OSCAR WILDE
This Edition consists of 500 copies.
Fifty copies have been printed on
hand-made paper.
[Illustration: 'HOW UTTER.']
Oscar Wilde
A STUDY
FROM THE FRENCH OF
ANDRÉ GIDE
WITH INTRODUCTION, NOTES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY
BY
STUART MASON
Oxford
THE HOLYWELL PRESS
MCMV
* * * * *
TO
DONALD BRUCE WALLACE,
OF NEW YORK,
IN MEMORY OF A VISIT LAST SUMMER TO
BAGNEUX CEMETERY,
A PILGRIMAGE OF LOVE WHEN WE
WATERED WITH OUR TEARS THE ROSES AND LILIES
WITH WHICH WE COVERED
THE POET'S GRAVE.
Oxford,
September, 1905.
[The little poem on the opposite page first saw the light in the pages
of the _Dublin University Magazine_ for September, 1876. It has not
been reprinted since. The Greek quotation is taken from the _Agamemnon_
of Æschylos, l. 120. ]
Αἴλινον, αἴινον εἰπὲ,
Τὸ δ᾽ ευ̉ νικάτω
O well for him who lives at ease
With garnered gold in wide domain,
Nor heeds the plashing of the rain,
The crashing down of forest trees.
O well for him who ne'er hath known
The travail of the hungry years,
A father grey with grief and tears,
A mother weeping all alone.
But well for him whose feet hath trod
The weary road of toil and strife,
Yet from the sorrows of his life
Builds ladders to be nearer God.
Oscar F. O'F. Wills Wilde.
_S. M. Magdalen College,_
_Oxford._
NOTE.
M. Gide's Study of Mr. Oscar Wilde (perhaps the best account yet
written of the poet's latter days) appeared first in _L'Ermitage_, a
monthly literary review, in June, 1902. It was afterwards reprinted
with some few slight alterations in a volume of critical essays,
entitled _Prétextes_, by M. Gide. It is now published in English for
the first time, by special arrangement with the author.
S. M.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Poem by Oscar Wilde .................................... xi
Introductory ........................................... 1
Inscription on Oscar Wilde's Tombstone ................. 11
Letters from M. André Gide ............................. 12
Oscar Wilde: from the French of André Gide ............. 15
Sonnet 'To Oscar Wilde,' by Augustus M. Moore .......... 89
List of Published Writings of Oscar Wilde .............. 93
Bibliographical Notes on The English Editions .......... 107
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
Cartoon: 'How Utter' .......................... Frontispiece
(From a Cartoon published by Messrs. Shrimpton at
Oxford about 1880. By permission of Mr. Hubert
Giles, 23 Broad St., Oxford).
Oscar Wilde at Oxford, 1878 ............................ 16
(By permission of Mr. Hubert Giles).
Oscar Wilde in 1893 .................................... 48
(From a Photograph by Messrs. Gillman & Co., Oxford).
The Grave at Bagneux ................................... 80
(By permission of the Proprietors of _The Sphere_
and _The Tatler_).
Reduced Facsimile of the Cover of _'The Woman's World'_ 96
* * * * *
Oscar Wilde
Introductory.
Oscar Fingall O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was born at 1 Merrion Square,
North, Dublin, on October 16th, 1854. He was the second son of Sir
William Robert Wilde, Knight, a celebrated surgeon who was President
of the Irish Academy and Chairman of the Census Committee. Sir William
Wilde was born in 1799, and died at the age of seventy-seven years.
Oscar Wilde's mother was Jane Francesca, daughter of Archdeacon Elgee.
She was born in 1826, and married in 1851. She became famous in
literary circles under the pen-names of 'Speranza' and 'John Fenshawe
Ellis,' among her published writings being _Driftwood from Scandinavia_
(1884), _Legends of Ireland_ (1886), and _Social Studies_ (1893). Lady
Wilde died at her residence in Chelsea on February 3rd, 1896[1].
Oscar Wilde received his early education at Portora Royal School,
Enniskillen, which he entered in 1864 at the age of nine years. Here he
remained for seven years, and, winning a Royal scholarship, he entered
Trinity College, Dublin, on October 19th, 1871, being then seventeen
years of age. In the following year he obtained First Class Honours in
Classics in Hilary, Trinity and Michaelmas Terms; he also won the Gold
Medal for Greek[2] and other distinctions. The Trinity College Magazine
_Kottabos_, for the years 1876-9, contains some of his earliest
published poems. In 1874 he obtained a classical scholarship[3], and
went up to Oxford, where, as a demy, he matriculated at Magdalen
College on October 17th, the day after his twentieth birthday. His
career at Oxford was one unbroken success. In Trinity Term (June),
1876, he obtained a First Class in the Honour School of Classical
Moderations (_in literis Græcis et Latinis_), which he followed up two
years later by a similar distinction in 'Greats' or 'Honour Finals'
(_in literis humanioribus_). In this same Trinity Term[4], 1878, he
further distinguished himself by gaining the Sir Roger Newdigate Prize
for English Verse with his poem, 'Ravenna[5],' which he recited at
the Encænia or Annual Commemoration of Benefactors in the Sheldonian
Theatre on June 26th. He proceeded to the degree of B. A. in the
following term[6]. He is described in Foster's _Alumni Oxonienses_ as a
'Professor of Æsthetics and Art critic.'
