{"id":151714423,"date":"2024-11-19T08:01:57","date_gmt":"2024-11-19T08:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/going-deep-with-de-profundis\/"},"modified":"2024-11-19T08:01:57","modified_gmt":"2024-11-19T08:01:57","slug":"going-deep-with-de-profundis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/zh_hk\/going-deep-with-de-profundis\/","title":{"rendered":"Going Deep with De Profundis"},"content":{"rendered":"

An appreciation of Oscar Wilde <\/h2>

Appreciation begins with understanding.<\/strong><\/p>

I hadn\u2019t appreciated quite to what extent until I visited Madrid\u2019s Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum after reading Laura Cumming\u2019s transcendent memoir Thunderclap.<\/em> <\/p>

She wrote \u2014 lovingly, evocatively \u2014 of lesser-known Dutch painters. When I encountered some of them in the small, warm-lit rooms of the museum it was with a thrill of recognition, even affection. Her words added depths to the two visible dimensions and my appreciation was richer and broader for being better informed.<\/p>

<\/figure>

Informed reading is equally enlightening. Knowing (even a bit) about a writer\u2019s life, context and preoccupations adds texture and meaning; instead of surface, we can savour all that lies beneath. <\/p>

Today, I\u2019ll be leading a brief guided tour through an excerpt from Oscar Wilde\u2019s<\/strong> prison epistle De Profundis <\/a> <\/em>(thanks to Project Gutenberg<\/a> for the online text). <\/p>

My A-Level English Language students study this text, and it is always a delight to pore over. Though Wilde is better known for the spiky wit and coruscating word play of The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere\u2019s Fan, <\/em>etc. De Profundis <\/em>is more affecting and no less a literary gem. <\/p>

To delve into the layers of meaning, we\u2019ll begin with an introduction to its context, then dive into Wilde\u2019s unmistakeable words. <\/p>

(Those of you who follow WTS will know this is the first post of its kind on Write To Success, so please forebear any rough patches). <\/p>

Below is the text that I\u2019ll analyze in the video \u2014 read it yourself first (preferably aloud) to get a feel for its tone and rhythm. <\/p>

\"focus<\/figure>

De Profundis<\/em><\/h1>

I must say to myself that I ruined myself, and that nobody great or small can be ruined except by his own hand.\u00a0 I am quite ready to say so.\u00a0 I am trying to say so, though they may not think it at the present moment.\u00a0 This pitiless indictment I bring without pity against myself.\u00a0 Terrible as was what the world did to me, what I did to myself was far more terrible still.<\/p>

I was a man who stood in symbolic relations to the art and culture of my age.\u00a0 I had realised this for myself at the very dawn of my manhood, and had forced my age to realise it afterwards.\u00a0 Few men hold such a position in their own lifetime, and have it so acknowledged.\u00a0 It is usually discerned, if discerned at all, by the historian, or the critic, long after both the man and his age have passed away.\u00a0 With me it was different.\u00a0 I felt it myself, and made others feel it.\u00a0Byron was a symbolic figure, but his relations were to the passion of his age and its weariness of passion.\u00a0 Mine were to something more noble, more permanent, of more vital issue, of larger scope.<\/p>

The gods had given me almost everything.\u00a0 But I let myself be lured into long spells of senseless and sensual ease.\u00a0 I amused myself with being a fl\u00e2neur<\/em>, a dandy, a man of fashion.\u00a0 I surrounded myself with the smaller natures and the meaner minds.\u00a0 I became the spendthrift of my own genius, and to waste an eternal youth gave me a curious joy.\u00a0 Tired of being on the heights, I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensation.\u00a0 What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion.\u00a0 Desire, at the end, was a malady, or a madness, or both.\u00a0 I grew careless of the lives of others.\u00a0 I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on.\u00a0 I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day to cry aloud on the housetop.\u00a0 I ceased to be lord over myself.\u00a0 I was no longer the captain of my soul, and did not know it.\u00a0 I allowed pleasure to dominate me.\u00a0 I ended in horrible disgrace.\u00a0 There is only one thing for me now, absolute humility. <\/p>

\"quarter<\/source><\/picture><\/div><\/a>
Photo by Jose De Queiroz<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>

I want to get to the point when I shall be able to say quite simply, and without affectation that the two great turning-points in my life were when my father sent me to Oxford, and when society sent me to prison.\u00a0 I will not say that prison is the best thing that could have happened to me: for that phrase would savour of too great bitterness towards myself.\u00a0 I would sooner say, or hear it said of me, that I was so typical a child of my age, that in my perversity, and for that perversity\u2019s sake, I turned the good things of my life to evil, and the evil things of my life to good.<\/p>

What is said, however, by myself or by others, matters little.\u00a0 The important thing, the thing that lies before me, the thing that I have to do, if the brief remainder of my days is not to be maimed, marred, and incomplete, is to absorb into my nature all that has been done to me, to make it part of me, to accept it without complaint, fear, or reluctance.\u00a0 The supreme vice is shallowness.\u00a0 Whatever is realised is right.<\/p><\/blockquote>

Please do share your thoughts on De Profundis<\/em>, and\/or this video, in the comments!<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An appreciation of Oscar Wilde <\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-151714423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nGoing Deep with De Profundis - Write To Success<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/zh_hk\/going-deep-with-de-profundis\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"zh_HK\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Going Deep with De Profundis - 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