身為後維多利亞時期的爭議性人物，王爾德宣稱藝術無關道德、非關實用、更不應迎合任何的威權或正典；他的「為藝術而藝術」強調所有的藝術都沒有實際用處，而且美的本質就是美。然而，若藝術誠如王爾德言，如此無用且無意義，我們該如何來檢視王爾德的文學地位，以及「為藝術而藝術」的社會價值？當大部分的現代批評家試圖將王爾德定位成無關社會和政治的藝術家時，本篇論文將試圖重回維多利亞美學運動，找出其自由文化精神，並以此探索王爾德美學的社會和政治重要性。換句話說，本篇論文將承繼，如琳達道林(Linda Dowling)和偉恩湯瑪士(Wayne Thomas)對於維多利亞美學的研究觀點，以自由文化為出發點，試圖重新脈絡化王爾德的美學，找出其社會和政治上的關連性。
在維多利亞美學運動中，約翰羅斯金(John Ruskin)提倡藝術應展現神聖且道德的內涵，並且要有倫理的教育性；而沃爾特佩特(Walter Pater)則強調個人對藝術和美的接收與感知，進而將藝術視為感官經驗的陶冶。但本論文研究發現，王爾德洞察了維多利亞美學內存的問題，因而用不同的方式呈現出真正的美學自由精神。無關道德、非關實用、抵抗威權等美學主張，成為王爾德自由美學，來抗斥以道德/常規化為出發點的美學社會功能。在此新歷史脈絡之下，本論文會將王爾德美學視為一個文化標誌，並探索此文化標誌的意義以及文學再現。
正文第二章「無用之大用」將會分析無關道德和非關實用的議題，探討王爾德美學在維多利亞新教主義與資本主義中的意義建構，本章將使用三篇王爾德的作品來探討王爾德對於維多利亞現代氛圍的批判態度。第三章「美學中的酷異身體」將處理抵抗威權的議題，從維多利亞的新興社會主義出發，延伸到資本主義的常規化力量，研究王爾德如何在他的評論和文學作品中呈現他的反思與反抗。本章將指出王爾德的抵抗式美學建構於他對中產身體的酷異改寫，以及在維多利亞英國中，挑戰所謂「正常」的社會控制與群眾期待；本章也會使用王爾德三篇作品來呈現上述的酷異化美學。第四章結論將會總結以上各章的重點，以王爾德的美學、性意識、和社會關聯性為基礎，呈現出一個較為完整的藝術家王爾德；本章將會論述王爾德自由美學是潛在的抵抗政治，以反本質論的出發點來解構道德/常規化的維多利亞邏輯中心論；在此背景中，王爾德不僅是社會次/反抗文化的殉道者，也是藝術與思想自由的倡議者。

Being a controversial figure in the late Victorian period, Oscar Wilde claims that art should not be about morality and utility, nor should it conform to any authority. Wilde’s art for art’s sake is thus self-defined as that all arts are useless and beauty means only beauty. However, if art is really useless and meaningless, how do we locate Wilde’s literary significance in his art for art’s sake? While many modern scholars who study Wilde’s aesthetics contend that Wilde is an asocial and apolitical artist, this thesis attempts to locate his social and political significance by retrieving the liberal spirit in the aesthetic movement of the Victorian period. In other words, this thesis will go back to the Victorian liberal culture itself and joins in the academic studies, as presented by Linda Dowling and David Thomas, to re-contextualize and re-examine Wilde’s aesthetics in a liberal sense.
While, in this aesthetic movement, John Ruskin proposes that art should be about divine moral order and educational in terms of ethics and Walter Pater contends that art is about individual perception of beauty and a cultivation of sensational experience, this thesis detects that Wilde realizes the intrinsic predicaments in the movement and therefore takes a different path to carry out genuine liberal spirit. His aesthetic claims of amorality, autility, and anti-authority thus become Wildean liberal aesthetics to resist the moral/normal claim of aesthetic social function. In this new-historicist framework, I will read Wilde’s aesthetics as a cultural sign and explore its meanings along with his literary representations.
Chapter two, “Useless Art as Liberating Art,” will focus on the issue of amorality and autility as constructed against the backdrop of Victorian evangelicalism and capitalism. Three of Wilde’s literary representations will be utilized to exemplify his critical stance against this cultural silhouette. Chapter three, “A Queer Body in Aesthetics,” will tackle the issue of anti-authority, set in Victorian fledgling socialism and presented in Wilde’s critical writings and literary works. I will argue that Wilde’s resistant aesthetics consists in his queer rewriting of the bourgeois body and his challenge against the normal in contrast to the social control and public opinion in the Victorian England. Three of Wilde’s literary works will also be scrutinized in detail to elucidate Wilde’s queering attempt. The concluding chapter will integrate the previous main points and render a more complete Wilde on the basis of his aesthetics, sexuality, and social involvement. I will conclude that Wildean liberal aesthetics could be a potential politics of resistance which exerts its anti-essentialist perspective to confound a coerced Victorian logocentrism, and in this scenario, Wilde is not only a martyr of social sub/counter-culture but also a promoter of artistic and intellectual freedom.

Table of Contents
Chapter One Introduction…………………………………………………… 1
Chapter Two
Useless Art as Liberating Art…………………………… 20
Chapter Three
A Queer Body in Aesthetics……………………………… 47
Chapter Four
Conclusion.…………………………………………………… 80
Works Cited ………………………………………………………………… 87

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