Oscar Wilde and Nihilism

Oscar Wilde and Nihilism examines Wilde’s major works in the context of nineteenth-century philosophical nihilism and the Victorian religious unsettlement. The book covers Wilde’s plays, the fairy tales, The Picture of Dorian Gray, the critical writings, and De Profundis to show how Wilde’s thinking about nihilism developed over the course of his career, profoundly influencing the tone and message of his work. Like Nietzsche, Wilde came to regard art as the only effective counterforce to the problem of nihilism, a uniquely consistent source of order and meaning in a godless universe. The book is intended for the general reader with an interest in nihilism, aesthetics, or Wilde, as well as for more specialist scholars. The aim is to provide the reader with the answers of an exceptionally brilliant and original intellect to the most compelling problem in philosophy: how to find meaning and purpose in life.

Colin Cavendish-Jones’s principal research interests are European nihilism, the Victorian religious unsettlement, the Romantic, Aesthetic and Modernist movements, the reception of Classical literature, and the intersection of literature and philosophy, particularly in the nineteenth century. He has written on a variety of nineteenth and early twentieth-century writers, including Pater, Wilde, Trollope, Hardy, Chesterton and Proust, as well as on the reception of Shakespeare in the nineteenth century. Dr. Cavendish-Jones studied Classics at Magdalen College, Oxford and subsequently practiced as an international lawyer in London, Dubai and the U.S.A. After working as a teacher, lecturer, journalist and theatre director in numerous countries throughout Europe, Asia and the Americas, he returned to academia and completed a PhD. in Victorian literature at the University of St. Andrews, focusing on the Aesthetic Movement. He is currently a professor in the Department of English at Xiamen University Malaysia.