He afterwards lectured on Art in America[7], 1882, and in the provinces
on his return to England. About this time he wrote his poems, _The
Sphinx_ and _The Harlot's House_ (1883), and his tragedy in blank
verse, _The Duchess of Padua_. The latter was written specially for
Miss Mary Anderson, but she did not produce it. This was, however,
played in America by the late Lawrence Barrett in 1883, as was also
another play in blank verse, entitled _Vera, or the Nihilists_, during
the previous year. He had already published in America and England a
volume of _Poems_, which went through several editions in a few months.
In 1884 Oscar Wilde married[8] Miss Constance Mary Lloyd, a daughter
of the well-known Q. C., by whom he had two sons, born in June, 1885,
and November, 1886, respectively. Mrs. Wilde died in 1898, and his only
brother, William, in March of the following year.
During the next five or six years after his marriage, articles
from his pen appeared in several of the leading reviews, notably
'The Portrait of Mr. W. H.' in _Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_ for
July, 1889, and those brilliant essays afterwards incorporated in
_Intentions_, in _The Nineteenth Century_ and _The Fortnightly Review_.
In 1888 he was the editor of a monthly journal called _The Woman's
World_. In July, 1890,_ The Picture of Dorian Gray_ appeared in
_Lippincott's Monthly Magazine_. It was the only novel he ever wrote,
and was published in book form with seven additional chapters in the
following year, and is one of the most remarkable books in the English
language.
With the production and immediate success of _Lady Windermere's Fan_
early in 1892, he was at once recognised as a dramatist of the first
rank. This was followed a year later by _A Woman of No Importance_,
and after brief intervals by _An Ideal Husband_ and _The Importance of
Being Earnest_[9]. The two latter were being played in London at the
time of the author's arrest and trial.
Into the melancholy story of his trial it is not proposed to enter here
beyond mentioning the fact that he was condemned by the newspapers,
and, consequently, by the vast majority of the British public, several
weeks before a jury could be found to return a verdict of 'guilty.' On
Saturday, May 25th, 1895, he was sentenced to two years' imprisonment
with hard labour, most of which period was passed at Wandsworth and
Reading.
On his release from Reading on Wednesday, May 19th, 1897, he at once
crossed to France with friends, and a few days later penned that
pathetic letter, pregnant with pity, in which he pleaded for the
kindlier treatment of little children lying in our English gaols. This
letter, with his own name attached, filled over two columns in _The
Daily Chronicle_ of May 28th. It created considerable sensation--a
well-known Catholic weekly comparing it 'in its crushing power to the
letter with which Stevenson shamed the shameless traducer of Father
Damien.' A second letter on the subject of the cruelties of the English
Prison system appeared in the same paper on March 24th, 1898. It was
headed: 'Don't Read This if You Want to be Happy To-day,' and was
signed 'The Author of _The Ballad of Reading Gaol_.' _The Ballad of
Reading Gaol_ was published early in this same year under the _nom
de plume_ 'C.3.3.,' Oscar Wilde's prison number. Its authorship was
acknowledged shortly afterwards in an autograph edition. Since that
time countless editions of this famous work have been issued in England
and America, and translations have appeared in French, German and
Spanish. Of this poem a reviewer in a London journal said,--'The whole
is awful as the pages of Sophocles. That he has rendered with his
fine art so much of the essence of his life and the life of others in
that _inferno_ to the sensitive, is a memorable thing for the social
scientist, but a much more memorable thing for literature. This is a
simple, a poignant, a great ballad, one of the greatest in the English
language.'
Of the sorrows and sufferings of the last few years of his life, his
friend Mr. Robert Harborough Sherard has written in _The Story of an
Unhappy Friendship_, and M. Gide refers to them in the following pages.
After several weeks of intense suffering 'Death the silent pilot' came
at last, and the most brilliant writer of the nineteenth century passed
away on the afternoon of November 30th, 1900, in poverty and almost
alone. The little hotel in Paris--Hotel d'Alsace, 13 rue des Beaux
Arts,--where he died, has become a place of pilgrimage from all parts
of the world for those who admire his genius or pity his sorrows. He
was buried, three days later, in the cemetery at Bagneux, about four
miles out of Paris.
STUART MASON.
[1] In 1890 Lady Wilde received a pension of £50 from the Civil List.
[2] The subject for this year, 1874, was 'The Fragments of the Greek
Comic Poets, as edited by Meineke.' The medal was presented annually,
from a fund left for the purpose by Bishop Berkeley.
[3] The demyship was of the annual value of £95, and was tenable for
five years. Oscar Wilde's success was announced in the _University
Gazette_ (Oxford), July 11, 1874.
[4] On Wednesday, May 1st, Oscar Wilde, dressed as Prince Rupert, was
present at a fancy dress ball given by Mrs. George Herbert Morrell at
Headington Hill Hall.
[5] 'The Newdigate was listened to with rapt attention and frequently
applauded.'--_Oxford and Cambridge Undergraduates' Journal_, June 27,
1878.
[6] The degree of B. A. was conferred upon him on Thursday, Novemher
28, 1878.
[7] Amongst the places he visited were New York, Louisville (Kentucky),
Omaha City and California. In the autumn of this same year, 1882, after
leaving the States, Mr. Wilde went to Canada and thence to Nova Scotia,
arriving at Halifax about October 8th.
[8] The announcement in _The Times_ of May 31, 1884, was as
follows:--'May 29, at S. James's Church, Paddington, by the Rev. Walter
Abbott, Vicar, Oscar, younger son of the late Sir William Wilde, M. D.,
of Dublin, to Constance Mary, only daughter of the late Horace Lloyd,
Esq., Q. C.'
