so-soI don't read political works. My initial apprehensions aside (due to the title), I was pleasantly surprised that the content didn't deal with political action. It focusses on artists, their individuality and the ideal environment to nurture true art. It zeros in on an artist's soul and deconstructs the inadvertent obstructions set by the society in the journey to self fulfillment. He gives abstract solutions to the crisis.
#OscarWilde
The work explains so eloquently the need to see a person for who he is rather than to measure one by what he has. It was interesting to see how this dominance of possession and assets over personality is shown to be entrenching deeper roots in the society than we first perceive.
#OscarWilde #Individuality
I suppose I never thought about it this way. This is the first non fictional work by Oscar Wilde that I am reading. I am surprised a little because I am more used to the very satirical plays by him.
#oscar #wilde
"The majority of people spoil their lives by an unhealthy and exaggerated altruism—are forced, indeed, so to spoil them. They find themselves surrounded by hideous poverty, by hideous ugliness, by hideous starvation. It is inevitable that they should be strongly moved by all this. The emotions of man are stirred more quickly than man‘s intelligence" - Oscar Wilde
#oscarwilde #man #emotion #intelligence #altruism
For the recognition of private property has really harmed Individualism, and obscured it, by confusing a man with what he possesses. It has led Individualism entirely astray. It has made gain not growth its aim. So that man thought that the important thing was to have, and did not know that the important thing is to be. The true perfection of man lies, not in what man has, but in what man is.
In America the President reigns for four years, and Journalism governs for ever and ever.
so-soFinally finished this book. I died, in translation, I was mostly sleeping through this book. Not bad, but too utopian for my taste.
Off to Carmilla.
#oscarwilde #thesoulofmanundersocialism #bookstagram #ebook
Starting #victober with Oscar Wilde's The Soul of Man under Socialism and I'm a bit disgusted. Hopefully, this is a short read and will be over soon.
#oscarwilde #thesoulofmanundersocialism #kindle #projectgutenberg #ebook #bookstagram
The Soul of a Man Under Socialism: And Other Essays | 
