by Neil McKenna
Clarke went into some detail about the attempted blackmail of Oscar, first by Alfred Wood and then by Allen and Cliburn, over his extravagantly worded `madness of kisses' letter to Bosie. This was one of Oscar's weakest points. It was not only the wording of the letter that was incriminating, it was the fact that Oscar had been prepared to pay money to retrieve it. Clarke attempted to draw the sting by making a joke. Though `the words of that letter appear extravagant to those who are in the habit of writing commercial correspondence', Clarke said to the jury, provoking laughter in court, it was in fact `a sort of prose sonnet', something of which Oscar `was and is in no way ashamed'.
Clarke turned next to the literary part of the case. It was alleged that Oscar had `joined in procuring the publication' of the Chameleon which contained material relating to `the practices and pastimes of persons of sodomitical and unnatural habits and tastes'. Such allegations were ludicrous, Clarke maintained. Oscar played no part in procuring the publication of the Chameleon. When he was asked to contribute to the magazine, he was good enough to send a selection of leftover epigrams, `Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young'. Though Queensberry's Plea of Justification had described these `epigrammatic statements' as `immoral', Clarke would be `amazed' if his learned friend, Edward Carson, appearing for Lord Queensberry, could find anything morally reprehensible in any of them. Indeed, when Oscar saw a copy of the Chameleon and read `The Priest and the Acolyte', he thought it a `disgrace to literature' and wrote immediately and indignantly to the editor to insist that the magazine be withdrawn from circulation.
As for The Picture of Dorian Gray, Clarke ridiculed the allegations in Queensberry's Plea. It was an extraordinary way of proceeding to attack a man on the basis of a novel which had been openly available `upon the bookstalls, and at bookshops and in libraries' for five years. `I have read the book for the purpose of this case and with care to see upon what my learned friend can build,' Clarke told the jury. With a flourish he held a copy of Dorian Gray aloft for the jury to see:
Here is the thing with Mr Oscar Wilde's name upon the title page and I shall be surprised if my learned friend can point to any passage within those covers which does more than describe as a novelist may or a dramatist may - nay, must - describe the passions and the vices of life if he desires to produce any work of art.
It was an accomplished opening speech which presented Oscar as a loving father, a devoted friend, and an accomplished writer and artist reluctantly driven to the recourse of law.
Oscar, `ponderous and fleshy, his face a dusky red', as the Star reported, took the stand, and Clarke led him gently through a recapitulation of the events leading up to Queensberry's card with hideous words. Oscar's performance was assured and impressive. He answered the questions Clarke put to him fluently and confidently, and with flashes of wit. The jury appeared to be warming to him. Meanwhile Carson was biding his time, listening intently to Clarke's opening speech and his examination of Oscar. He was still undecided about what his first question to Oscar would be. According to his friend and biographer, Edward Marjoribanks, Carson always considered that the first question put in cross-examination was the crucial moment in any case. Oscar unwittingly solved Carson's problem for him, when in answer to a question from Sir Edward Clarke about his age, Oscar confidently replied, `I am thirtynine years of age.'
It was a small lie, a lie born out of Oscar's vanity, but nevertheless a lie that Carson would ruthlessly exploit. The well-prepared Carson had a copy of Oscar's birth certificate in front of him, and it may have been that he had heard of Oscar's propensity to knock a year or two off his real age. Carson rose to begin his cross-examination. He was extremely tall and thin, with a slight stoop. On this morning, he was suffering from a bad cold, which had given his voice a slightly rasping quality.
`You stated at the commencement of your examination that you were thirtynine years of age. I think you are over forty. Isn't that so?' said Carson matter- of-factly. Oscar was immediately flustered.
`I don't think so. I think I am either thirty-nine or forty - forty at my next birthday,' Oscar floundered. `If you have my certificate there, that settles the matter.'
`You were born, I believe, upon the 16th October 1854?' Carson continued. `Did you wish to pose as being young?'
`No.'
`This makes you more than forty?'
`Yes,' said Oscar. `I have no intention of posing for a younger man at all. I try to be correct in the date.'
Carson had done his work well. He had demonstrated to the jury that Oscar had lied under oath. And if Oscar was prepared to lie about small things, then surely he would be prepared to lie about bigger things. If Oscar could `pose' as being younger than he really was, could he not also pose as a sodomite? Not only that, Oscar had been detected in vanity, a vice unlikely to endear itself to the upstanding burghers of Clapton and Stoke Newington.
