Oscar Wilde was a writer and renowned conversationalist whose wit, humor, and style made him the toast of London society in the late 1800s. Born in Dublin in 1854, Wilde was raised in an upper-class family. His mother’s interest in literature was something she shared with her son as he grew up. As a young man, Wilde studied classics, or classical studies, at Trinity College, Dublin, and Oxford University. By the 1880s, Wilde was living and writing in London. In his lifetime, he published poetry, essays, short stories, and plays, as well as the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. Wilde’s work and flamboyant personality became representative of the Aestheticism movement. Though married and a father to two sons, Wilde’s sexual orientation gained notoriety and ultimately led him to be imprisoned from 1895 to 1897 due to Victorian laws against “gross indecency,” which effectively criminalized gay relationships. He died of meningitis in 1900.

Wilde’s keen intellect and knack for witty banter shine through in much of his work, including “The Decay of Lying.” He adeptly uses rhetorical devices, wordplay, and allusion to make insightful and humorous observations about behavior, art, style, and literature, and these skills are on display in this essay.