Delphi Complete Works of Oscar Wilde (Illustrated) (301 page)

Gesling had advised me to have the remains placed in the coffin at once, as decomposition would begin very
rapidly, and at
8.30 in
the evening the men came to screw it down. An unsuccessful photograph of Oscar was taken by Maurice Gilbert at my request, the flashlight did not work properly. Henri Davray came just before they had put on the lid. He was very kind and nice. On Sunday, the next day, Alfred Douglas arrived, and various people whom I do not know called. I expect most of them were journalists. On Monday morning at 9 o’clock, the funeral started from the hotel — we all walked to the Church of St. Germain des Près behind the hearse — Alfred Douglas, Reggie Turner and myself, Dupoirier, the proprietor of the hotel, Henri the nurse, and Jules, the servant of the hotel, Dr. Hennion and Maurice Gilbert, together with two strangers whom I did not know. After a low mass, said by one of the vicaires at the altar behind the sanctuary, part of the burial office was read by Father Cuthbert. The Suisse told me that there were fifty-six people present — there were five ladies in deep mourning — I had ordered three coaches only, as I had sent out no official notices, being anxious to keep the funeral quiet. The first coach contained Father Cuthbert and the acolyte; the second Alfred Douglas, Turner, the proprietor of the hotel, and myself; the third contained Madame Stuart Merrill, Paul Fort, Henri Davray and Sar Luis; a cab followed containing strangers unknown to me. The drive took one hour and a half; the grave is at Bagneux, in a temporary concession hired in my name — when I am able I shall purchase ground elsewhere at Père la Chaise for choice. I have not yet decided what to do, or the nature of the monument. There were altogether twenty-four wreaths of flowers; some were sent anonymously. The proprietor of the hotel supplied a pathetic bead trophy, inscribed, “A mon locataire,” and there was another of the same kind from “The service de l’Hotel,” the remaining twenty-two were, of course, of real flowers. Wreaths came from, or at the request of, the following: Alfred Douglas, More Adey, Reginald Turner, Miss Schuster, Arthur Clifton, the Mercure de France, Louis Wilkinson, Harold Mellor, Mr. and Mrs. Texiera de Mattos, Maurice Gilbert, and Dr. Tucker. At the head of the coffin I placed a wreath of
laurels inscribed, “A tribute to his literary achievements and distinction.” I tied inside the wreath the following names of those who had shown kindness to him during or after his imprisonment, “Arthur Humphreys, Max Beerbohm, Arthur Clifton, Ricketts, Shannon, Conder, Rothenstein, Dal Young, Mrs. Leverson, More Adey, Alfred Douglas, Reginald Turner, Frank Harris, Louis Wilkinson, Mellor, Miss Schuster, Rowland Strong,” and by special request a friend who wished to be known as “C.B.”

I can scarcely speak in moderation of the magnanimity, humanity and charity of John Dupoirier, the proprietor of the Hotel d’Alsace. Just before I left Paris Oscar told me he owed him over £190. From the day Oscar was laid up he never said anything about it. He never mentioned the subject to me until after Oscar’s death, and then I started the subject. He was present at Oscar’s operation, and attended to him personally every morning. He paid himself for luxuries and necessities ordered by the doctor or by Oscar out of his own pocket. I hope that —— or —— will at any rate pay him the money still owing. Dr. Tucker is also owed a large sum of money. He was most kind and attentive, although I think he entirely misunderstood Oscar’s case.

Reggie Turner had the worst time of all in many ways — he experienced all the horrible uncertainty and the appalling responsibility of which he did not know the extent. It will always be a source of satisfaction to those who were fond of Oscar, that he had someone like Reggie near him during his last days while he was articulate and sensible of kindness and attention....

Robert Ross.

CRITICISMS

By Robert Ross

Vol. I. Page 80 Line 3. I demur very much to your statement in this paragraph. Wilde was too much of a student of Greek to have learned anything about controversy from Whistler. No doubt Whistler was more nimble and more naturally gifted with the power of repartee, but when Wilde indulged in controversy with his critics, whether he got the best of it or not, he never borrowed the Whistlerian method. Cf. his controversy with Henley over Dorian Gray.

Then whatever you may think of Ruskin, Wilde learnt a great deal about the History and Philosophy of Art from him. He learned more from Pater and he was the friend and intimate of Burne-Jones long before he knew Whistler. I quite agree with your remark that he had “no joy in conflict” and no doubt he had little or no knowledge of the technique of Art in the modern expert’s sense.

