Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies

Negation appears in Wilde’s four society comedies in various ways. Prejudiced high-society members emphatically resist the advent of a mixed, open society, a refusal which is tapped for its dramatic potential. Others, mostly outcasts or adventurers, but also inside outsiders, resent society as it is...

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Main Author: Jacqueline Fromonot
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Presses Universitaires de la Méditerranée 2010-12-01
Series:Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/cve/2714
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author Jacqueline Fromonot
author_facet Jacqueline Fromonot
author_sort Jacqueline Fromonot
collection DOAJ
description Negation appears in Wilde’s four society comedies in various ways. Prejudiced high-society members emphatically resist the advent of a mixed, open society, a refusal which is tapped for its dramatic potential. Others, mostly outcasts or adventurers, but also inside outsiders, resent society as it is and bring chaos in this outwardly well-ordered, but basically corrupted and hypocritical cosmos. Their ironical and iconoclastic stances boil down to the polemic negation of values, to arouse laughter but more profoundly to assess their relevance. Negation is thus resorted to with a view to reactivating a consensual subtext, subverting it and questioning its truth value, thus giving more width and scope to these light and apparently superficial comedies.
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record_format Article
series Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens
spelling doaj-art-26747add43214707b09cc458a7dd6ccd2025-01-30T10:21:40ZengPresses Universitaires de la MéditerranéeCahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens0220-56102271-61492010-12-0172213610.4000/cve.2714Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society ComediesJacqueline FromonotNegation appears in Wilde’s four society comedies in various ways. Prejudiced high-society members emphatically resist the advent of a mixed, open society, a refusal which is tapped for its dramatic potential. Others, mostly outcasts or adventurers, but also inside outsiders, resent society as it is and bring chaos in this outwardly well-ordered, but basically corrupted and hypocritical cosmos. Their ironical and iconoclastic stances boil down to the polemic negation of values, to arouse laughter but more profoundly to assess their relevance. Negation is thus resorted to with a view to reactivating a consensual subtext, subverting it and questioning its truth value, thus giving more width and scope to these light and apparently superficial comedies.https://journals.openedition.org/cve/2714
spellingShingle Jacqueline Fromonot
Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens
title Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
title_full Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
title_fullStr Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
title_full_unstemmed Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
title_short Mrs Erlynne, Forms, Functions and Figures of Negation in Oscar Wilde’s Society Comedies
title_sort mrs erlynne forms functions and figures of negation in oscar wilde s society comedies
url https://journals.openedition.org/cve/2714
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