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Love! What is love? It's nothing. It's just a word. It doesn't exist. Only pleasure is important.
Oscar Wilde
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Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote questions the essence of love, suggesting it is merely a concept overshadowed by the pursuit of pleasure.

In this quote, Oscar Wilde provocatively challenges the conventional understanding of love, implying that it lacks substance and holds no real importance. He posits that love is merely a term without true existence, which is ultimately transcended by the experience of pleasure, thus suggesting that seeking enjoyment is the primary objective in life rather than being entangled in the complexities of love.

Themes

LovePleasureExistenceConceptOscar Wilde

In practice

Example use cases

During a discussion on the nature of human emotions, this quote can highlight the debate between love and pleasure.

More from Oscar Wilde

Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
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When one has never heard a man's name in the course of one's life, it speaks volumes for him; he must be quite respectable.
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Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.
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A truth ceases to be true when more than one person believes in it.
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His morality is all sympathy, just what morality should be
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