[9] Of _The Importance of Being Earnest_ the author is reported to have
said, 'The first act is ingenious, the second beautiful, the third
abominably clever.' It was revived by Mr. George Alexander at the St.
James's Theatre on January 7, 1902; and _Lady Windermere's Fan_ on
November 19, 1904.
* * * * *
[Illustration: A cross.]
Oscar Wilde
OCT. 16TH, 1854--NOV. 30TH, 1900.
VERBIS MEIS ADDERE NIHIL AUDEBANT
ET SUPER ILLOS STILLABAT ELOQUIUM
MEUM.
JOB XXIX, 22
R. I. P.
_Inscription on Oscar Wilde's Tombstone._
* * * * *
_Letters from M. André Gide._
I.
CHÂTEAU DE CUVERVILLE,
PAR CRIQUETOT L'ESNEVAL,
SNE. INFERIEURE.
Monsieur,
Quelque plaisir que j'aurai de voir mon étude sur Wilde traduite en
anglais, je ne puis vous répondre avant d'avoir correspondu avec mon
éditeur. L'article en question, après avoir paru dans 'l'Ermitage,'
a été réunie à d'autres études dans un volume, _Prétextes_, que le
_Mercure de France_ édita l'an dernier. Un traité me lie à cette
maison et je ne suis pas libre de décider seul.
Votre lettre a mis quelque temps à me parvenir ici, où pourtant
j'habite. Dès que j'aurai la réponse du _Mercure de France_ je
m'empresserai de vous la faire savoir.
Veuillez croire, Monsieur, à l'assurance de mes meilleurs sentiments.
ANDRÉ GIDE.
_Septembre 9, 1904._
II.
Monsieur,
Je laisse à mon éditeur le soin de vous écrire au sujet des conditions
de la publication en anglais de mon étude..... Je désire, comme je
vous le disais, que la traduction que vous proposez de faire se
reporte au texte donné par le _Mercure de France_ dans mon volume
_Prétextes_, et non à celui, fautif, de 'l'Ermitage.'....
Le texte des contes de Wilde que je cite s'éloigne, ainsi que vous
pouvez le voir, du texte anglais que Wilde lui-même en a donné. Il
importe que ce _texte oral_ reste différent du texte écrit de ces
'poems in prose.' Je crois, si ridicule que cela puisse paraître
d'abord, qu'il faut retraduire en anglais le texte francais que j'en
donne (et que j'ai écrit presque sous la dictée de Wilde) et non pas
citer simplement le texte anglais tel que Wilde le rédigea plus tard.
L'effet en est très différent.
Veuillez croire, Monsieur, à l'assurance de mes sentiments les
meilleurs.
ANDRÉ GIDE.
_Septembre 14th, 1904._
* * * * *
Oscar Wilde
I was at Biskra in December, 1900, when I learned through the
newspapers of the lamentable end of Oscar Wilde. Distance, alas!
prevented me from joining in the meagre procession which followed his
body to the cemetery at Bagneux. It was of no use reproaching myself
that my absence would seem to diminish still further the small number
of friends who remained faithful to him--at least I wanted to write
these few pages at once, but for a considerable period Wilde's name
seemed to become once more the property of the newspapers.
Now that every idle rumour connected with his name, so sadly famous,
is hushed; now that the mob is at last wearied after having praised,
wondered at, and then reviled him, perhaps, a friend may be allowed
to lay, like a wreath on a forsaken grave, these lines of affection,
admiration, and respectful pity.
When the trial, with all its scandal, which so excited the public mind
in England threatened to wreck his life, certain writers and artists
attempted to carry out, in the name of literature and art, a kind of
rescue. It was hoped that by praising the writer the man would be
excused. Unfortunately, there was a misunderstanding here, for it must
be acknowledged that Wilde was not a great writer. The leaden buoy
which was thrown to him helped only to weigh him down; his works, far
from keeping him up, seemed to sink with him. In vain were some hands
stretched out: the torrent of the world overwhelmed him--all was over.
[Illustration: OSCAR WILDE AT OXFORD, 1878.]
It was not possible at that time to think of defending him in any other
way. Instead of trying to shelter the man behind his work, it was
necessary to show forth first the man as an object of admiration--as
I am going to try to do now--and then the work itself illuminated by
his personality. 'I have put all my genius into my life; I have put
only my talent into my works,' said Wilde once. Great writer, no, but
great _viveur_, yes, if one may use the word in the fullest sense of
the French term. Like certain Greek philosophers of old, Wilde did not
write his wisdom, but spoke and lived it, entrusting it rashly to the
fleeting memory of man, thereby writing it as it were on water.
Let those who knew him for a longer time than I did, tell the story of
his life. One of those who listened to him the most eagerly relates
here simply a few personal recollections.
I.
And the mighty nations would have crowned me, who
am crownless now and without name,
And some orient dawn had found me kneeling on the
threshold of the House of Fame.
I.
Those who became acquainted with Wilde only in the latter years of his
life form a wrong conception of the wonderful creature he formerly was,
if they judge from the enfeebled and crushed being given back to us
from prison, as Ernest Lajeunesse paints him, for instance, in the best
or rather the only passable article on the great reprobate which any
one has had the talent or the courage to write[1].
It was in 1891 that I met him for the first time. Wilde had
then what Thackeray calls 'one of the greatest of a great man's
qualities'--success[2]. His manner and his appearance were triumphant.
His success was so assured that it seemed to go in front of him, and
he had only to advance. His books were causing wonder and delight. All
London was soon to rush to see his plays[3]. He was rich, he was great,
he was handsome, he was loaded with happiness and honours.