[There never was a greater master of controversy than Whistler, and I believe Wilde borrowed his method of making fun of the adversary. Robert Ross’s second point is rather controversial. Shaw agrees with me that Wilde never knew anything really of music or of painting and neither the history nor the so-called philosophy of art makes one a connoisseur of contemporary masters. F.H.]

Page 94. Last line. For “happy candle” read “Happy Lamp.” It was at the period when oil lamps were put in the middle of the dinner table just before the general introduction of electric light; by putting “candle” you lose the period. Cf. Du Maurier’s pictures of dinner parties in
Punch
.

Page 115. I venture to think that you should state that Wilde at the end of his story of ‘Mr. W.H.’ definitely says that the theory is all nonsense. It always appeared
to me a semi-satire of Shakespearean commentary. I remember Wilde saying to me after it was published that his next Shakespearean book would be a discussion as to whether the commentators on Hamlet were mad or only pretending to be. I think you take Wilde’s phantasy too seriously but I am not disputing whether you are right or wrong in your opinion of it; but it strikes me as a little solemn when on Page 116 you say that the ‘whole theory is completely mistaken’; but you are quite right when you say that it did Wilde a great deal of harm. [Ross does not seem to realise that if the theory were merely fantastic the public might be excused for condemning Oscar for playing with such a subject. As a matter of fact I remember Oscar defending the theory to me years later with all earnestness: that’s why I stated my opinion of it. F.H.]

Page 142 Line 19. What Wilde said in front of the curtain was: “I have enjoyed this evening immensely.”

[I seem to remember that Wilde said this; my note was written after a dinner a day or two later when Oscar acted the whole scene over again and probably elaborated his effect. I give the elaboration as most characteristic. F.H.]

Vol. II. Page 357 Line 3. Major Nelson was the name of the Governor at Reading prison. He was one of the most charming men I ever came across. I think he was a little hurt by the “Ballad of Reading Gaol,” which he fancied rather reflected on him though Major Isaacson was the Governor at the time the soldier was executed. Isaacson was a perfect monster. Wilde sent Nelson copies of his books, “The Ideal Husband” and “The Importance of Being Earnest,” which were published as you remember after the release, and Nelson acknowledged them in a most delightful way. He is dead now.

[Major Isaacson was the governor who boasted to me that he was knocking the nonsense out of Wilde; he seemed to me almost inhuman. My report got him relieved and Nelson appointed in his stead. Nelson was an ideal governor. F.H.]

Page
387. In
the First Edition of the “Ballad of Reading Gaol” issued by Methuen I have given the original draft of the poem which was in my hands in September 1897, long before Wilde rejoined Douglas. I will send you a copy of it if you like, but it is much more likely to reach you if you order it through Putnam’s in New York as they are Methuen’s agents. I would like you to see it because it fortifies your opinion about Douglas’ ridiculous contention; though I could explode the whole thing by Wilde’s letters to myself from Berneval. Certain verses were indeed added at Naples. I do not know what you will think, but to me they prove the mental decline due to the atmosphere and life that Wilde was leading at the time. Let us be just and say that perhaps Douglas assisted more than he was conscious of in their composition. To me they are terribly poor stuff, but then, unlike yourself, I am a heretic about the Ballad.

Page
411. In
fairness to Gide: Gide is describing Wilde after he had come back from Naples in the year 1898, not in 1897, when he had just come out of prison.

Appendix Page 438 Line 20. Forgive me if I say it, but I think your method of sneering at Curzon unworthy of Frank Harris. Sneer by all means; but not in that particular way.

[Robert Ross is mistaken here: no sneer was intended. I added Curzon’s title to avoid giving myself the air of an intimate. F.H.]

Page 488 Line 17. You really are wrong about Mellor’s admiration for Wilde. He liked his society but loathed his writing. I was quite angry in 1900 when Mellor came to see me at Mentone (after Wilde’s death, of course), when he said he could never see any merit whatever in Wilde’s plays or books. However the point is a small one.

Page 490 Line 6. The only thing I can claim to have invented in connection with Wilde were the two titles
“De Profundis” and “The Ballad of Reading Gaol,” for which let me say I can produce documentary evidence. The publication of “De Profundis” was delayed for a month in 1905 because I could not decide on what to call it. It happened to catch on but I do not think it a very good title.

