21 “Well, really I might be.” Plays, Lady Windermere’s Fan, p. 35.
22 “Every word of a comedy dialogue.” More Letters, p. 112.
23 “It should run.” Ibid., p. 113.
24 “Just like a large packing case.” Plays, Lady Windermere’s Fan, p. 22.
25 “It saves a great deal.” More Letters, p. 111.
26 “The society that allows.” Illustrated London News, Feb. 27, 1892.
27 “infantine … both in subject.” Henry James Letters, p. 372.
28 “reconcile the things.” Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, Apr. 9, 1892.
29 “I don’t think.” Plays, Lady Windermere’s Fan, p. 44.
30 “only thorough playwright.” Katharine Worth, Oscar Wilde (New York: Grove, 1983), p. 5.
31 “The adjective was unnecessary.” Plays, Lady Windermere’s Fan, p. 11.
32 “there are certain temperaments.” Dorian, p. 101.
33 “Mr. Oscar Wilde.” Daily Telegraph, Feb. 22, 1892.
34 “I hope you wrote.” Clark, Lady Wilde to Oscar Wilde, n.d. [1891].
35 “A more scholarly and accomplished man.” New York Herald, June 9, 1893.
36 “he was of no use.” Madeleine Stern, Purple Passage: The Life of Mrs. Frank Leslie (Tulsa: University of Oklahoma Press, 1953), p. 160.
37 “I’m taking Willie over.” Ibid., p. 164.
38 “rather exceptionally good-looking.” Alfred Douglas, The Autobiography of Lord Alfred Douglas (London: Martin Secker, 1929), p. 23.
39 “That flowerlike sort.” Bernard Shaw and Alfred Douglas: A Correspondence, ed. Mary Hyde (London: Murray, 1982), p. 4
40 “I have no sympathy.” Fiction, “The Remarkable Rocket,” p. 135.
41 “It is awfully hard work.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 270.
42 “To love oneself.” Ibid., An Ideal Husband, p. 213.
43 “To love one’s self.” Clark, signed sheet of epigrams.
44 “A really well-made buttonhole.” “Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young,” Chameleon, Dec. 1894, p. 1.
45 “A really exquisite buttonhole.” Clark, epigrams.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: TRANSLATING ECSTASY
1 “Ah! I have kissed.” Plays, Salome, p. 91.
2 “green like a curious.” [Raymond] and Ricketts, Oscar Wilde, p. 53.
3 “Yes, I never thought.” Robertson, Life Was Worth Living, p. 125.
4 “the serpent of old Nile.” Letters, p. 834.
5 “my own words.” Kerry Powell, Oscar Wilde and the Theatre of the 1890s (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 42.
6 “The dress, the title.” Ibid., p. 52.
7 “Thy mouth is like a band.” Plays, Salome, p. 73.
8 “Woman lies at the base.” Jane Wilde, Social Studies, p. 248.
9 “It is his eyes.” Plays, Salome, p. 71.
10 “The mystery of Love.” Ibid., p. 91.
11 “a walking compendium.” Letters, p. 316, n. 5.
12 “I shall take out letters.” Pall Mall Budget, June 30, 1892.
13 “Tyrian purple.” Letters, p. 333.
14 “Parma violets.” Cecil, Max, p. 91.
15 “fading” or “tired.” Letters, p. 332–33.
16 “Only care must be taken.” Lord Chamberlain’s Records: 1909 and 1910, Manuscript Division, British Library.
17 “It is only the shudder.” Edgar Saltus, Oscar Wilde: An Idler’s Impression (New York: AMS Press, 1968), p. 20.
18 “an oriental Hedda Gabler.” William Archer, “Mr. Oscar Wilde’s New Play,” Black & White, May 11, 1893.
19 “I felt pity.” Letters, p. 293.
20 “an arrangement in blood.” London Times, Feb. 23, 1893.
21 “Of course I plagiarise.” Max Beerbohm, Letters to Reggie Turner, ed. Rupert Hart-Davis (London: Hart-Davis, 1964), p. 36.
22 “For the only artist.” Letters, p. 348 n. 3.
23 “like a silver hatchet.” Rothenstein, Men and Memories, p. 187.
24 “a vile constitution.” Chris Snodgrass, Aubrey Beardsley: Dandy of the Grotesque (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 28.
25 “seeking everywhere for lovers.” Plays, Salome, p. 75.
26 “Dear Aubrey is too Parisian.” [Raymond] and Ricketts, Oscar Wilde, p. 51.
27 “When I have before me.” The Café Royal Story: A Living Legend, ed. Leslie Frewin (London: Hutchinson Benham, 1963), p. 24.
28 “Don’t sit.” New Criterion, Jan. 1926.