Some compared him to an Asiatic Bacchus, others to some Roman Emperor,
and others again to Apollo himself,--in short, he was resplendent.
In Paris his name passed from mouth to mouth as soon as he arrived.
Several absurd sayings went round concerning him, as that after all he
was only the man who smoked gold-tipped cigarettes, and walked about
the streets with a sunflower in his hand. For, skilful in misleading
those who are the heralds of earthly fame, Wilde knew how to hide his
real personality behind an amusing phantom, with which he humorously
deluded the public.
I had heard him talked about at Stéphane Mallarmé's house, where he was
described as a brilliant conversationalist, and I expressed a wish to
know him, little hoping that I should ever do so. A happy chance, or
rather a friend, gave me the opportunity, and to him I made known my
desire. Wilde was invited to dinner. It was at a restaurant. We were a
party of four, but three of us were content to listen. Wilde did not
converse--he told tales. During the whole meal he hardly stopped. He
spoke in a slow, musical tone, and his very voice was wonderful. He
knew French almost perfectly, but pretended, now and then, to hesitate
a little for a word to which he wanted to call our attention. He had
scarcely any accent, at least only what it pleased him to affect when
it might give a somewhat new or strange appearance to a word--for
instance, he used purposely to pronounce _scepticisme_ as skepticisme.
The stories he told us without a break that evening were not of his
best. Uncertain of his audience he was testing us, for, in his wisdom,
or perhaps in his folly, he never betrayed himself into saying anything
which he thought would not be to the taste of his hearers; so he doled
out food to each according to his appetite. Those who expected nothing
from him got nothing, or only a little light froth, and as at first
he used to give himself up to the task of amusing, many of those who
thought they knew him will have known him only as the amuser.
When dinner was over we went out. My two friends walking together,
Wilde took me aside and said quite suddenly, 'You hear with your eyes;
that is why I am going to tell you this story.'
He began:--
'When Narcissus died, the Flowers of the Fields were plunged in grief,
and asked the River for drops of water that they might mourn for him.
'"Oh," replied the River, "if all my drops of water were tears, I
should not have enough to weep for Narcissus myself--I loved him."
'"How could you help loving Narcissus?" rejoined the Flowers, "so
beautiful was he."
'"Was he beautiful?" asked the River.
'"And who should know that better than yourself?" said the Flowers,
"for, every day, lying on your bank, he would mirror his own beauty in
your waters."'
Wilde stopped for a moment, and then went on:--
'"If I loved him," replied the River, "it is because when he hung over
my waters I saw the reflection of my waters in his eyes."'
Then Wilde, drawing himself up, added with a strange outburst of
laughter, 'That is called _The Disciple_.'
We had reached his door, and left him. He asked me to meet him again.
During the course of that year and the next I saw him frequently and
everywhere.
* * * * *
In the presence of others, as I have mentioned, Wilde would put on an
air of showing off in order to astonish, or amuse, or even exasperate
people. He never listened to, and scarcely took any notice of an idea
from the moment it was no longer purely his own. When he was no longer
the only one to shine, he would shut himself up, and emerge again
only when one found oneself alone with him once more. But as soon as
we were alone again he would begin, 'Well, what have you been doing
since yesterday?' Now, as at that time my life was passing uneventfully
enough, the telling of what I had been doing was of no interest. So,
to humour him, I began recounting some trifling incidents, and noticed
while I was speaking that Wilde's face was growing gloomy.
'You really did that?' he said.
'Yes,' I answered.
'And you are speaking the truth?'
'Absolutely.'
'Then why repeat it? You must see that it is not of the slightest
importance. You must understand that there are two worlds--the one
exists and is never talked about; it is called the real world because
there is no need to talk about it in order to see it. The other is the
world of Art; one must talk about that, because otherwise it would not
exist.'
Then he went on:--
'Once upon a time there was a man who was beloved in his village
because he used to tell tales. Every morning he left the village, and
when he returned in the evening all the labourers of the village who
had been working all the day would crowd round him and say, "Come,
now, tell us a tale. What have you seen to-day?"
'The man said, "I have seen in the forest a Faun playing on a flute
and making a band of little wood-nymphs dance."
'"Go on with your story; what did you see?" the men would say.
'"When I reached the sea-shore, I saw three mermaids beside the waves,
combing their green hair with golden combs."
'And the villagers loved him because he used to tell them tales.
'One morning he left his village as usual, and when he reached the
sea-shore he saw three mermaids at the water's edge combing their
green hair with golden combs. And as he passed on his way he saw, near
a wood, a Faun playing a flute to a band of wood-nymphs.
'That evening when he returned to his village the people said to him
as they did every evening, "Come, tell us a tale: what have you seen?"
'And the man answered, "I have seen nothing."'
Wilde stopped for a moment to allow the effect of the story to sink
into me, and then he continued, 'I do not like your lips; they are
quite straight, like the lips of a man who has never told a lie. I want
you to learn to lie so that your lips may become beautiful and curved
like the lips of an antique mask.
'Do you know what makes the work of art, and what makes the work of
nature? Do you know what the difference is? For the narcissus is as
beautiful as a work of art, so what distinguishes them cannot be merely
beauty. Do you know what it is that distinguishes them? A work of art
is always unique. Nature, who makes nothing durable, is ever repeating
herself, so that nothing she makes may be lost. A single narcissus
produces many blooms--that is why each one lives but a day. Every time
Nature invents a new form she at once makes a _replica_. A sea-monster
in one sea knows that in another sea there is another monster like
itself. When God creates in history a Nero, a Borgia or a Napoleon
He puts another one on one side. No one knows it, but that does not
matter; the important point is that _one_ may be a success. For God
makes man, and man makes the work of art.'