Carson's cross-examination of Oscar was to last a day and half, and must go down as one of the most bruising encounters in English legal history. Unlike Sir Edward Clarke's courtly, gentle questions, Carson's cross-examination was tantamount to an interrogation. Carson was fast on his feet, moving with lightning speed from one topic to another and back again, ambushing Oscar who found himself ill-prepared for such an encounter. Carson began with the literary part of the case. His technique of cross-examination was simple but devastating. He would take a damning position about the work in question and invite Oscar to agree with him. Carson's questions came short and fast and repetitive, like the staccato fire from a machine-gun. Had he read Bosie's poems? Did he approve of them? Were they `improper'? Was `The Priest and the Acolyte' improper? Was it `wrong'? Was it `immoral'? Was it `blasphemous'? Was it `scandalous'? Was it `sodomitical'? Had Oscar publicly disavowed it? If not, why not? Did Oscar agree with his own `Phrases and Philosophies'? Were they moral or immoral? Were they true? Were they safe? Were they likely to lead to immorality in young men?
Oscar was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. If he agreed with Carson's extreme and damning analyses, then he damned himself. If he disagreed, he unleashed another burst of Carson's machine-gun fire. If he hesitated for a second, paused to collect his thoughts or frame his reply, Carson leapt in demanding an immediate answer. A yes or a no? Did he agree or disagree? Was it or was it not the case? Oscar's attempts to explain, to expound and to qualify his answers were ruthlessly mown down by Carson's deadly volleys. The cumulative effect was devastating. Oscar was being exposed as a liar and an equivocator, as a vain man of nebulous morality, a man who, if he did not directly condone the sodomitical in literature, equally would not or could not condemn it.
Oscar did his best but was visibly flustered by Carson's onslaught. Giving evidence was fatiguing, and Oscar was already tired out with insomnia and worry. What was more, he was deprived of his accustomed endless supply of gold-tipped cigarettes and their gently narcotising effect. Smoking for Oscar was a necessary adjunct to talking, and he was used to the smoke of his cigarettes wreathing and curling around him in fantastic arabesques, just as his conversation wove its own complex rhythms and intricate patterns. Oscar was the most accomplished and sought-after conversationalist of his day, but this interrogation by Carson gave him no time to beguile and enchant, to charm and hypnotise the jurymen, though he did, at least, manage to amuse them with some memorable epigrams.
Just before the court adjourned for lunch, Carson turned his attention to Dorian Gray and read aloud extracts from a letter of 19 July 1890 which Oscar wrote to the Scots Observer. `Each man sees his own sin in Dorian Gray,' Oscar had written. `What Dorian Gray's sins are, no one knows. He who finds them has brought them.'
`Then you left it open to be inferred, I take it,' said Carson, `that the sins of Dorian Gray, some of them, may have been sodomy?'
`That is according to the temper of each one who reads the book; he who has found the sin has brought it,' Oscar replied.
`Then, I take it that some people upon reading the book,
at all events, might reasonably think that it did deal with sodomy?' Carson persisted.
`Some people might think so.' Oscar was faltering. `Whether it would be reasonable or not-'
Carson wheeled about and tried another line of attack.
When Dorian Gray came out in book form: had it been modified and purged a good deal?
`No.'
`In contrast with the original book?'
`No.'
`Did you say "not at all"?'
`No,' said Oscar. `I say there were additions made in one or two - in one case, certainly. It had been pointed out to me, not by any newspaper criticism or anything, but by the only critic of this century I set high, Mr Walter Pater. He had pointed out to me that a certain passage was liable to misconstruction.'
`In what respect?' Carson demanded.
`In every respect.'
`In what respect?' Carson snapped.
`In the respect that it would convey the impression that the sin of Dorian Gray was sodomy,' Oscar wretchedly conceded.
Carson had finally wrung it out of him. Dorian Gray's sin was sodomitical. The court rose for lunch. Carson had cross-examined Oscar to deadly effect. He had drawn first blood in less than three quarters of an hour.