29 “Yes, Yes, I look.” quoted in “The Same Old Solotaire,” London Review of Books, July 4, 1996, p. 22.
30 “schoolboy faults.” Letters, p. 432.
31 “naughty scribbles.” Matthew Sturgis, Passionate Attitudes (London: Macmillan, 1995), p. 153.
32 “whole thing must be a joke.” Ibid.
33 “a polyphonic variation.” Oscar Wilde: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Richard Ellmann (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall 1969), p. 60.
34 “Drama, the most objective form.” Letters, p. 589.
35 “but as the man.” Kernahan, In Good Company, p. 316.
36 “Oh, I’m radiant.” Max Beerbohm, Herbert Beerbohm Tree: Some Memories of Him and His Art (London: Hutchinson, 1920), p. 187.
37 “obviously mad.” Beerbohm, Letters to Reggie Turner, p. 39.
38 “nothing escaped.” Rothenstein, Men and Memories, p. 146.
39 “I am sorry to say.” Beerbohm, Letters to Reggie Turner, p. 35.
40 “inborn and cannot ever be.” Anglo-American Times, Mar. 25, 1893; also Letters, p. 290.
41 “silver dagger.” S. N. Behrman, Portrait of Max (New York: Random House, 1960), p. 37.
42 “Giving lectures for him.” Cecil, Max, p. 48.
43 “the gift of.” Ibid., p. 68.
44 “Tell me.” Leverson, Letters to the Sphinx, p. 42.
45 “I am so sorry.” Clark, Constance Wilde to Oscar Wilde, Sept. 18, 1892.
46 “He has become mad.” Clark, Constance Wilde to Mrs. Fitch, Sept. 14, 1892.
47 “As Herod in my Salome.” Hesketh Pearson, Beerbohm Tree: His Life and Laughter (London: Methuen, 1956), p. 65.
48 “My God! he must be supernatural.” Ibid.
49 “wildest profligate who spills.” Ibid., p. 69.
50 “Puritanism is not a theory.” Ibid., p. 70.
51 “a woman’s play.” Letters, p. 335.
52 “Oh! no one.” Plays, A Woman of No Importance, p. 157.
53 “foolish,” “slippery.” Pearson, Beerbohm Tree, p. 69.
54 “If I go.” Mikhail, p. 239.
55 “too fluctuating—for theatrical purposes.” Beerbohm Tree to Oscar Wilde, Dec. 12, 1891, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.
56 “Ladies and Gentlemen.” Pearson, Beerbohm Tree, p. 71.
57 “People love a wicked aristocrat.” Ibid., p. 67.
58 “Despite its qualities.” Bookman, Mar. 1895.
59 “a clever, immature work.” Illustrated London News, Aug. 5, 1893.
60 “My husband is a kind of promissory note.” Plays, A Woman of No Importance, p. 114.
61 “The Book of Life.” Ibid., p. 112.
62 “Women have a much better time.” Ibid., p. 103.
63 “All the married men.” Ibid., p. 114.
64 “As far as I can ascertain.” quoted in New York Herald Tribune, July 21, 1946.
65 “dresses the part.” More Letters, p. 119.
66 “I need not tell you.” Ibid., p. 120.
67 “Your presence here.” Clark, Elisabeth Marbury to Oscar Wilde, Nov. 10, 1893.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: MOSTLY FAMOUS
1 “Desire, at the end.” Letters, p. 466.
2 “This indeed is life!” Café Royal Story, p. 27.
3 “When I am in trouble.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 293.
4 “What shall we do.” Ibid., p. 270.
5 “sits as
if blowing bubbles.” Michael Field, Works and Days, ed. T. and D. C. Sturge Moore (London: Murray, 1933), p. 140.
6 “allowing the people.” Ibid.
7 “a champagne dinner.” Letters, p. 503.
8 “no more than the romantic expression.” William Roughhead, Bad Companions (Edinburgh: Green, 1930), p. 178. See also Neil Bartlett, Who Was That Man? A Present for Mr. Oscar Wilde (London: Penguin, 1988), p. 141.
9 “had heard of rich men.” Dorian, p. 154.
10 “a narcissus,” Letters, p. 314.
11 “To the Gilt-mailed Boy.” inscribed volume in Taylor Collection, Princeton University.
12 “These familiarities were rare.” Douglas, Autobiography, p. 75.
13 “I blame myself.” Letters, p. 429.
14 “revolting,” “loathsome.” Ibid.
15 “So far from his leading me.” Douglas, Autobiography, p. 76.
16 “feasting with panthers.” Letters, p. 492.
17 “closely bound up.” Writings, “The Soul of Man Under Socialism,” p. 32.
18 “Your defect was not.” Letters, p. 425.
19 “I am one.” Ibid., p. 468.