Page 555 Line 18. Do you happen to have compared Douglas’ translation of Salome in Lane’s First edition (with Beardsley’s illustrations) with Lane’s Second edition (with Beardsley’s illustrations) or Lane’s little editions (without Beardsley’s illustrations)? Or have you ever compared the aforesaid First edition with the original? Douglas’ translation omits a great deal of the text and is actually wrong as a rendering of the text in many cases. I have had this out with a good many people. I believe Douglas is to this day sublimely unconscious that his text, of which there were never more than 500 copies issued in England, has been entirely scrapped; his name at my instance was removed from the current issues for the very good reason that the new translation is not his. But this is merely an observation not a correction.

[I talked this matter over with Douglas more than once. He did not know French well; but he could understand it and he was a rarely good translator as his version of a Baudelaire sonnet shows. In any dispute as to the value of a word or phrase I should prefer his opinion to Oscar’s. But Ross is doubtless right on this point. F.H.]

Appendix Page 587. Your memory is at fault here. The charge against Horatio Lloyd was of a normal kind. It was for exposing himself to nursemaids in the gardens of the Temple.

[I have corrected this as indeed I have always used Ross’s corrections on matters of fact. F.H.]

Page 596 Line 13. I think there ought to be a capital “E” in exhibition to emphasise that it is the 1900 Exhibition in Paris.

THE SOUL OF MAN UNDER SOCIALISM

When I was editing “The Fortnightly Review,” Oscar Wilde wrote for me “The Soul of Man Under Socialism.” On reading it then it seemed to me that he knew very little about Socialism and I disliked his airy way of dealing with a religion he hadn’t taken the trouble to fathom. The essay now appears to me in a somewhat different light. Oscar had no deep understanding of Socialism, it is true, much less of the fact that in a healthy body corporate socialism or co-operation would govern all public utilities and public services while the individual would be left in possession of all such industries as his activity can control.

But Oscar’s genius was such that as soon as he had stated one side of the problem he felt that the other side had to be considered and so we get from him if not the ideal of an ordered state at least
aperçus
of astounding truth and value.

For example he writes: “Socialism ... by converting private property into public wealth, and substituting co-operation for competition, will restore society to its proper condition of a thoroughly healthy organism, and insure the material well-being of each member of the community.”

Then comes the return on himself: “But for the full development of Life ... something more is needed. What is needed is Individualism.”

And the ideal is always implicit: “Private property has led Individualism entirely astray. It has made gain not growth its aim.”

Humor too is never far away: “Only one class thinks more about money than the rich and that is the poor.”

His short stay in the United States also benefited him.... “Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. It has been found out.”

Taken all in all a provocative delightful essay which like
Salome
in the æsthetic field marks the end of his
Lehrjahre
and the beginning of his work as a master.

A LAST WORD

In the couple of years that have elapsed since the first edition of this book was published, I have received many letters from readers asking for information about Wilde which I have omitted to give. I have been threatened with prosecution and must not speak plainly; but something may be said in answer to those who contend that Oscar might have brought forward weightier arguments in his defence than are to be found in Chapter XXIV. As a matter of fact I have made him more persuasive than he was. When Oscar declared (as recorded on page 496) that his weakness was “consistent with the highest ideal of humanity if not a characteristic of it,” I asked him: “would he make the same defence for the Lesbians?” He turned aside showing the utmost disgust in face and words, thus in my opinion giving his whole case away.

He could have made a better defence. He might have said that as we often eat or drink or smoke for pleasure, so we may indulge in other sensualities. If he had argued that his sin was comparatively venial and so personal-peculiar that it carried with it no temptation to the normal man, I should not have disputed his point.

Moreover, love at its highest is independent of sex and sensuality. Since Luther we have been living in a centrifugal movement, in a wild individualism where all ties of love and affection have been loosened, and now that the centripetal movement has come into power we shall find that in another fifty years or so friendship and love will win again to honor and affinities of all sorts will proclaim themselves without shame and without fear. In this sense Oscar might have regarded himself as a forerunner and not as a survival or “sport.” And it may well be that some instinctive feeling of this sort was at the back of his mind though too vague to be formulated in words. For even in our dispute (see Page 500) he pleaded that the world was becoming more tolerant, which, one hopes, is true. To become more tolerant of the faults of others is the first lesson in the religion of Humanity.

THE END