Oscar Wilde Interviews and Recollections

Volume 1

Also by E. H. Mikhail

The Social and Cultural Setting of the I 8gos John Galsworthy the Dramatist

Comedy and Tragedy Sean O'Casey: A Bibliography of Criticism

A Bibliography of Modern Irish Drama I8gg-I970 Dissertations on Anglo-Irish Drama

The Sting and the Twinkle: Conversations with Sean O'Casey (co-editor with John 0' Riordan)

J. M. Synge: A Bibliography of Criticism Contemporary British Drama I950-I976

J. M. Synge: Interviews and Recollections (editor) W. B. Yeats: Interviews and Recollections (two volumes) (editor)

English Drama I goo- I 950 Lady Gregory: Interviews and Recollections (editor)

Oscar Wilde: An Annotated Bibliography of Criticism A Research Guide to Modern Irish Dramatists

OSCAR WILDE

Interviews and Recollections

Volume I

Edited by

E. H. Mikhail

Selection and editorial matter© E. H. Mikhail 1979 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1979 978-o-333-2.4040-3

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means

without permission

First published 1979 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD

London and Basingstoke Associated companies in Delhi

Dublin Hong Kong Johannesburg Lagos Melbourne New rork Singapore Tokyo

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Oscar Wilde, interviews and recollections Vol. 1

1. Wilde, Oscar I. Mikhail, Edward Halim 828'.8'og PR5823

This book is sold subject to the standard conditions

of the Net Book Agreement

ISBN 978-1-349-03925-8 ISBN 978-1-349-03923-4 (eBook)DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-03923-4

To Isabelle

Contents

Acknowledgements XI

Biographical Table XV

Introduction XIX

INTERVIEWS AND RECOLLECTIONS

Oscar Wilde at Trinity College Dublin Sir Edward Sullivan Memories of Trinity Days Horace Wilkins 2

Oscar Wilde at Magdalen College Oxford Sir David Hunter-Blair

Oscar Wilde: an Oxford Reminiscence W. W. Ward Oscar Wilde at Oxford G. T. Atkinson

3 12

Oscar Wilde at the Divinity Exam Douglas Sladen 21

A Gay Spirit Edgar Jepson 22

Oscar Wilde the Aesthete Francis Gribble 23 The Aesthetic Craze Sir Frank Benson 26 Oscar Wilde's Courage Robert Harborough Sherard 28 Oscar Wilde and Frank Miles Frank Harris 30 Oscar Wilde and the Pre-Raphaelite Movement Mrs]. Comyns

Carr 33 Oscar Wilde before America Violet Hunt 35 Oscar Wilde's Arrival 36 The Theories of a Poet 39 On the Philadelphia Express 42 Oscar Wilde and Whitman 46 Oscar Wilde in Boston Mrs Thomas Bailey Aldrich 48 A Man of Culture Rare 50 Speranza's Gifted Son 53

Vlll CONTENTS

Oscar Wilde in Omaha 58 The Sunflower Poet 59 Oscar Wilde Mary Watson 64 The Apostle of Estheticism Talks Plainly 67 Oscar Wilde in Denver 76 Oscar Wilde in Colorado Mrs J. Comyns Carr 78 Beauty's Great Exponent 79 Oscar Wilde in Montreal 8 I Oscar Wilde: The Arch-Aesthete on Aestheticism 84 Aestheticism's Apostle 86 Oscar Wilde in the West 87 The Apostle of Modern Art 8g The Aesthetic Apostle go Oscar Wilde Talks of Texas gi The Great Esthete 93 Oscar Dear, Oscar Dear! g6 Oscar Wilde in New York Anna, Comtesse de Bremont IOO The Apostle of Beauty in Nova Scotia 105 My Quarrel with Oscar Wilde Sir James Rennell Rodd I I I Oscar Wilde Returns I I 4 My First Meeting with Oscar Wilde Robert Harborough Sherard I I 7 A Dinner with Oscar Wilde Edmond de Goncourt I 2 I Breakfast with Oscar Beverley Nichols I 22 Oscar Wilde in Chelsea Ernest Rhys I 24 Oscar Wilde and Art Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson I 25 Oscar Wilde and his Mother Gertrude Atherton I 26 Memories of Oscar Wilde L. B. Walford I28 At Lady Wilde's Reception Anna, Comtesse de Bremont I33 Oscar Wilde and His Mother Walter T. Spencer I35 Oscar Wilde under the Limelight Katharine Tynan I37 A Kind Man H. M. Swanwick I 39 My Introduction to Oscar Wilde A. H. Cooper-Prichard I42 My First Meeting with Oscar Wilde W. B. Yeats I44 Reminiscences of Oscar Wilde Walter Crane I 50 Memories of Oscar Wilde Arthur Fish I 52 The Reminiscences of a Short Life Herbert Vivian I 54 Oscar Wilde William Rothenstein I 58 A Golden Evening Sir Arthur Conan Doyle I6I