20 “I have never posed.” Ibid., p. 479.
21 “The first duty.” “Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young,” Chameleon, Dec. 1894, p. 1.
22 “If Bosie has really made.” George Ives diaries, Nov. 15, 1894, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.
23 “After going among that set.” Ibid., Jan. 1, 1895.
24 “Well, I shall find out.” Ibid., Aug. 24, 1894.
25 “When the prurient.” Letters, p. 375.
26 “sterile and uncreative.” Ibid., p. 426.
27 “stayed smoking cigarettes.” Ibid.
28 “Things are the wrong colour.” Ibid., p. 327.
29 “the mere fact.” Ibid., p. 644.
30 “Any boy found disobeying.” Ibid., p. 334.
31 “lazy and luxurious.” Ibid., p. 868.
32 “We do no logic.” Ibid.
33 “I think him perfectly delightful.” Ibid.
34 “exercised a sort of enchantment.” Alfred Douglas, Without Apology (London: Martin Secker, 1938), p. 75.
35 “as simple and innocent.” Rupert Croft-Cooke, Bosie: Lord Alfred Douglas, His Friends and Enemies (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1963), p. 93.
36 “kill me, they wreck.” Letters, p. 336.
37 “I am true Love.” Aesthetes and Decadents of the 1890s, ed. Karl Beckson (Chicago: Academy, 1981), p. 82.
38 “perhaps the thing.” Letters, p. 437.
39 “I want everyone to say.” Ibid.
40 “Love me, not with smiles.” Pierre Louÿs, Two Erotic Tales: The Songs of Bilitis, trans. Mary Hanson Harrison (Evanston: Evanston Publishing, 1995), p. 275.
41 “chose at once.” Letters, p. 410.
42 “Examinations are of no value.” Plays, A Woman of No Importance, p. 131.
43 “I have done no work.” Letters, p. 341.
44 “divided in interest.” Ibid., p. 342.
45 “charming people should smoke.” Ibid., p. 343.
46 “were spoiling each other’s lives.” Ibid., p. 431.
47 “a gentle and penitent child.” Ibid., p. 435.
48 “aimless, unhappy and absurd.” Ibid., p. 346.
49 “May Allah ease.” Stanley Weintraub, Reggie: A Portrait of Reginald Turner (New York: George Braziller, 1965), p. 30.
50 TIME HEALS EVERY WOUND. Letters, p. 434.
51 “I am not going to try.” Croft-Cooke, Bosie, p. 97.
52 WHAT A FUNNY LITTLE MAN. Letters, p. 446.
53 “his small hand.” Ibid., p. 439.
54 “I think if you were dead.” Ibid., p. 446.
55 “The prospect of a battle.” Ibid.
56 “My Own Boy.” Ibid., p. 326.
57 “the world is changed.” Dorian, p. 260.
58 “I suppose you have come.” Trials, p. 67.
59 “The letter is a prose poem.” Ibid., p. 68.
60 “yellow satin could console one.” Dorian, p. 140.
61 “A mixture of English rowdyism.” London Times, Apr. 17, 1894.
62 “Have you seen The Yellow Book?” Leverson, Letters to the Sphinx, p. 53.
63 “It is dull.” Letters, p. 354.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: A BROKEN LINE
1 “We can have in life.” Dorian, p. 234.
2 “I little thought.” Louis Hamon, Cheiro’s Memoirs: The Reminiscences of a Society Palmist (London: Rider, 1912), p. 56.
3 “The mystery of the world.” Ibid.
4 “It is only shallow people.” Dorian, p. 45.
5 “Is the break still there?” Hamon, Cheiro’s Memoirs, p. 56.
6 “I see a very brilliant life.” Letters, p. 558 n.
7 “Death and Love.” Ibid., p. 558.
8 “I am truly sorry.” Clark, Lady Wilde to Oscar Wilde, Mar. 29, 1894.
9 “Now that I come.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 287.
10 “the sheer passion of love.” Letters, p. 361n.
11 “As a rule.” Plays, An Ideal Husband, p. 169.
12 “The ten commandments.” Ibid., p. 217.
13 “There is something entertaining.” London Theatre Museum Library, unidentified newspaper clipping.
14 “One’s past is what one is.” Plays, An Ideal Husband, p. 185.
15 “strength and courage.” Ibid., p. 193.
16 “working his way.” Pall Mall Gazette, Jan. 4, 1893.
17 “I thank you.” London Theatre Museum Library, unidentified newspaper clipping.
18 “so helpless, so crude.” James, Henry James Letters, vol. 3, p. 514.
19 “Really? You care for places?” Leon Edel, Henry James: The Middle Years, 1882–1895 (New York: Lippincott, 1962), p. 31.
20 “a fatuous fool.” Ibid.
