
The Complete Plays of Oscar Wilde (Annotated)
Enriched Edition. Vera, The Duchess of Padua, Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, Salomé, An Ideal Husband, For Love of the King, The Decay of Lying…By Oscar WildeLength25h 33m
About this audiobook
The Complete Plays of Oscar Wilde gathers the dramatic works through which Wilde transformed the late-Victorian stage: the glittering society comedies Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and The Importance of Being Earnest, alongside the symbolist tragedy Salome and earlier dramatic experiments. These plays combine epigrammatic brilliance, social satire, and formal elegance, exposing the hypocrisies of respectability while delighting in paradox, artifice, and theatrical wit. Situated between Victorian melodrama, French decadence, and modern comedy of manners, they remain central to fin-de-siècle literature. Oscar Wilde, Irish-born classicist, critic, aesthete, and public provocateur, brought to drama a mind shaped by Oxford learning, continental art theory, and a lifelong fascination with masks, performance, and moral doubleness. His own navigation of fame, scandal, and social constraint informs the plays' recurring tensions between public virtue and private desire, sincerity and pose, law and imagination. This collection is indispensable for readers interested in theatre, literary modernity, or the anatomy of social convention. Wilde's plays reward both performance and close reading, offering comedy of dazzling surface and enduring intellectual depth.
This enriched edition has been carefully crafted to add value to your reading experience.
- A comprehensive Introduction outlines these selected works' unifying features, themes, or stylistic evolutions.
- The Author Biography highlights personal milestones and literary influences that shape the entire body of writing.
- A Historical Context section situates the works in their broader era—social currents, cultural trends, and key events that underpin their creation.
- A concise Synopsis (Selection) offers an accessible overview of the included texts, helping readers navigate plotlines and main ideas without revealing critical twists.
- A unified Analysis examines recurring motifs and stylistic hallmarks across the collection, tying the stories together while spotlighting the different work's strengths.
- Reflection questions inspire deeper contemplation of the author's overarching message, inviting readers to draw connections among different texts and relate them to modern contexts.
- Lastly, our hand‐picked Memorable Quotes distill pivotal lines and turning points, serving as touchstones for the collection's central themes.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 4.5 (2.2K)
Includes Amazon, Goodreads, LibraryThing, StoryGraph
GenreLiterary Classics
Length25 hrs 33 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateJun 5, 2019
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1The Complete Plays of Oscar Wilde (Annotated)
26ACT TWO
2Introduction
27ACT THREE
3Author Biography
28ACT FOUR
4Historical Context
29A Woman of No Importance
5Synopsis (Selection)
30THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY
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6The Plays
31ACT ONE
7Vera
32ACT TWO
8PERSONS IN THE PROLOGUE.
33ACT THREE
9PERSONS IN THE PLAY.
34ACT FOUR
10PROLOGUE.
35Salomé
11ACT I.
36Salome (English version)
12ACT II.
37An Ideal Husband
13ACT III.
38THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY
14ACT IV.
39ACT ONE
15The Duchess of Padua
40SECOND ACT
16THE DUCHESS OF PADUA
41THIRD ACT
17THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY
42FOURTH ACT
18ACT I
43The Importance of Being Earnest
19ACT II
44THE PERSONS IN THE PLAY
20ACT III
45ACT ONE
21ACT IV
46ACT TWO
22ACT V
47ACT THREE
23Lady Windermere’s Fan
48La Sainte Courtisane
24THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY
49A Florentine Tragedy
25ACT ONE
50For Love of the King