CONTENTS

And So Wilde Came to Lunch Lady Emiry Luryens Recollections of Oscar Wilde Henri de Regnier My First Meeting with Oscar Wilde Jean Joseph-Renaud An English Poet in Paris Jacques Daurelle The Diner-Out A. J. A. Symons Oscar Wilde at the Lyric Club Luther Munday The Unwritten Introduction Frederic Whyte The Dramatist Hesketh Pearson 'That Man Will Be Eaten by Worms' Ernest Rhys Lady Windermere's Fan Anna, Comtesse de Bremont The Censure and Salome 'I Adore Paris' Oscar Wilde Salome Adolphe Rette How Oscar Wilde Dreamed of Salome Gomez Carrillo Oscar Wilde Michael Field Oscar Wilde at The Vale C. J. Holmes My Memories of Oscar Wilde Louise Jopling A Great Poseur Of Oscar Wilde

Constance, Lady Benson W. Graham Robertson

The Beginnings of A Woman of .No Importance Beerbohm Tree

Oscar Wilde Blackmailed Hesketh Pearson A Woman of .No Importance Julia .Neilson The Raconteur A. Hamilton Grant

Sir Herbert

New Views of Mr. Oscar Wilde Percival W. H. A/my The Oscar Wilde Rule Hesketh Pearson 'I Never Walk' Wilfrid Scawen Blunt With Tree at the Haymarket W. H. Leverton An Ideal Husband Gilbert Burgess Haymarket Memories Julia .Neilson Nobody Reads Nowadays Squire Bancroft Mr. Oscar Wilde on Mr. Oscar Wilde

Appendix Oscar Wilde's American Lecture Tour

IX

203 206 208

214 216 219 220 228 235 237 238 239 243 245 246

Acknowledgements

I wish to express my gratitude to Dr Brian F. Tyson who read this work in typescript and made many valuable suggestions. At various stages I also received useful comments, information, support or assistance from Miss Barbara Dickinson, Mrs Jeane Handerek, Mr Montgomery Hyde, Mr Merlin Holland, Professor William A. Armstrong, Mrs Jacqueline McCartin and Mrs Christine Bender.

I am grateful to Miss Bea Ramtej for her patience and skill in typing and preparing the final manuscript; to Mr Tim Farmiloe of Macmillan for his interest and encouragement and to Miss Julia Brittain and her colleagues of the same firm for their help in seeing the book through the press.

Thanks are due to the University of Lethbridge for granting me sabbatical leave to complete this work.

It is also a pleasant duty to record my appreciation to the staff of the University of Lethbridge Library; the British Library, London; the Newspaper Library, Colindale; the National Library oflreland, Dublin; the University of California Library, Los Angeles; the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; the Bodleian Library, Oxford; and the New York Public Library.