Forestalling what I was on the point of saying, he proceeded, 'Yes,
I know ... one day a great restlessness fell upon the earth, as if,
at last, Nature was going to create something unique, something quite
unique, and Christ is born on earth. Yes, I know, quite well, but
listen:--
'When Joseph of Arimathæa came down in the evening from Mount Calvary
where Jesus had just died, he saw on a white stone a young man seated
weeping. And Joseph went near to him and said, "I understand how great
thy grief must be, for certainly that Man was a just Man." But the
young man made answer, "Oh, it is not for that that I am weeping. I am
weeping because I, too, have wrought miracles. I also have given sight
to the blind, I have healed the palsied, and I have raised the dead;
I, too, have caused the barren fig-tree to wither away, and I have
turned water into wine. And yet they have not crucified me[4]."'
And that Oscar Wilde was convinced of his representative mission was
made quite clear to me on more than one occasion.
The Gospel disturbed and troubled the pagan Wilde. He could not
forgive it its miracles. The pagan miracle lies in the work of Art;
Christianity encroached on it. Every strong departure from realism in
art demands a realism which is convinced in life. His most ingenious
fables, his most alarming ironies were uttered with a view to confront
the two moralities--I mean, pagan naturalism and Christian idealism,
and to put the latter out of countenance in every respect. This is
another of his stories:--
'When Jesus was minded to return to Nazareth, Nazareth was so changed
that He no longer recognised His own city. The Nazareth where He had
lived was full of lamentations and tears; this city was filled with
outbursts of laughter and song. And Christ entering into the city saw
some slaves laden with flowers, hastening towards the marble staircase
of a house of white marble. Christ entered into the house, and at the
back of a hall of jasper He saw, lying on a purple couch, a man whose
disordered locks were mingled with red roses, and whose lips were
red with wine. Christ drew near to him, and laying His hand on his
shoulder said to him, "Why dost thou lead this life?" The man turned
round, recognized Him and said, "I was a leper once; Thou didst heal
me. Why should I live another life? "
Christ went out of the house, and behold! in the street He saw a woman
whose face and raiment were painted and whose feet were shod with
pearls. And behind her walked a man who wore a cloak of two colours,
and whose eyes were bright with lust. And Christ went up to the man
and laid His hand on his shoulder, and said to him, "Tell Me why art
thou following this woman, and why dost thou look at her in such
wise?" The man turning round recognized Him and said, "I was blind;
Thou didst heal me; what else should I do with my sight?"
'And Christ drew near to the woman and said to her, "This road which
thou art following is the pathway of sin; why follow it?" The woman
recognized Him, and laughing said, "The way which I follow is a
pleasant way, and Thou hast pardoned all my sins."
'Then Christ felt His heart filled with sadness, and He was minded to
leave the city. But as He was going out of it He saw sitting by the
bank of the moat of the city, a young man who was weeping. He drew
near to him, and touching the locks of his hair, said to him, "Friend,
why dost thou weep?" The young man raised his eyes, recognized Him and
made answer, "I was dead and Thou hast raised me to life. What else
should I do with my life?"'
Let me tell this one story more, illustrating one of the strangest
pitfalls into which the imagination can mislead a man, and let any one,
who is able, understand the strange paradox which Wilde here makes use
of:--
'Then there was a great silence in the Judgment Hall of God. And the
Soul of the sinner stood naked before God.
'And God opened the Book of the life of the sinner and said, "Surely
thy life hath been very evil. Thou hast" (there followed a wonderful,
a marvellous list of sins[5]). "Since thou hast done all this, surely
I will send thee to Hell."
'And the man cried out, "Thou canst not send me to Hell."
'And God said to the man, "Wherefore can I not send thee to Hell?"
'And the man made answer and said, "Because in Hell I have always
lived."
'And there was a great silence in the Judgment Hall of God.
'And God spake and said to the man, "Seeing that I may not send thee
to Hell, I am going to send thee to Heaven."
'"Thou canst not send me to Heaven."
'And God said to the man, "Wherefore can I not send thee to Heaven?"
'And the man said, "Because I have never been able to imagine it."
'And there was a great silence in the Judgment Hall of God[6].'
One morning Wilde handed me an article in which a sufficiently dense
critic congratulated him on 'knowing how to write pretty stories in
which the better to clothe his thoughts.'
'They think,' began Wilde, 'that all thoughts come naked to the birth.
They do not understand that I _cannot_ think otherwise than in stories.
The sculptor does not try to reproduce his thoughts in marble; _he
thinks in marble_, straight away. Listen:--
'There was once a man who could think only in bronze. And this man one
day had an idea, an idea of _The Pleasure that Abideth for a Moment_.
And he felt that he must give expression to it. But in the whole world
there was but one single piece of bronze, for men had used it all up.
And this man felt that he would go mad if he did not give expression
to his idea. And he remembered a piece of bronze on the tomb of his
wife, a statue which he had himself fashioned to set on the tomb of
his wife, the only woman he had ever loved. It was the image of _The
Sorrow that Endureth for Ever_. And the man felt that he was becoming
mad, because he could not give expression to his idea. Then he took
this image of Sorrow, of the _Sorrow that endureth for Ever_, and
broke it up and melted it and fashioned of it an Image of Pleasure, of
the _Pleasure that abideth for a Moment_.'