21 “How can my piece.” James, Henry James Letters, vol. 3, p. 514.
22 “I have come.” Ibid., p. 521.
23 “hideously, atrociously dramatic.” Ibid., vol. 4, p. 9.
24 “from nearly twenty years.” Ibid., p. 10.
25 “ugly Swiss governess.” Letters, p. 360.
26 “I have been doing nothing.” Ibid., p. 362.
27 “first act is ingenious.” Ibid.
28 “He led a happy, idle life.” Trials, p. 121.
29 “being with those who are young.” Ibid., p. 127.
30 “ploughed through the waves.” Holland, Son of Oscar Wilde, p. 199.
31 “long rambling castles.” Ibid., p. 54.
32 “I invented that magnificent flower.” Letters, p. 373.
33 “I love drinking Bovril.” Athenaeum, Sept. 29, 1894.
34 “Bovril Company informs us.” Ibid., Oct. 13, 1894.
35 “a morbid and middle-class affair.” Berggren, The Definitive Four-Act Version of The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 26n.
36 “Of all sweet passions.” Croft-Cooke, Bosie, p. 353.
37 “The home seems.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 286.
38 “When you are not.” Letters, p. 439.
39 “the first noble sorrow.” Ibid., p. 375.
40 “I am sorry.” Ibid., p. 384.
41 “are equally good.” Ibid., p. 369.
42 “I think it would be.” Clark, Elisabeth Marbury to Oscar Wilde, Mar. 15, 1895.
43 “This scene that you feel.” Heskem Pearson, The Last Actor-Managers (London: Methuen, 1950), p. 28.
44 “I’ll send you a box.” Ibid., p. 78.
45 “I fly to Algiers.” More Letters, p. 67.
46 “One felt less softness.” Gide, Oscar Wilde, p. 27.
47 “Prudence!” Ibid., p. 30.
48 “Would you like to know.” Ibid., p. 29.
49 “as beautiful as bronze statues.” Jonathan Fryer, André and Oscar: Gide, Wilde and the Gay Art of Living (London: Constable, 1997), p. 112.
50 “I hope to ha
ve quite.” Gide, Oscar Wilde, p. 28.
51 “quite exquisite.” More Letters, p. 128.
52 “the beggars here.” Ibid.
53 “I hope you’re like me.” Fryer, André and Oscar, p. 112.
54 “It’s impossible to gauge.” Ibid., p. 113.
55 “great pleasure of the debauched.” Ibid., p. 119.
56 “there is no such thing.” Letters, p. 671.
57 “so bad, so disappointing.” Ibid., p. 378.
58 “stepped past the limits.” Constance Wilde to Arthur Humphreys, June 1, 1894, quoted in Sotheby’s catalog of July 23, 1985.
59 “not far short.” Ibid.
60 “I am the most truthful person.” Ibid.
61 “how much I love you.” Ibid., Aug. 11, 1894.
62 “must not talk.” Clark, Constance Wilde to Arthur Humphreys, Oct. 22, 1894.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: THE LAST FIRST NIGHT
1 “Some kill their love.” Poetry, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, p. 153.
2 “A man who marries.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 259.
3 “The play is a success.” Mason, Sir George Alexander, p. 78.
4 “Mabel a daisy.” Leverson, Letters to the Sphinx, p. 34.
5 “No” “it must be.” New Criterion, Jan. 1926.
6 “On the contrary.” Plays, The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 307.
7 “Well, wasn’t I right?” Mason, Sir George Alexander, p. 79.
8 “left a grotesque bouquet.” Letters, p. 383.
9 “stood uttering every foul word.” Ibid., p. 438.
10 “I don’t see anything.” Ibid., p. 384.
11 “into motion the forces.” Ibid., p. 491.
12 “serious lies to a bald man.” Ibid., p. 493.
13 “No doubt he will perform.” Trials, p. 8.
14 “It is not friendly.” Guy Deghy and Keith Waterhouse, Café Royal: Ninety Years of Bohemia (London: Hutchinson, 1956), p. 83.
15 “to be dogged.” Letters, p. 360.
16 “You stated that your age.” Trials, p. 105.
17 “Ah no, Mr. Carson.” Ibid., p. 116.
18 “a man of great taste.” Ibid., p. 125.
19 “Did you ever kiss him?” Ibid., p. 133.
20 “If the country.” Ibid., p. 149.
21 “I hope Oscar.” Ibid., p. 152.
22 “Yellow Book under his arm.” London Theatre Museum Library, various newspaper accounts.
23 “Don’t you keep Christmas.” O’Sullivan, Aspects of Wilde, p. 106.
24 “fashionable and well-aired.” Berggren, The Definitive Four-Act Version of The Importance of Being Earnest, p. 123.
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