The editor and publishers wish to thank the following who have kindly given permission for the use of copyright material:

Adam International Review for the extract from 'And So Wilde Came to Lunch' by Lady Emily Lutyens, published in Vol. XXII, Nos. 241-243 ( 1954); Edward Arnold Ltd for the extracts 'My Quarrel with Oscar Wilde' by Sir James Rennell Rodd from Social and DiploTTUltic Memories I884-18y3 and 'Memories of Oscar Wilde' by L. B. Walford from Memories of Victorian London; Associated Book Publishers Ltd for the extract from An Artist's Reminiscences by Walter Crane, published by Methuen & Co. Ltd; Ernest Benn Ltd and Charles Scribner's Sons for the extracts 'Oscar Wilde at Trinity College Dublin' by Sir Edward Sullivan from Oscar Wilde: The Man- the Artist, the Martyr by Boris Brasol and 'The Aesthetic Craze' by Sir Frank Benson from My Memoirs; Ernest Benn Ltd for the extract 'Oscar Wilde- and Art' by Sir Johnston

xu ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Forbes-Robertson from A Player Under Three Reigns; The Bodley Head for the extract from T wenry Years of my Life by Louise Jopling; The Bodley Head for the extracts 'Oscar Wilde at the Lyric Club' from A Chronicle of Friendships by Luther Munday; 'With Tree at the Haymarket' from Through the Box-Office Window: Memories of Fifty Years at the Haymarket Theatre by W. H. Leverton; and the extract from The Real Oscar Wilde by Robert Harborough Sherard, published by T. Werner Laurie Ltd; Jonathan Cape Ltd on behalf of the Estate of Frederick Whyte for the extract from William Heinemann: A Memoir, Jonathan Clowes Ltd on behalf of the Conan Doyle Estate for the extract 'A Golden Evening' by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle from Memories and Adventures; Constable & Co. Ltd for extracts from T wenry Years of My Life by Douglas Sladen; Crowding Memories by Mrs Thomas Bailey Aldrich; Forry Years in my Bookshop by Walter T. Spencer and Self and Partners by C. J. Holmes; Curtis Brown Ltd on behalf of Beverley Nichols for the extract 'Breakfast with Oscar' from Horizon, VI (Autumn 1964); Curtis Brown Ltd on behalf of the Executors for Gertrude Atherton and Liveright Publishing Corporation, for the extract from Adventures of a .Novelist, by Gertrude Atherton, US Copyright renewed 1959 by Muriel Atherton Russell; J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd and Miss Stella Rhys for the extracts 'Oscar Wilde in Chelsea' from Everyman Remembers and 'That Man Will be Eaten by Worms' from Wales England Wed by Ernest Rhys; The Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, for the extract 'I Never Walk' by Wilfred Scawen Blunt from My Diaries: Being A Personal .Na"ative of Events r888--r914; Victor Gollancz Ltd for the extract 'A Kind Man' by H. M. Swanwick from I Have Been Young; Grove Press Inc., for the extract 'Oscar Wilde and Frank Miles' by Frank Harris from My Life and Loves; Hamish Hamilton Ltd for the extract from Time Was (1931), by W. Graham Robertson; Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc., for the extracts from Oscar Wilde Discovers America by Lloyd Lewis and Henry Justin Smith, copyright renewed 1964 by Kathryn Lewis and Harold P. Smith; Hutchinson Publishing Group Ltd for the extracts from This for Re­membrance by Julia Neilson, The Flurried Years by Violet Hunt and Reminiscences by Mrs J. Comyns Carr; Mills and Boon Ltd for the extract 'Oscar Wilde the Aesthete' by Francis Gribble from The Romance of the Oxford Colleges; John Murray (Publishers) Ltd for the extract from Works and Days- The Diary of Michael Field by T. Sturge Moore; The New York Times for the extract 'The Beginnings of A Woman of .No