The afternoon session was, if anything, worse. Carson reopened his crossexamination with a fresh volley of questions about Dorian Gray, determinedly focusing on Basil Hallward's confession of his love for Dorian. Carson read out a lengthy passage, laying particular emphasis on the part where Basil says to Dorian, `I quite admit that I adored you madly, extravagantly, absurdly. I was jealous of everyone to whom you spoke.'
Were the feelings between these two men natural and moral? Had Oscar ever known these feelings towards a younger man? Never?
`Have you ever adored a young man, some twenty-one years younger than yourself, madly?' Carson demanded.
`No, not madly,' Oscar replied. `Not madly.'
`Well, adored him?'
`I have loved one friend in my life,' said Oscar seriously.
Carson refused to let the question go. Had Oscar ever `adored' a young man? `I prefer "loved", that is higher.'
"`Adored", sir?'
`And I say "loved" - it is greater.'
`Never mind going higher,' Carson snarled. `Keep down to the level of your own words.'
Oscar was stung into a rebuke. `Keep your own words to yourself. Leave me mine,' he snapped. `Don't put words to me I haven't said.'
But Carson refused to be deflected. `I want an answer to this simple question,' he declared. `Have you ever felt that feeling of adoring madly a beautiful male person many years younger than yourself?'
`I have never given adoration to anyone except myself,' Oscar declared, provoking loud laughter in court.
Carson did not smile. He turned to the subject of the `yellow book' that Lord Henry Wotton gave to Dorian and which had exerted such a strange and compelling influence over Dorian's life. Had Oscar a particular novel in mind at the time he wrote Dorian Gray? Oscar admitted that he had A Rebours by Huysmans in his mind. Somehow or other, Carson already knew that Dorian's `yellow book' was A Rebours. He had a copy of it in court with him and had read it thoroughly. Was it an immoral book? Did it deal with undisguised sodomy? Was it a sodomitical book? Was it a book depicting sodomy? Oscar equivocated, Carson persisted, even offering to read a sodomitical passage until he was overruled by the judge, Mr Justice Collins.
Oscar's declaration that he had in the course of his life `loved one friend' was significant. Though he would vigorously deny all the sexual allegations against him, telling lie after lie after bald lie, his love for Bosie was sacred. It was the tower of ivory that could not be besmirched or sullied by lies, falsehoods and half-truths. When Carson turned to cross-examine him about the `madness of kisses' letter, once again Oscar rousingly and unambiguously declared his love for Bosie. `I have expressed, and feel great and, I hope, undying love for him as I say I do. He is the greatest friend I have.'
Oscar had rallied after lunch but he was oddly unprepared for Carson's next great onslaught. Carson turned to the sorry saga of the `madness of kisses' letter and Alfred Wood's attempts to blackmail Oscar over this and other letters. Oscar was forced to endure a long cross-examination as to how he first met Wood and what occurred between them that first night. Why did Oscar invite Wood to dine with him at the Florence that first evening? Had he taken Wood to Tite Street? Had he ever taken Wood to Tite Street? Did Oscar swear to that? Did Wood go with Oscar to Tite Street? Did Oscar ever engage in any immoral practices with Wood? Had he ever opened his trousers? Put his hand upon his person? Ever put his own person between the legs of Wood?
Then Carson began to ruthlessly reconstruct the sequence of events surrounding the attempted blackmail of Oscar first by Wood and then by William Allen and Robert Cliburn.
Did Oscar consider that Wood was trying to levy blackmail?
`Yes,' said Oscar, `and I was determined to face him on the subject.'
`You thought he was going to levy blackmail and you determined to face it?' Carson reiterated.
`Yes.'
`And the way you faced it was by giving him sixteen pounds to go to America?' Carson made no attempt to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. Did Oscar call Wood by his Christian name? And did Wood call Oscar by his Christian name? `Did you think it a curious thing that a man with whom you were on such intimate terms as to call him "Alfred" should try to levy blackmail?' Carson demanded witheringly.
Carson turned from the unappetising subject of Oscar's dealings with blackmailers to his relationship with Edward Shelley, his publisher's `office boy', as Carson called him, and in particular to Oscar's seduction of Shelley in the Albemarle Hotel. Had Oscar asked `this lad' to dine with him at the Albemarle Hotel? Was it to be `an intellectual treat'?
`Well, for-him,- yes,' Oscar replied, provoking laughter in court.
