Wilde Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills
Wilde
(wīld), Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills 1854-1900. Irish writer. Renowned as a wit in London literary circles, he achieved recognition with The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), a novel. He also wrote plays of lively dialogue, such as The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), and poetry, including "The Ballad of Reading Gaol" (1898).
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.