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xiii

Importance' by Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree, copyright 1916 by The New York Times Company; Sir John Rothenstein and Michael Rothenstein for the extract 'Oscar Wilde' by Sir William Rothenstein from Men and Memories: Recollections I8Jiri!)OO; The Society of Authors and Miss Pamela Hinkson for the extract 'Oscar Wilde Under the Limelight' by Katharine Tynan from Twenry-Fiveyears: Reminiscences; Miss C. Ward for the extract 'Oscar Wilde: An Oxford Reminiscence' by W. W. Ward from Son of Oscar Wilde; A. P. Watt & Son on behalf of M. B. Yeats and Miss Anne Yeats, and Macmillan Publishing Co. Inc., for the extract 'My first Meeting with Oscar Wilde' from Autobiography by W. B. Yeats. US copyright 1916, 1935 and 1944, 1963 by Bertha Georgie Yeats. A. P. Watt & Son on behalf of Michael Holroyd for the extract from The Life of Oscar Wilde by Hesketh Pearson, published by Macdonald &Jane's Ltd;

Every effort has been made to trace all the copyright holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangement at the first opportunity.

I864-7I I867 I87I-4 I874

I88o

I88I

Biographical Table

I6 October

23 February

October

June I9 April 5July March-April

I8 June

I5 July I9 July 28 November Autumn

August

September ?3oJune 24 December

January-? May

?July

Dr William Wilde marries Jane Fran­cesca Elgee Oscar Wilde born at 2 I Westland Row, Dublin Family moves to I Merrion Square North Dr William Wilde knighted in recog­nition of his services to statistical science At Portora Royal School, Enniskillen Isola Wilde, Oscar's sisrer, dies At Trinity College Dublin Goes up to Magdalen College, Oxford, as Demy Travels in Italy with Mahaffy, his tutor Death of Sir William Wilde First in Mods Visits Greece with Mahaffy, returning via Rome Wins Newdigate Prize with his poem Ravenna Ravenna published in book form First in Greats B.A. degree Takes rooms with Frank Miles at I3 Salisbury Street, London Moves with Miles to Keats House, Tite Street, Chelsea Vera published Poems published Embarks for U.S.A. Lectures in U.S.A. and Canada all the year In Paris, Hotel Voltaire; meets Robert Sherard Moves into rooms at 9 Charles Street, Grosvenor Square

XVI BIOGRAPHICAL TABLE

1885

1886

!888 1889

18go

Aug-Sep Visits New York briefly for production of Vera

24 September

26 November 29 May May-June 1 January sJune

3 November June

May July

2oJune

?June/July 26 January

February

April

2 May July

November Nov-Dec 20 February 26 May June July Aug-Sep

November

22 February 5 March

19 April June-Oct

Begins lecture-tour in U.K., which lasts off and on for a year Engaged to Constance Lloyd Married to Constance Lloyd in London On honeymoon in Paris and Dieppe Moves into 16 Tite Street Cyril Wilde born Meets Robert Ross Vyvyan Wilde born Undertakes editorship of the Woman's World The Happy Prince and other Tales published 'The Portrait of Mr W. H.' published in Blackwood's. Gives up editorship of the Woman's World The Picture of Dorian Gray published m Lippincott's Meets Lord Alfred Douglas The Duchess of Padua produced in New York as Guido Ferranti The Soul of Man under Socialism published in Fortnightly The Picture of Dorian Gray published in book form Intentions published Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories published A House of Pomegranates published Writes Salome in Paris Lady Windermere's Fan produced Limited edition of Poems published Salome banned by Lord Chamberlain Takes cure at Hamburg Writes A Woman of .No Importance in Norfolk Takes a holiday at Babbacombe Cliff, at Torquay. Salome published in French Leaves Babbacombe; engages rooms at the Savoy Hotel, London, and starts living there A Woman of .No Importance produced At The Cottage, Goring-on-Thames

