Oscar Wilde Quotes About Romance

• The very essence of romance is uncertainty.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Relationship, Essence

  Oscar Wilde (2007). “Epigrams of Oscar Wilde”, p.104, Wordsworth Editions

• Romance should never begin with sentiment. It should begin with science and end with a settlement.

  Oscar Wilde

  Romance, Ends, Should

  Oscar Wilde (2007). “Epigrams of Oscar Wilde”, p.104, Wordsworth Editions

• They spoil every romance by trying to make it last forever.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Life, Sex

  Oscar Wilde, Russell Jackson, Joseph Bristow, Ian Small (2000). “The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: The picture of Dorian Gray : the 1890 and 1891 texts”, p.27, Oxford University Press on Demand

• To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Life, Confidence

  "Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young" (1894)

• Men always want to be a woman's first love. That is their clumsy vanity. We women have a more subtle instinct about things.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Inspirational, Men

  "Two Society Comedies".

• I really don't see anything romantic in proposing. It is very romantic to be in love. But there is nothing romantic about a definite proposal. Why, one may be accepted. One usually is, I believe. Then the excitement is all over. The very essence of romance is uncertainty. If ever I get married, I'll certainly try to forget the fact.

  Oscar Wilde

  Believe, Essence, Romance

  Oscar Wilde (2004). “The Best of Oscar Wilde: Selected Plays and Writings”, p.250, Penguin

• Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Funny, Witty

  Oscar Wilde (2007). “The Collected Works of Oscar Wilde”, p.39, Wordsworth Editions

• When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Life, Breakup

  The Picture of Dorian Gray ch. 4 (1891). A very similar statement is found inWilde's playAWoman of No Importance, act 3 (1893).

• He must have a truly romantic nature, for he weeps when there is nothing at all to weep about.

  Oscar Wilde

  Romance, Romanticism

  Oscar Wilde (2012). “The Complete Short Stories of Oscar Wilde”, p.31, Courier Corporation

• Romance should never begin with sentiment. It should begin with science and end with a settlement. Nothing spoils romance so much as a sense of humor in the woman. When one is in love one always begins by deceiving oneself, and one always ends by deceiving others. This is what the world calls a romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Deceiving Others, Romance, World

• While we look to the dramatist to give romance to realism, we ask of the actor to give realism to romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Giving, Romance, Acting

  Oscar Wilde (2014). “A Critic in Pall Mall: Being Extracts from Reviews and Miscellanies”, p.16, Simon and Schuster

• Nothing spoils romance so much as a sense of humor in the woman

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Deceiving Others, Romance

  Oscar Wilde (2014). “Epigrams and Aphorisms”, p.51, BoD – Books on Demand

• Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to make it last forever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only difference between a caprice and a life-long passion is that the caprice lasts a little longer.

  Oscar Wilde

  Passion, Differences, Long

  The Picture of Dorian Gray ch. 2 (1891)

• Twenty years of romance makes a woman look like a ruin; but twenty years of marriage makes her something like a public building.

  Oscar Wilde

  Marriage, Years, Romance

  A Woman of No Importance act 1 (1893)

• Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Love, Funny, Relationship

  Oscar Wilde (2010). “Epigrams & Aphorisms”, p.56, BoD – Books on Demand

• The beautiful, passionate, ruined South, the land of magnolias and music, of roses and romance . . . living on the memory of crushing defeats

  Oscar Wilde

  Beautiful, Crush, Memories

• Romance lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as possible.

  Oscar Wilde

  Life, Art, Passion

  Oscar Wilde, Moira Muldoon (2005). “The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Writings”, p.211, Simon and Schuster

• The worst of having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one so unromantic.

  Oscar Wilde

  Romance, Kind, Worst

  Oscar Wilde (2015). “The Picture of Dorian Gray (Diversion Classics)”, p.17, Diversion Books

• I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will always be in love with love. A grande passion is the privilege of people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes of a country. Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. This is merely the beginning.

  Oscar Wilde

  Country, Passion, Class

  Oscar Wilde (2016). “The picture of Dorian Gray/Le portrait de Dorian Gray”, p.60, Oscar Wilde

• Sometime you will find, even as I have found, that there is no such thing as romantic experience; there are romantic memories, and there is the desire of romance- that is all. Our most fiery moments of ecstasy are merely shadows of what somewhere else we have felt, or of what we long someday to feel

  Oscar Wilde

  Memories, Somewhere Else, Long

  Oscar Wilde (1969). “The Artist as Critic: Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde”, p.17, University of Chicago Press

• Lo! with a little rod I did but touch the honey of romance — And must I lose a soul's inheritance?

  Oscar Wilde

  Romance, Soul, Inheritance

  Oscar Wilde (2013). “The Artist As Critic: Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde”, p.12, Random House

• Any place you love is the world to you”, explained the pensive Catherine Wheel, who had been attached to an old deal box in early life, and prided herself on her broken heart; “but love is not fashionable any more, the poets have killed it. They wrote so much about that nobody believed them, and I am not surprised. True love suffers, and is silent. I remember myself once- But it is no matter now. Romance is a thing of the past.

  Oscar Wilde

  Heart, Past, Love Is

• Fashion is what one wears oneself. What is unfashionable is what other people wear. Just as vulgarity is simply the conduct of other people. And falsehoods the truths of other people. Other people are quite dreadful. The only possible society is oneself. To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.

  Oscar Wilde

  Fashion, Husband, Vulgarity Is

  "Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young" (1894)

• I had buried my romance in a bed of asphodel.

  Oscar Wilde

  Romance, Bed, Buried

  Oscar Wilde (2015). “The Picture of Dorian Gray (with an Essay by Jules Barbey D'Aurevilly)”, p.65, Mondial

• It is quite true that I have worshipped you with far more romance of feeling than a man usually gives to a friend. Somehow, I had never loved a woman. I suppose I never had time. Perhaps, as Harry says, a really grande passion is the privilege of those who have nothing to do, and that is the use of the idle classes in a country

  Oscar Wilde

  Country, Passion, Men

  Oscar Wilde, Russell Jackson, Joseph Bristow, Ian Small (2000). “The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: The picture of Dorian Gray : the 1890 and 1891 texts”, p.90, Oxford University Press on Demand

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