Oscar Wilde wrote.
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde ( 16 October 185430 November 1900 ) was an Irish playwright , novelist , essayist , and poet . After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s , he became one of London 's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s . As a spokesman for aestheticism , he tried his hand at various literary activities : he published a book of poems , lectured in the United States and Canada on the new `` English Renaissance in Art '' , and then returned to London where he worked prolifically as a journalist . He wrote Salome ( 1891 ) in French in Paris but it was refused a licence for England due to the absolute prohibition of Biblical subjects on the English stage . The Importance of Being Earnest , A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is a play by Oscar Wilde .