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Oscar Wilde

Irish poet, playwright, and aesthete (1854-1900)

  • Fame89.3
  • Momentum10.0
  • Global rank#84
Source-basedStable
  • Fame89.3
  • Momentum10.0
  • Global rank#84
  • United Kingdom rank#8
  • Writers rank#15
  • Wikipedia235.5K
Lived 1854–1900, aged 46United Kingdom
United Kingdom flagUnited KingdomIE flagFR flagWritersWriter / Author
  • Wikipedia
    131 languages
    Cross-language footprint
  • Global rank
    #84
    Fame.am leaderboard
  • Era
    1854–1900
    Aged 46
  • Known for
    Dorian Gray
    2009
Summary
Updated 2026-08-13

The man who turned wit into an art form and then watched it fail him in court. Wilde's epigrammatic brilliance made him the toast of Victorian London until a libel suit he filed unraveled into his own prosecution, conviction, and imprisonment for "gross indecency."

Biography

About

Born in Dublin to Anglo-Irish intellectuals, Wilde proved himself an exceptional classicist at Trinity and Oxford, where he absorbed the aestheticism of tutors Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university he moved to London and tried everything — poems, lectures across America on interior decoration, periodical reviews — becoming known as much for flamboyant dress and conversational glitter as for the work itself. At the turn of the 1890s he hit his stride: The Picture of Dorian Gray in 1890, then four society comedies that made him the most successful playwright of late-Victorian London. At…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde
said
A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.
— "", in Blackwood's Magazine (July 1889)
Oscar Wilde
said
All charming people, I fancy, are spoiled. It is the secret of their attraction.
— "The Portrait of Mr. W. H.", Blackwood's Magazine (July 1889)
Oscar Wilde
said
A simile committing suicide is always a depressing spectacle.
— "The Poets' Corner III", The Pall Mall Gazette (30 May 1887)
Oscar Wilde
said
Most modern calendars mar the sweet simplicity of our lives by reminding us that each day that passes is the anniversary of some perfectly uninteresting event.
— "A New Calendar", The Pall Mall Gazette (February 17, 1887)
Oscar Wilde
said
A poet can survive everything but a misprint.
— "The Children of the Poets", The Pall Mall Gazette (October 14, 1886)
via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA
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By the numbers

Score breakdown

The six component signals behind the Fame score, and their ranks across the leaderboards.

Fame
Stable
89.3
Composite of search demand, mentions, audience & graph footprint.
Score components
Momentum10.0
Historical32.5
Now attention37.2
Source confidence75.0
Completeness85.0
Global rank
#84
Country rank
#8
Category rank
#15
Receipts

Sources

  • Wikidata
    wikidata · wikidata.org
    High confidence
  • Wikipedia
    wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org
    High confidence
  • Pantheon 2.0
    database · pantheon.world
    High confidence