The deadly volley of questions continued. Was Oscar alone with Shelley in his sitting room in the Albemarle Hotel? Was there a bedroom leading off? Did they smoke cigarettes? Did he give Shelley whisky and sodas? Did Oscar embrace Shelley in the sitting-room? Did he kiss him? Did he put his hand on Shelley's person? Did he take him into the bedroom? Did they take off their clothes? Did they sleep together all night? Did Oscar take his person in his hand? Oscar could bear it no more.
`My Lord,' he protested to the judge, `is it not sufficient for me to give an entire denial without being exposed to the ignominy of detail after detail of an imaginary thing going on?' Mr Justice Collins agreed, but as far as the jurymen were concerned the damage was done.
Carson's pace never slowed for a second. He turned abruptly to Oscar's relationship with Alfonso Conway. `Did you become intimate with a young lad named Conway?' he demanded. Was it true that Conway sold newspapers on the pier at Worthing? Had Oscar arranged to meet Conway one evening at about nine o'clock? Did they walk towards Lancing? Was the road lonely? Did Oscar kiss him on the road? Did he put his hands inside his trousers? Were there familiarities of any kind? Did Oscar give him money? Oscar gave a decided negative to all Carson's questions. Now with a flourish Carson produced a cigarette case, a book and a photograph of Oscar, all of which were inscribed with the words `Alfonso Conway from his friend Oscar Wilde'. These, together with a silver-topped walking stick, were all gifts from Oscar to Alfonso. There were further questions which led to damaging revelations. Had Oscar bought a straw hat and a suit of clothes for Alfonso? Did he take the boy to stay in a hotel in Brighton? `You dressed him up to bring him to Brighton?' Carson sneered. `In order that he might look more like an equal?'
When the court rose for the day, Oscar left the witness box feeling bruised and battered by Carson's mauling. Though he had rallied himself after lunch and fought Carson bravely, there was no disguising from himself or from anyone else that Carson's blows were hitting home. It was not just a question of searching out real or imagined sodomitical incidents and intent in his work, though that was damaging enough. Carso
n's persistent interrogation was laying bare unsavoury and decidedly suspect facts about his life. It was clear to the jury that Oscar had been blackmailed over letters he had written to Bosie. He had paid Alfred Wood, a youth he barely knew, an enormous sum of money to retrieve these letters. And it was clear, too, that he had had some sort of murky encounters and exchanges with at least two other professional blackmailers.
More damaging still, Carson had shown that Oscar had had questionable friendships with two young men. And, though the jury might just have been able to swallow Oscar's version of the innocent literary friendship that existed between the celebrated writer and the publisher's office boy, it was well nigh impossible for them to understand what species of friendship - other than sodomitical - could exist between an unemployed teenage newspaper vendor plucked from the beach at Worthing and the author of The Importance of Being Earnest. Oscar's denials of any impropriety had been vehement and frequent. But whether these protestations would be sufficient to convince the sceptical burghers of Clapton and Stoke Newington was anybody's guess.
So very ugly
`I often betray myself with a kiss.'
That evening the rumour got about that Oscar had fled abroad, that he had panicked after his first day in the witness box and caught the boat train to Ostend. In fact, Oscar and Bosie had spent a wretched evening closeted in the Holborn Viaduct Hotel with Humphreys and Clarke, engaged in a depressing post-mortem on the day's proceedings. Oscar and Bosie had been invited to the Leversons' that night for what was intended to be a celebratory dinner, but they were obliged to cry off. `Pray excuse us from dining tonight as we have a lot of very important business to do,' they told her in a joint telegram. `Everything is very satisfactory,' they added, in a dismal attempt at optimism. It was a long way from the `complete triumph' prophesied by the Sibyl Robinson just a week earlier.
Oscar's interview with Humphreys and Clarke must have been painful for all concerned. The questions Carson had asked Oscar about his sexual relations with Alfred Wood, Edward Shelley and Alfonso Conway had been so very detailed and so very precise that it was obvious that Queensberry's defence team had managed to interview the boys concerned and take statements. Oscar could no longer claim that the allegations of sodomy and gross indecency outlined in Queensberry's Plea of Justification were groundless and absurd. It was perhaps during this conference that Oscar asked Clarke if there were any limits on the questions Carson could put to him.