Wilde was a believer in a certain fatality besetting the path of the
artist, and that the _Man_ is at the mercy of the Idea. 'There are,' he
used to say, 'artists of two kinds: some supply answers, and others ask
questions. It is necessary to know if one belongs to those who answer
or to those who ask questions; for the one who asks questions is never
the one who answers them. There are certain works which wait for their
interpretation for a long time. It is because they are giving answers
to questions that have not yet been asked--for the question often comes
a terribly long time after the answer.'
And he added further, 'The soul is born old in the body; it is to
rejuvenate the soul that the body becomes old. Plato is Socrates young
again.'
Then it was three years before I saw him again.
[1] In _La Revue Blanche_.
[2] _Henry Esmond_, Book II, chap. XI. Thackeray puts these words into
the mouth of the famous Mr. Joseph Addison, who continues:--''T is the
result of all the others; 't is a latent power in him which compels the
favour of the gods, and subjugates fortune.'
[3] Oscar Wilde's first play, _Lady Windermere's Fan_, was produced
at the St. James's Theatre on February 20, 1892. This was followed by
_A Woman of No Importance_, April 19, 1893, and _An Ideal Husband_,
January, 3, 1895, at Haymarket; and _The Importance of Being Earnest_,
February 14, 1895, at the St. James's.
[4] This story appeared under the title of 'The Master' with other
Poems in Prose in _The Fortnightly Review_ for July, 1894. Two of them,
'The Disciple' and 'The House of Judgment,' were first published in
_The Spirit Lamp_ in 1893. This was a magazine published at Oxford
under the editorship of Lord Alfred Douglas, who had recently bought it
from the founder and changed its style and form. A complete set of the
fifteen numbers is now exceedingly scarce.
[5] Henri Davray translated these 'Poems in Prose' in _La Revue
Blanche_.
[6] Since Villiers de l'Isle-Adam has betrayed it, every one knows,
alas! the great secret of the Church: _There is no Purgatory!_
II.
I have made my choice, have lived my poems, and
though youth is gone in wasted days,
I have found the lover's crown of myrtle better than
the poet's crown of bays.
II.
Here tragic reminiscences begin.
A persistent rumour, growing louder and louder with the fame of his
successes (in London his plays were being acted in no less than three
different theatres at the same time[1]), attributed to Wilde strange
habits, on hearing of which, some people tempered their indignation
with a smile, while others were not in the least indignant. It was
claimed, moreover, as regards these alleged habits, that he concealed
them little, and often on the other hand paraded them--some said
courageously, others out of cynicism, and others for a pose. I was
filled with astonishment when I heard these rumours. In no way, all the
time that I had been intimate with him, had he given me the slightest
ground for suspicion. But already out of prudence numbers of his old
friends were deserting him. They did not yet actually cut him, but they
no longer made a point of saying they had met him.
An extraordinary coincidence brought us together again. It was in
January, 1895. I was travelling. A peevish disposition urged me on,
and I sought solitude rather than novelty of scene. The weather was
frightful. I had fled from Algiers to Blidah, and I was about to quit
Blidah for Biskra. Just as I was leaving my hotel, I glanced, through
idle curiosity, at the slate on which visitors' names were inscribed.
What did I see there? By the side of my own name, actually touching it,
was Wilde's. I have said that I was thirsting to be alone, so I took
the sponge and rubbed my name out. Before reaching the railway station,
however, I was not quite sure that a little cowardice did not underlie
that act, so at once retracing my steps I had my bag taken upstairs and
wrote my name on the slate again.
In the three years since I had seen him--for I can hardly count a short
meeting in Florence the year before--Wilde had certainly changed.
One felt that there was less tenderness in his look, that there was
something harsh in his laughter and a madness in his joy. He seemed,
at the same time, to be more sure of pleasing and less ambitious to
succeed therein. He had grown reckless, hardened, and conceited.
Strangely enough, he no longer spoke in fables, and during several days
that I tarried there I was not once able to draw the shortest tale from
him. My first impression was one of astonishment at finding him in
Algeria.
'Oh,' he said to me, 'just now I am fleeing from art. I want only to
adore the sun. Have you ever noticed how the sun detests thought? The
sun always causes thought to withdraw itself and take refuge in the
shade. Thought dwelt in Egypt originally, but the sun conquered Egypt;
then it lived for a long time in Greece, and the sun conquered Greece,
then in Italy, and then in France. Nowadays all thought is driven back
as far as Norway and Russia, places where the sun never goes. The sun
is jealous of art.'
To adore the sun, ah! that was--for him--to adore life. Wilde's lyrical
adoration was fast becoming a frenzied madness. A fatality led him
on; he could not and would not withdraw himself from it. He seemed to
devote all his zeal and all his worth to over-rating his destiny, and
over-reaching himself. '_My_ special duty,' he used to say, 'is to
plunge madly into amusement.' He used to make a point of searching for
pleasure as one faces an appointed duty. Nietzsche surprised me less,
on a later occasion, because I had heard Wilde say, 'No, not happiness!
Certainly not happiness! Pleasure. One must always set one's heart upon
the most tragic.'
He would walk about the streets of Algiers preceded, escorted, and
followed by an extraordinary mob of young ruffians. He talked to
them all, regarded them all with equal delight, and threw them money
recklessly. 'I hope to have thoroughly demoralized this town,' he told
me. I thought of Flaubert's saying when he was asked what kind of
reputation he most desired--'that of being a demoralizer,' he replied.