BIOGRAPHICAL TABLE XVII

October

9 November December 9 February

May June

I I June Aug-Sep

9 October October 3 January Jan-Feb I4 February I8 February

28 February

I March 9 March

March 3 April 5 April 6-26 April 24 April

26 April I May 7 May 20 May 25 May

4July 24 September I2 November 20 November

Takes rooms at 10 and I I St James's Place. Writes An Ideal Husband there Lady Windermere's Fan published Goes with Alfred Douglas to Cairo Salome published in English, illustrated by Beardsley In Florence with Douglas The Marquess of Queensberry, Alfred Douglas's father, calls on Wilde at his Tite Street house and, after insulting his host, is expelled The Sphinx published Writes The Importance of Being Earnest at Worthing A Woman of No Importance published At Brighton with Douglas An Ideal Husband produced Visits Algiers with Douglas The Importance of Being Earnest produced The Marquess of Queensberry leaves with the hall porter of the Albemarle Club an insulting visiting card for Wilde Receives Queensberry's card at Albe­marle Club Obtains warrant for Queensberry's arrest Queensberry remanded at Bow Street for trial at Old Bailey Visits Monte Carlo with Douglas Queensberry trial opens Queensberry acquitted. Wilde arrested Imprisoned at Holloway By order of the Sheriff the auction sale of Wilde's belongings at I6 Tite Street takes place First trial opens Jury disagree. New trial ordered Released on bail Second trial opens Sentenced to two years' hard labour and imprisoned (after two days in Newgate) at Pentonville Transferred to Wandsworth Gaol First examination in bankruptcy Second examination in bankruptcy Transferred to Reading Gaol

XVlll BIOGRAPHICAL TABLE

I896 3 February Death of Lady Wilde I 1 February Salome produced in Paris

1897 Jan-March Writes De Profundis 18 May Transferred to Pentonville 19 May Released. Crosses to Dieppe by night boat 26 May Moves from Dieppe to Berneval-sur-Mer 4- 1 1 September At Rouen. Meets Douglas there 15 September Leaves Dieppe for Paris 20 September Arrives at Naples ?1 October Moves to Villa Giudice, Posilippo 15-18 October Visits Capri with Douglas December Visits Sicily

1898 January Moves to 31 Santa Lucia, Naples ?13 February Moves to Hotel de Nice, Paris 13 February The Ballad qf Reading Gaol published c.28 March Moves to Hotel d'Alsace 7 April Death of Constance Wilde in Genoa,

following operation June-July At Nogent-sur-Marne August At Chennevieres-sur-Marne 15 December Leaves for Napoule, near Cannes

1899 February The Importance of Being Earnest published February Leaves Napoule for Nice 25 February Leaves Nice for Gland, Switzerland I April Leaves Gland for Santa Margherita April-May Returns to Paris, Hotel de Ia Neva May Moves to Hotel Marsollier 23-6june At Trouville and Le Havre July An Ideal Husband published july At Chennevieres-sur-Marne August Moves back to Hotel d'Alsace

1900 2-10 April At Palermo 15 May In Rome May Ten days at Gland May-June Returns to Paris 10 October Operated on 30 November Dies in Hotel d'Alsace 3 December Buried in the Cemetery ofBagneux, Paris

1905 23 February De Projundis published 1909 20 july Remains removed to the Cemetery of

Pere Lachaise, Paris.

Introduction

In 1943 Hesketh Pearson mentioned to Bernard Shaw that he wished to write a Life of Oscar Wilde. 'My advice is, very decidedly, Don't,' was Shaw's reply, ' ... Harris, Ransome and Sherard have gleaned that field .... There is nothing more to be said that is of any interest.' 1 Shaw, however, was wrong; the large output ofbooks on Wilde shows little sign of diminishing, and a new generation continues to be fascinated by the man's psychological peculiarities and by his paradoxes and epigrams. With the appearance of Wilde's Letters in 1 g62, students of his writings now possess an assuredly reliable body of facts on which a reassessment of his work can be based. All the critical evaluations of his achievement vitiate themselves in accepting biased popular judgements of the writer's personality. In recent years, however, Wilde's stature has undergone novel if not radical alteration. W. H. Auden and Richard EHmann have devoted long serious commentaries to his personality and his literary achievement, and the reader is encouraged to examine the writings in order to determine their significance in the light of contemporary literary appreciation.

Yet with the hundreds of studies that exist, not enough attention seems to have been given to Wilde as a conversationalist- the important quality upon which his whole dramatic career was based when George Alexander, the actor-manager of the St James's Theatre, having listened to him spellbound at a dinner party, commissioned him to write a social comedy. Wilde's personality pervaded all he wrote. His comedies have what merit they possess from being now an imitation, now a record, of his talk. According to Walter Pater, 'There is always something of an excellent talker about the writings of Mr. Oscar Wilde.' 2 Andre Gide reported Wilde as saying: 'Voulez-vous savoir le grand drame de rna vie? C'est que j'ai mis mon genie dans rna vie; je n'ai mis que mon talent dans mes oeuvres.' 3 In a letter to a friend Wilde himself described The Picture rif Dorian Gray as being 'rather like my own life- all conversation and no action', 4 and nobody who heard his conversation ever doubted the truth of the remark. Bernard Shaw said that 'Wilde was incomparably great as a raconteur, conversationalist, and a personality.' Max Beerbohm found him 'the most spontaneous and yet the most polished' of the masters of table­talk. To Laurence Housman, Wilde was 'the best talker I have ever met'; to W. B. Yeats, 'the greatest talker of his time'; and to William Rothenstein, 'an unique talker and story-teller'. George Moore, who

XX INTRODUCTION

loathed him, after hearing him hold a table entranced for several hours at a dinner given to the Princess of Monaco by Frank Harris, had to admit that he had heard nothing in his life like Oscar's conversation, and cursed himself for having allowed seven years to pass by since their last meeting. Arthur Conan Doyle recalls that Wilde's conversation 'left an indelible impression upon my mind'. Ada Leverson records that Wilde was quicker in repartee and conversation than in his writings, and that he afterwards constantly made use in his work of things he had improvised. Princess Ouroussoff, who gave large dinner parties in her flat in Paris, declared, after listening to one of Wilde's fables, that she clearly saw an aura around his head. The British Ambassador in Paris, Lord Lytton ('Owen Meredith'), was consoled in his last days by Wilde, who was the sole person outside Lytton's family whom he wished to see.

Wilde's ability as a conversationalist was certainly inherited from his parents. Seldom can there have been such an ill-assorted couple; the husband debauched and almost deformed, the wife idealistic and statuesque. But whatever the future difficulties of their marriage, because of their shared curiosity in people and books and their love of conversation, it can be said that their marriage was a success and that they were never bored in each other's company. When Wilde entered Portora Royal School, the children crowded round this large boy who charmed them even at that early age, as he was to charm others all his life, by the rarest of gifts, being able to give an extraordinary quality to the events of everyday life. During his three years at Trinity College Dublin, Oscar's con­versation, at times impetuous and a little vulgar, became polished by practice with Mahaffy, the supreme exponent of the art. At Oxford, there was a group of athletes who looked with jaundiced eyes on Oscar's eccentric clothes: it had reached their ears too that he boasted of spending all his allowance on collecting china; this incited them to organise a 'rag', one of the traditions of the University. The bullies decided to smash the incipient collection into small pieces. They were unlucky. Oscar seized the strongest of them and flung him on top of the gang who were on the stairs outside waiting for the signal to start the vandalism. 'And now,' said Oscar, 'give me the pleasure of tasting a bottle of excellent brandy.' The party ended at dawn with the athletes sitting at Oscar's feet listening to his stories, like the animals enchanted by the music of Orpheus. When Lord Ronald Gower became bored, having always had everything he could possibly want, Oscar succeeded in amusing him for hours on end. He would often go to Oscar's rooms in Magdalen and, when Oscar was in London, they attended exhibitions together or went to listen to a popular preacher, or to visit music halls.

Oscar said, 'No man has any real success in this world unless he has got women to back him, and women rule Society.' It was true enough that when Oscar graduated Queen Victoria ruled the Empire, and about a dozen women, whom Oscar determined to get to know, led the most

INTRODUCTION xxi

imposing Society in Europe. These women were bored, surrounded by over-well-mannered husbands or lovers; they were bored by interminable Court functions and ever more magnificent dinner parties; they were bored at the Opera where for the twentieth time they had to listen to Patti; they were still more bored in the country, reduced to the company of the hunting set and their dogs. Oscar had the power, with his gaiety and his imagination unhampered by the slightest modesty, to rescue people from their boredom and under a veneer of morality to lead them into a constant routine of amusement. 'To get in to Society nowadays one has either to feed people or shock people- that is all,' asserted Oscar, and the method that he adopted was the latter- the feeding he could not afford. His paradoxes and affectations for which he had been well known at Oxford now opened the doors of drawing-rooms for him and, better still, those of country houses.

There is no question that Wilde was at his best not in the written but in the spoken word. Nothing at all resembling his conversation had been heard before. The great talkers of the past were more limited in their appeal, too anxious to appropriate the conversation and steer it in the direction of their choice, and most of them were accused of grave social defects by someone or other. Dean Swift was caustic and inclined to be quarrelsome; Doctor Johnson was dogmatic and occasionally shouted people down; Coleridge was a pure monologist, unadaptable, and without humour; Macaulay was too informative and self-assertive; Carlyle was verbose and denunciatory. Wilde's sole equal in the art of entertaining was Sydney Smith, the most spontaneously witty and amusing talker on record, who never bored his listeners, never preached, and never monopolised the conversation. But he had neither the poetry, nor the profundity of Wilde, whose humour, which glistened with wit, played around every subject so happily and continuously that people would sit listening to him, spellbound, oblivious of time. Unfortunately for us, it was all so enjoyable that no one was capable of recording what Nellie Melba, recollecting Wilde in her autobiography, called 'that brilliant fiery­coloured chain of words' .5

It is my intention to restore the true perspective of Wilde's career, to revive the conversationalist, to re-create him first and foremost as a genial wit and humorist. The present volume includes all the interviews Wilde gave, as well as all the recollections of those who knew him. Some of these interviews have never seen the light since their first publication over ninety years ago in obscure, inaccessible, and widely scattered periodicals. Others were published only in foreign languages and have their first appearance in English here. The contributions range in time from Wilde's youth at Oxford to the ultimate decline of his health and fortune in Paris. Wilde knew the social e1ite- Pater, Ruskin, Whistler, Gladstone; encouraged the young writers of his day-Shaw, Yeats, Beerbohm; and met the eminent literary figures wherever he went- Whitman in the United States; and Mallarme, Louys, Gide, and De Goncourt in France. In addition to the

XXll INTRODUCTION

men of letters, however, the contributors include actors and actresses, stage managers, aristocrats, politicians, publishers, journalists, personal friends, and even the warder and the chaplain at Wilde's prison, as well as the proprietor of the hotel in which he died.

In the preparation of this work I encountered a few difficulties. First, most existing studies ofWilde are not satisfactory sources of interviews and recollections. Hesketh Pearson, for example, talking about the banning of Salome in England, says that Wilde 'announced quite seriously in a Paris journal, Le Gaulois, that he intended to become a Frenchman',8 but never gives the exact date, which, however, could be found through a time­consuming process. On the other hand, Stuart Mason, in his authoritative Bibliograplry of Oscar Wilde, was even more elusive when he said: 'In an interview published at the time, the author expressed himself as follows , . .'7 -without ever mentioning where the interview appeared.

The second difficulty was that even after all the interviews and recollections were collected, they had to be carefully verified as many of them were not authentic. Wilde himself was aware of this problem in his lifetime when he wrote to Ernest Dowson from Naples: 'The Neapolitan papers have turned out to be the worst form of American journalism. They fill columns with me, and write interviews of a fictitious character .' 8 And when he was asked by Mary Watson, during his American lecture tour, whether he was pleased at the reporters' interviews he replied, 'I have been quite amused at the ~truggle each of the gentlemen has had to write what I did not say.'9 Similarly, when W. B. Yeats was asked by an interviewer whether he remembered speaking to Gerald Cumberland he answered, 'Yes, I remember saying "good afternoon" to him. A dreadful man, published a lot of interviews which never took place.' 10 Most of those writers of reminiscences of Wilde were only acquainted with him more or less superficially, and many of them practically not at all beyond a mere passing introduction.

On the other hand, even those who knew Wilde well did not record all his conversations. Luther Munday, for example, says in his autobiography: 'I regret now I never made a note at the time of many of his flashes of wit, his brilliant sayings, which went unrecorded.' 11 Among those who were pleased to treat Wilde royally was Serge Diaghilev, a rich and handsome young Russian, who was to bring the Russian Ballet to Europe and who wanted to buy some of Aubrey Beardsley's drawings to reproduce in his review Le monde de !'art. Alas, no one has recorded the conversation between those two great aesthetes. Nor is it known how many country houses Wilde visited because, after the scandal, many of the writers of memoirs deliberately forgot the name of one who had been a magnet to attract fashionable women, when cards were sent with the words 'To meet Mr. Oscar Wilde'.

Furthermore, some reliable writers of recollections, whose memory is not infallible, confused their dates and made some statements that cannot

INTRODUCTION XXlll

stand up under examination. W. B. Yeats, for example, says in Autobi­ographies (p. 1 34) that he 'saw a good deal of Wilde at that time- ... 1887 or 1888 ... [alter] I had published my first book The Wanderings of Usheen.' Obviously Yeats cannot be accurate, because Wanderings was not published until I889. Walter Crane, in An Artist's Reminiscences (pp. 194-5), dates his recollections of Wilde to the. I 873----9 period, while he mentioned The Happy Prince, which appeared in I888. Worse still, Henri Mazel, of the Mercure de France, says that he 'saw him again in I90I ' 12 - one year after Wilde's death.

The verification of all the interviews and recollections included in the present work entailed extensive travel. Several periodicals had to be examined at the British Library, London; the Newspaper Library, Colindale; and the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. I also had access to 'The Robert Ross Memorial Collection' at the Bodleian Library, Oxford; 'The Library of William Andrews Clark, Jr.: Wilde and Wildeana' at the University of California, Los Angeles; the Katherine S. Dreier Collection ofWilde at Yale University; the Arents Tobacco Collection ofWilde at the New York Public Library; and the Wilde manuscripts at the British Museum.

These difficulties, however, were worth surmounting, and I do hope that the present work will be of some interest to both scholars and general readers. In years to come, people reading his works will want to know more about Wilde the man than the evil tradition which his name formerly evoked.

E. H. MIKHAIL

NOTES

I. Hesketh Pearson, The Life of Oscar Wilde (London: Methuen, 1946) p. 1. 2. Walter Pater, 'A Novel by Mr. Oscar Wilde,' The Bookman (London), 1 (Nov

I8gi), 59-61. 3· 'Would you like to know the great drama of my life? It is that I have put my

genius into my life- I have put only my talent into my works.' 4· The Letters of Oscar Wilde, ed. Rupert Hart-Davis (London: Rupert Hart­

Davis, 1962) p. 255· 5· Nellie Melba, Melodies and Memories (London: Thornton Butterworth, 1925)

PP· 74-5· 6. Hesketh Pearson, op. cit., p. 228. 7· Stuart Mason, Bibliography of Oscar Wilde (London: T. Werner Laurie, I9I4)

P· 370. 8. The Letters of Oscar Wilde, op. cit., p. 656. g. Mary Watson, People I Have Met (San Francisco: Francis, Valentine, 18go) p.

so. 10. Nancy Pyper, 'Four O'Clock Tea with W. B. Yeats', Musical Life and Arts

(Winnipeg, Manitoba) (I Dec I924), pp. 161-5.

XXIV INTRODUCTION

11. Luther Munday, A Chronicle of Friendships (London: T. Werner Laurie, 1912)

P· 96. 12. Henri Maze!, 'My Recollections of Oscar Wilde', Everyman (London), 1, no. 1

(18 Oct 1912) 14.