Wilde. Here he received a thorough education in classical literature, history and philosophy, expanded his intellectual interests and began to work actively as a poet. It is especially important that his academic activities and literary interests developed in parallel. On the one hand, he seriously prepared for examinations and achieved a high academic result. On the other hand, already during his studies he published poetry and received the Newdigate Prize for Ravenna.