In the face of all this I was filled with astonishment, admiration, and
alarm. I knew of his shaky position, the enmities he had created, and
the attacks which were being made upon him, and I knew what dark unrest
lay hidden beneath his outward pretence of pleasure.
On one of those last evenings in Algiers, Wilde seemed to have made up
his mind not to say a single serious word. At last I became somewhat
annoyed at the exaggerated wit of his paradoxes, and I said to him,
'You have got something better to talk about than this nonsense; you
are talking to me as if I were the public. You ought rather to talk to
the public as you know so well how to talk to your friends. Why is it
your plays are not better? The best that is in you, you talk; why do
you not write it?' 'Oh, well,' he cried immediately, 'my plays are not
good, I know, and I don't trouble about that, but if you only knew how
much amusement they afford! They are nearly all the results of a bet.
So was _Dorian Gray_--I wrote that in a few days because a friend of
mine declared that I could not write a novel. Writing bores me so.'
[Illustration: OSCAR WILDE, 1893.]
Then, turning suddenly towards me, he said, '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.'
It was only too true. The best of his writing is but a poor reflection
of his brilliant conversation. Those who have heard him talk find him
disappointing to read. _Dorian Gray_ in its conception was a wonderful
story, far superior to _La Peau de Chagrin_, and far more significant!
Alas! when written, what a masterpiece spoiled. In his most delightful
tales literary influence makes itself too much felt. However graceful
they may be, one notices too much literary effort; affectation and
delicacy of phrase[2] conceal the beauty of the first conception of
them. One feels in them, and one cannot help feeling in them, the
three periods of their generation. The first idea contained in them is
very beautiful, simple, profound, and certain to make itself heard;
a kind of latent necessity holds the parts firmly together, but from
that point the gift stops. The development of the parts is done in an
artificial manner; there is a lack of arrangement about them, and when
Wilde elaborates his sentences and endeavours to give them their full
value, he does so by overloading them prodigiously with tiny conceits
and quaint and trifling fancies. The result is that one's emotion is
held at bay, and the dazzling of the surface so blinds one's eyes and
mind, that the deep central emotion is lost.
He spoke of returning to London, as a well-known peer was insulting
him, challenging him, and taunting him with running away.
'But if you go back what will happen? 'I asked him. 'Do you know the
risk you are running?'
'It is best never to know,' he answered. 'My friends are
extraordinary--they beg me to be careful. Careful? but can I be
careful? That would be a backward step. I must go on as far as
possible. I cannot go much further. Something is bound to happen ...
something else.'
Here he broke off, and the next day he left for England.
The rest of the story is well-known. That 'something else' was hard
labour.
[I have invented nothing, nor altered anything, in the last few
sentences I have quoted. Wilde's words are fixed in my mind, and, I
might almost say, in my ears. I do not say that Wilde clearly saw the
prison opening to receive him, but I do assert that the great and
unexpected event which astonished and upset London, suddenly changing
Oscar Wilde from accuser into accused, did not cause him any surprise.
The newspapers, which chose to see in him only a buffoon,
misrepresented, as far as they could, the position taken up for his
defence, even to the extent of wresting all meaning from it. Perhaps
some day in the far future it will be seemly to lift this dreadful
trial out of the mire--but not yet.]
[1] _An Ideal Husband_ at the Haymarket and _The Importance of Being
Earnest_ at the St. James's. Possibly _Lady Windermere's Fan_ or _A
Woman of No Importance_ was being played at a suburban theatre at the
same time.
[2] M. Gide first wrote _euphuisme_ but altered it to _euphémisme_ on
republishing his 'Study' in _Prétextes_. Euphuism or 'extreme nicety
in language' seems to be more appropriate in the present case than
euphemism or 'a softening of offensive expressions.'
III.
For the crimson flower of our life is eaten by the cankerworm
of truth.
And no hand can gather up the fallen withered petals
of the rose of youth.
III.
As soon as he came out of prison, Oscar Wilde went back to France. At
Berneval, a quiet little village near Dieppe, a certain 'Sebastian
Melmoth' took up his abode. It was he. As I had been the last of his
French friends to see him, I wanted to be the first to greet him on
his return to liberty, and as soon as I could find out his address I
hastened to him.
I arrived about midday without having previously announced my proposed
visit. M. Melmoth, whom T----[1] with warm cordiality invited to Dieppe
fairly frequently, was not expected back till the evening. He did not
return till midnight.
It was as cold as winter. The weather was atrocious. The whole day I
wandered about the deserted beach in low spirits and bored to death.
How could Wilde have chosen Berneval to live in, I wondered. It was
positively mournful. Night came, and I went back to the hotel to engage
a room, the same hotel where Melmoth was living--indeed it was the only
one in the place. The hotel, which was clean and pleasantly situated,
catered only for second-class boarders, inoffensive folk enough, with
whom I had to dine. Rather poor company for Melmoth, I thought.
Fortunately I had a book to read, but it was a gloomy evening, and at
eleven o'clock I was just going to abandon my intention of waiting up
for him when I heard the rumbling of carriage wheels. M. Melmoth had
arrived, benumbed with cold. He had lost his overcoat on the way. And,
now that he came to think of it, he remembered that a peacock's feather
which his servant had brought him the previous evening was a bad omen,
and had clearly foretold some misfortune about to befall him; luckily
it was no worse. But as he was shivering with cold, the hotel was set
busy to warm some whiskey for him. He hardly said 'How do you do?' to
me. In the presence of others, at least, he did not wish to appear to
be at all moved. And my own emotion was almost immediately stilled on
finding Sebastian Melmoth so plainly like the Oscar Wilde of old--no
longer the frenzied poet of Algeria, but the sweet Wilde of the days
before the crisis; and I found myself taken back not two years, but
four or five. There was the same dreamy look, the same amused smile,
the same voice.
He occupied two rooms, the best in the hotel, and he had arranged them
with great taste. Several books lay on the table, and among them he
showed me my own _Nourritures Terrestres_, which had been published
lately. A pretty Gothic Virgin stood on a high pedestal in a dark
corner.
Presently we sat down near the lamp, Wilde drinking his grog in little
sips. I noticed, now that the light was better, that the skin of his
face had become red and common looking, and his hands even more so,
though they still bore the same rings--one to which he was especially
attached had in a reversible bezel an Egyptian scarabæus in lapis
lazuli. His teeth were dreadfully decayed.
We began chatting, and I reminded him of our last meeting in Algiers,
and asked him if he remembered that I had almost foretold the
approaching catastrophe.
'Did you not know,' I said, 'almost for certain what was awaiting you
in England? You saw the danger and rushed headlong into it, did you
not?'
Here I think I cannot do better than copy out the pages on which I
wrote shortly afterwards as much as I could remember of what he said.
'Oh, naturally,' he replied, 'of course I knew that there would be
a catastrophe, either that or something else; I was expecting it.
There was but one end possible. Just imagine--to go any further was
impossible, and that state of things could not last. That is why there
had to be some end to it, you see. Prison has completely changed me[2].
I was relying on it for that. ---is terrible. He cannot understand
that--he cannot understand that I am not taking up the same existence
again. He accuses the others of having changed me--but one must never
take up the same existence again. My life is like a work of art. An
artist never begins the same work twice, or else it shows that he has
not succeeded. My life before prison was as successful as possible. Now
all that is finished and done with.'
He lighted a cigarette and went on: 'The public is so dreadful that it
knows a man only by the last thing he has done. If I were to go back
to Paris now, people would see in me only the convict. I do not want
to show myself again before I have written a play. Till then I must
be left alone and undisturbed.' And he added abruptly, 'Did I not do
well to come here? My friends wanted me to go to the South to recruit,
because at first I was quite worn out. But I asked them to find me, in
the North of France, a very small place at the seaside, where I should
see no one, where it was very cold and there was hardly ever any sun.
Did I not do well to come and live at Berneval? [Outside the weather
was frightful.] Here every one is most good to me--the Curé especially.
I am so fond of the little church, and, would you believe it, it is
called _Notre Dame de Liesse_[3]! Now, is not that charming? And now
I know that I can never leave Berneval, because only this morning the
Curé offered me a perpetual seat in the choir-stalls.
And the Custom-house men, poor fellows, are so bored here with nothing
to do, that I asked them if they had not anything to read, and now I
am giving them all the elder Dumas' novels. So I must stay here, you
see. And the children, oh, the children they adore me. On the day of
the Queen's Jubilee I gave a grand fête and a big dinner, when I had
forty children from the school, all of them, and the schoolmaster, to
celebrate it. Is not that absolutely charming? You know that I admire
the Queen very much. I always have her portrait with me.'
And he showed me her portrait by Nicholson, pinned on the wall. I
got up to look at it. A small bookshelf was close to it, and I began
glancing at the books. I wanted to lead Wilde on to talk to me in a
more serious vein. I sat down again, and rather timidly asked him if he
had read _Souvenirs de la Maison des Morts_.
He gave me no direct answer, but began:--'Russian writers are
extraordinary. What makes their books so great is the pity they put
into them. You know how fond I used to be of _Madame Bovary_, but
Flaubert would not admit pity into his work, and that is why it has a
petty and restrained character about it. It is sense of pity by means
of which a work gains in expanse, and by which it opens up a boundless
horizon. Do you know, my dear fellow, it was pity that prevented me
from killing myself? During the first six months I was dreadfully
unhappy, so utterly miserable that I wanted to kill myself, but what
kept me from doing so was looking at _the others_, and seeing that they
were as unhappy as I was, and feeling sorry for them. Oh, dear! what a
wonderful thing pity is, and I never knew it.'
He was speaking in a low voice without any excitement.
'Have you ever learned how wonderful a thing pity is? For my part I
thank God every night, yes, on my knees I thank God for having taught
it to me. I went into prison with a heart of stone, thinking only of
my own pleasure, but now my heart is utterly broken--pity has entered
into my heart. I have learned now that pity is the greatest and most
beautiful thing in the world. And that is why I cannot bear ill-will
towards those who caused my suffering and those who condemned me;
no, nor to any one, because without them I should not have known all
that. ---- writes me terrible letters. He says he does not understand
me, that he does not understand that I do not wish every one ill, and
that every one has been horrid to me. No, he does not understand me.
He cannot understand me any more. But I keep on telling him that in
every letter: we cannot follow the same road. He has his, and it is
beautiful--I have mine. His is that of Alcibiades; mine is now that of
St. Francis of Assisi. Do you know St. Francis of Assisi? A wonderful
man! Would you like to give me a great pleasure? Send me the best life
of St. Francis you can find.'
I promised it to him. He went on:
'Yes, afterwards we had a charming prison Governor, oh, quite a
charming man, but for the first six months I was dreadfully unhappy.
There was a Governor of the prison, a Jew, who was very harsh, because
he was entirely lacking in imagination.'
This last expression, spoken very quickly, was irresistibly funny; and,
as I laughed heartily, he laughed too, repeated it, and then said: