Oscar Wildes Aesthetic Education The Oxford Classical Curriculum 1st Ed 978-3-030 14373 2978 3 030 14374 9

Oscar Wilde’s
Aesthetic Education
The Oxford Classical Curriculum
Leanne Grech
Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century
Writing and Culture
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Joseph Bristow
Department of English
University of California - Los Angeles
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Leanne Grech
Oscar Wilde’s
Aesthetic Education
The Oxford Classical Curriculum
Leanne Grech
Sunshine West, VIC, Australia
Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture

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Dedicated to Annie Grech
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to begin by acknowledging the many people who have

crossed my path and offered encouragement and emotional support as
I embarked on my first major research project. The experience of pre-
paring this book for publication has led me to realize that it takes a
community of people to create a book.
I was fortunate enough to receive an Australian Postgraduate
Award, funded by the Australian government, which enabled
me to focus on producing original research. I acknowledge The
University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Arts and School of Culture and
Communication for providing me with funding to attend local and inter-
national conferences during my candidature. The School of Culture and
Communication also assisted me by acquiring specialist academic books.
My Ph.D. supervisors, Clara Tuite and K. O. Chong-Gossard, were
outstanding academic mentors and every part of this book has been
shaped by their insights. With their guidance, I found my own voice
as a scholar and an author. I am grateful to Grace Moore and Chris
Mackie, who also shared some of the supervision responsibilities. For
many years, Chris gave me the opportunity to assist with his research on
Classical reception and Homeric poetry. The process of researching the
themes of spectatorship and male beauty in Homer has influenced my
own interpretation of The Picture of Dorian Gray. To Katherine Firth,
Florina Tufescu, and James O’Maley, I thank you for kindly reading and
responding to earlier versions of my chapters.
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I thank my Ph.D. examiners, Stefano Evangelista and Joseph Bristow.

Many of Evangelista suggestions for revision have been incorporated in
my chapters on Wilde’s travel poetry and his North American lecture
tour. Joe’s response encouraged me to envisage my Ph.D. as a book. His
detailed feedback and expert knowledge have helped me through the
revision process. Importantly, Joe is a meticulous editor who has enabled
me to achieve a higher standard of research.
I thank Kathleen Riley, Alastair Blanshard, and Iarla Manny for invit-
ing me to contribute to their essay collection, Oscar Wilde and Classical
Antiquity. Kathleen’s suggestions have strengthened my analysis of The
Soul of Man and “The Critic as Artist.” I also acknowledge the anony-
mous scholar who reviewed my manuscript; their thoughtful comments
helped me to improve the overall structure and readability of this book.
I thank Ben Doyle and Camille Davies, my editors at Palgrave. Ben
saw the potential in my work and the team at Palgrave have made it pos-
sible for me to share my ideas with a global audience. Camille has helped
me to navigate the administrative and technical details associated with
this project. I have worked closely with my editor, Larissa Tittl, a fellow
Wildean, who prepared the index for this book.
I would also like to the thank the staff at the New York Historical
Society and the University of Washington Libraries for granting me the
permission to reproduce copyrighted images in this book. I thank Merlin
Holland for allowing me to reproduce a list of Wilde’s notes to the
Symposium, as well as material from Wilde’s letters, which remain under
copyright.
I dedicate this book to my mother, Annie. I could not have seen this
project to completion without her unwavering support. Finally, I want
to thank the members of my family, Mary, Julie, Jason, Shelley, Richard,
Lauren, and my close friend Sarah, for helping me along this path.
Thank you for standing by me through all of the highs and lows.
CONTENTS
1 Introduction: Greek Forms and Gothic Cloisters 1

1 Oscar Wilde and Oxford 3
2 The Oxford Classical Curriculum 7
3 Wilde Scholarship and the Classics 12
4 Chapter Outlines 15
Bibliography 28
2 Popery and Paganism: Divided Loyalties in the Travel

Poems 31
1 Roman Catholicism in Context 33
2 Going Over to Rome 41
3 Impressions of Greece and Rome 47
Bibliography 74
3 American Beauty: Aestheticism Across the Atlantic 79

1 The Arrival 81
2 Theories in Practice 96
3 Aestheticism and Practical Education 104
4 Impressions of America 108
Bibliography 120
ix
x CONTENTS
4 Civilizing England: Oxford, Empire, and Aesthetic

Education 123
1 The Formation of Greats 127
2 The Tyranny of Work 133
3 Oxford and Aesthetic Consumption 139
Bibliography 156
5 Fervent Friendships: Oxford Platonism and The Picture

of Dorian Gray 159
1 Eros According to Jowett and Pater 164
2 The Picture of Dorian Gray and the Aesthetics of Desire 173
Bibliography 204
6 Wilde and Douglas: Redefining the Beloved 209

1 Classicism in the Courtroom 213
2 Finding Fault 219
3 Finding Christ 232
Bibliography 254
Epilogue: Some Thoughts on Aesthetic Education 257
Appendix: Notes from Oscar Wilde’s Copy of the Symposium 261
Index 265
LIST OF FIGURES
Chapter 3
Fig. 1 Portrait of Oscar Wilde, “number 16,” 1882 (Photograph
by Napoleon Sarony. Library of Congress, Washington) 85
Fig. 2 J. H. Ryley in the role of Bunthorne from a production
of Patience, 1881 (Photograph by Marc Gambier, University
of Washington Libraries, Special Collections, negative number
UW36077) 86
Fig. 3 Oscar Wilde with Richard D’Oyly Carte and Bunthorne.
“Aestheticism as Oscar Wilde understands it.” (Cover illustration
from the Daily Graphic, 11 January 1882. New-York Historical
Society, image number 47,832) 89
Fig. 4 Oscar Wilde admiring the American dollar. “Aestheticism
as Oscar Wilde understands it.” (Cover illustration from
the Daily Graphic, 11 January 1882. New-York Historical
Society, image number 47,832) 90
Fig. 5 Portrait of Oscar Wilde, “number 22,” 1882 (Photograph
by Napoleon Sarony, Library of Congress, Washington) 95
xi
CHAPTER 1
Introduction:
Greek Forms and Gothic Cloisters
When Oscar Wilde was in his third year at Oxford, in 1877, he

completed a personal questionnaire in a Confessions Album. 1
Contributors were asked to list their ambitions, favourite artists, and
authors and to note the character traits they most admired in them-
selves and others. When responding to the question, “What is your
aim in life?” Wilde wrote that he wanted to achieve “Success: fame or
even notoriety.”2 By the time the trials for gross indecency took place in
1895, he had experienced a sudden and traumatic shift between these
two forms of success. Wilde’s achievements as an author were eclipsed
by the trials, which exposed his sexual relationships with young men and
resulted in a two-year prison sentence. This historically significant turn
of events has led many scholars to concentrate on the literature that
Wilde produced in the 1890s. This book, however, emphasizes that
Wilde began his career as a promising young classicist and that his
public profile began to take shape while he was at Oxford.
When commenting on Wilde’s academic history, Linda Dowling
reminds us: “Wilde would have been famous beyond Oxford for his
Newdigate and his Double First. As it was, his First was widely known
to have been the best of his year.” 3 Dowling’s study, Hellenism and
Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford (1994), has been most influential in
establishing the significance of Wilde’s background as a student of the
Classics. In recent years, the collective efforts to publish and analyse
archival material from Wilde’s undergraduate years has meant that we
© The Author(s) 2019 1

L. Grech, Oscar Wilde’s Aesthetic Education,
Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14374-9_1
2 L. GRECH
know much more about the literature and philosophical theories that he
studied at Oxford. We also have the advantage of referring to Wilde’s
letters, notebooks, and early essays to learn more about this important
period in his intellectual life.
Wilde’s identity as a classically trained intellectual has gained more
attention as scholars have started to focus on Wilde’s reception of
Classical literature. While this area of scholarship is gaining momentum,
so far, Iain Ross’s Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece (2013) is the only
comprehensive study which considers the influential teachers and texts
that Wilde encountered while studying at Trinity College and Magdalen
College.4 Ross’s study has done much to strengthen our view of Wilde
as a classical scholar, but so far most of the research on this subject
has arisen from a handful of articles and book chapters which look to
Classicism as another way to contextualize Wilde’s sexual politics. 5 The
present book offers a different approach, one that is anchored the history
surrounding Classical studies at Oxford and Wilde’s conceptualization of
aestheticism as an alternative style of education.
Oscar Wilde’s Aesthetic Education charts the development of Wilde’s
aesthetic philosophy, beginning with his undergraduate writing, and
ending with his prison letter, which was addressed to his lover, Lord
Alfred Bruce Douglas. My study adopts a narrative approach that
outlines the path that Wilde took to become a career-aesthete after he
completed his studies at Magdalen College, Oxford. The history of
Wilde’s connection to Oxford is introduced with reference to earlier
texts, such as his Oxford letters (1876–1877), travel poetry (1877–
1879), and American lectures (1882). My focus on Oxford Classicism also
delivers a new approach to interpreting Wilde’s well-known literary
works, including “The Critic as Artist” (1890, revised 1891 and 1894),
The Soul of Man (1891), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890, revised 1891),
and Wilde’s prison letter (composed between late 1896 and early 1897).
In framing Wilde as a classically trained intellectual, I argue that Wilde’s
literature and aesthetic theory speaks to the consumer public and
encourages them to create an intellectual life for themselves via the
Aesthetic Movement. The expression “aesthetic education” relates to
Wilde’s vision of aestheticism as a self-directed learning process or a mode
of self-culture, which is motivated by a desire to recognize beauty, in all
of its variegated forms, and to derive pleasure from aesthetic
appreciation.6 Of course, this style of learning could only extend to those
who had a disposable income and the leisure time to make art an integral
part of their everyday life.
1 INTRODUCTION: GREEK FORMS AND GOTHIC CLOISTERS
The aim of this study is to show that Wilde used the culture of the
Aesthetic Movement to maintain an intellectual relationship with
Oxford. As a promoter of aestheticism, Wilde invited his audience to
view the home as an intellectual domain where they could recreate the
world of the university. Consumers could capture some of Oxford’s
medieval aesthetic by decorating their homes with arts and crafts style
furnishings that were inspired by medieval designs. Moreover, the dia-
logic structure of “The Critic as Artist” and the exchanges that take
place between the characters in The Picture of Dorian Gray both rec-
reate the intimacy of the college tutorial. These works also serve as a
reminder that Plato’s philosophy could be approached through a reading
of Wilde’s aesthetic literature.
1 OSCAR WILDE AND OXFORD

Initially, Oscar Wilde moved to Oxford because he intended to pursue
a career as a Classical scholar and believed that having a degree from
Oxford would improve his chances of gaining a fellowship. Before
beginning his studies in England, he received an elite Classical educa-
tion in Ireland. He was introduced to Classical studies at Portora Royal
School, Enniskillen, where he developed a talent for composing “deft
and mellifluous oral translations from Thucydides, Plato and Virgil” and
won an award for his translation of Aeschylus’s Agamemnon.7 In his
late teens, he continued his studies at Trinity College Dublin for three
years, after being awarded a scholarship (1871–1874). During his time
at Trinity, Wilde began to explore his interest in Roman Catholicism
and befriended his ancient history tutor, Reverend John Pentland
Mahaffy. Mahaffy was struck by Wilde’s “aptitude for, and keen delight
in, Hellenic studies,” and became Wilde’s earliest academic mentor.8
Likewise, Wilde admired Mahaffy enough to maintain contact with him
while he was at Oxford and even joined him on trips to Italy and Greece.
In 1874, Wilde left Trinity before completing his degree because he
had secured another scholarship (known as a demyship) at Magdalen
College. By the time that Wilde was nearing the completion of his sec-
ond degree in 1878, his plans for the future were much more uncertain.
His father, Sir William Wilde, had died in 1876, leaving the family in
debt, and as final exams were looming, Wilde feared that he was nearing
the awful prospect of “leaving Oxford and doing some horrid work to
earn bread.”9 But Wilde set this fear aside after winning the Newdigate
4 L. GRECH
English Verse Prize for Ravenna (1878) and achieving his First in Literæ
Humaniores (or “Greats”) in close succession. Literæ Humaniores was
the official name of the examination in Classical studies, but it was com-
monly referred to as “Greats” because the literary component of the
exam focused on “the best authors from humane literature.” 10 Despite
Wilde’s impressive academic achievements, he was not offered a fellow-
ship at Magdalen—and we can only speculate as to why a fellowship
eluded him.
Wilde’s closest friends sensed that his attitude towards academic
work was rather ambivalent. In his memoir, In Victorian Days (1939), Sir
David Hunter-Blair recalls a conversation that took place while he and
Wilde were together at Magdalen. A close mutual friend named William
Ward asked Wilde to describe his plans for the future; Wilde answered:
“God knows … I won’t be a dried-up Oxford don, anyhow. I’ll be a
poet, a writer, a dramatist. Somehow or other I’ll be famous, and if not
famous, I’ll be notorious.”11 This strangely prophetic comment indicates
that Wilde was aware that the work of a don was far from glamorous.
In the latter half of the nineteenth century, tutors at Oxford colleges
were responsible for coaching their students to perform well under
exam conditions, and the demands of teaching left them with little time
for writing and independent research. Oxford dons spent most of their
professional life correcting translations, reading texts with their
students, and questioning their tutees on their interpretations, as well as
preparing their own commentaries on the sources that were studied for
the Moderations and Greats exams. 12 Wilde’s response to Ward is in
keeping with the sentiments that he expressed in the Confessions Album.
When speaking among his friends, Wilde claimed that he would choose a
life in the public eye over an academic position. Of course, he was much
more cautious in practice and only gravitated towards London after
discovering that academic positions were scarce.
Before leaving Oxford, Wilde applied for a fellowship at Trinity
College and made inquiries about commencing an archaeology stu-
dentship in Athens. It was at this time that he began to work on aca-
demic pieces of writing. Wilde corresponded with the publisher, George
Macmillan, and mentioned that he was interested in translating selec-
tions from Herodotus.13 He also offered to edit a translation of one of
Euripides’s plays, “either the Mad Hercules or the Phoenissae: plays with
which [he was] well acquainted.”14 Macmillan was receptive to this idea,
but, as far as we know, Wilde did not deliver any of his translations or
commentaries.15 Around the same time, Wilde produced an essay on
“Historical Criticism” for the Chancellor’s English Essay prize in 1879.
The judges decided not to award any prizes and the essay remained bur-
ied in the archives for over a century, until Phillip E. Smith and Michael
S. Helfand mentioned this work in their Introduction to Oscar Wilde’s
Oxford Notebooks (1989).16 More recently, the essay has been published
alongside Wilde’s critical essays in volume IV of The Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde.17
When it seemed as though the doors to the academy had closed on
him, Wilde relocated to London and created new opportunities for him-
self as a celebrity aesthete. Although he left Oxford, he continued to
mention this inspiring place in his personal and published writing. John
Dougill has observed that Wilde is one of many former students who
retrospectively idealized Oxford as “a cloistered utopia, a student para-
dise, or an Athenian city-state.” 18 This imagery is most apparent in Frank
Harris’s account of Wilde’s impressions of Oxford in Oscar Wilde: His
Life and Confessions (1916). Harris is not the most reliable biographer,
yet he touches on some key ideas that are central to Wilde’s literary rep-
resentation of Oxford:
I was the happiest man in the world when I entered Magdalen for the
first time. Oxford—the mere word to me is full of an inexpressible, an
incommunicable charm. Oxford—the home of lost causes and impossible
ideals; Matthew Arnold’s Oxford—with its dreaming spires and grey
colleges, set in velvet lawns and hidden away among the trees, and
about it the beautiful fields, all starred with cowslips and fritillaries where
the quiet river winds its way to London and the sea. … Oxford was
paradise to me. My very soul seemed to expand within me to peace and
joy. Oxford—the enchanted valley, holding in its flowerlet cup all the
idealism of the middle ages. Oxford is the capital of romance, Frank; in its
own way as memorable as Athens, and to me it was even more
entrancing.19
Harris’s reconstructed Wildean dialogue responds to the intellectual cul-

ture and the beautiful scenery that is contained within and around the
historic walls of the colleges. Even now, students and visitors who tour
the colleges are impressed by the manicured lawns and gardens that sur-
round the medieval cloisters. Magdalen College is still bordered by a
serene tree-lined walk that winds its way alongside the River Cherwell.
6 L. GRECH
The medieval heritage of the university fuses with its history as

the seat of Classical learning in England, and, as Harris suggests,
Wilde referred to Oxford and Athens interchangeably. We can notice
a similar pattern in a letter that Wilde wrote to a Cambridge student
named Henry C. Marillier in 1885. 20 In this letter, he briefly reflected
on his student days: “I remember bright young faces, and grey misty
quadran- gles, Greek forms passing through Gothic cloisters, life
playing among ruins, and, what I love best in the world, Poetry and
Paradox dancing together!”21 In this image of Oxford, the university
students morph into bright, white Classical sculptures, set against the
backdrop of the grey Gothic architecture. Oxford is both English and
Greek: an ancient institution that remains forever young. Oxford
might be called the “capital of romance,” not only for the beauty of its
landscape but also because the teachers of Wilde’s era aspired to
recreate the dialogue exchange of an Athenian symposium with their
students: the bright, sculpturesque youths who lived, learned, and
played together amid the cloisters. We should not forget that the
colleges at Oxford were exclusively male communities for students of
Wilde’s generation. The first residential hall for women (Lady Margaret
Hall) opened in 1878; the year that Wilde completed his degree.
Oxford is also imbued with nostalgia because the university symbol-
izes the period before Wilde inhabited the commercial world of London,
where he established himself as a professional writer. As an aesthetic
theorist, critic, and fiction writer, Wilde had to contend with a highly
competitive and fractured literary marketplace. 22 Although he critiqued
the bourgeois consumer public in his writing (both anonymous and
signed), he needed to accommodate the tastes and interests of this
audience to promote his brand of aestheticism. If we turn to Harris’s
biography once more, we see that another part of Oxford’s charm was its
isolation from the “sordid” industrial world, where graduates would go
to enter a profession and earn a living:
In Oxford, as in Athens, the realities of sordid life were kept at a distance.

No one seemed to know anything about money or care anything about it.
Everywhere the aristocratic feeling; one must have money, but must not
bother about it. And all the appurtenances of life were perfect: the food,
the wine, the cigarettes; the common needs of life became artistic symbols,
our clothes even won meaning and significance. I almost reformed fashion
and made modern dress aesthetically beautiful; a second greater reforma-
tion, Frank.23
The reference to the aristocratic atmosphere of the university is perti-

nent, as the exclusivity of Classical studies helped to ensure that power-
ful leadership roles would remain within the hands of the ruling class. 24
Stefano Evangelista highlights some of the ideological implications of a
Classical education when he states that “Greek became the language not
only of the intellectual, but of the social and political elites, for whom
a classics degree (typically from Oxford) was the first step into a career
in Parliament, in the Civil Service, or in the Church—that is, in some
of the major institutions of the Empire.”25 Following the 1850 Royal
Commission into the financial and operational management of the col-
leges at Oxford and Cambridge, reformers and philanthropists invested
in making Oxford more accessible to international students and local
students with lower incomes. But, for the most part, Oxford continued
to operate as an elite institution which afforded students the chance to
establish ties with young aristocrats and future statesmen. Wilde did not
seek out a career in politics. Nor did he entertain thoughts of joining
the clergy. At one point, however, Wilde applied to become an Inspector
of Schools, and he called on the assistance of political contacts that he
knew from Oxford (see Chapter 4). He also used his Oxford credentials
to substantiate his popular identity as a discriminating consumer and a
champion of aesthetic reform.
2 THE OXFORD CLASSICAL CURRICULUM

The rise of Hellenic studies at Oxford contributed to the broader cul-
tural movement known as the English Hellenic revival. Roman litera-
ture and history had dominated the curriculum from the Renaissance to
the Regency era, but this changed at the turn of the nineteenth century.
The study of Greek language and literature emerged as a new exciting
discipline in England, and this development was reflected in the Literæ
Humaniores exam, which was first introduced in 1800. Originally, this
exam tested students’ ability to translate Classical sources and their
knowledge of religion. In 1807, the scope of the exam was broadened to
include philosophical texts on rhetoric, logic, moral philosophy, along-
side mathematics and physics.26
In the early days, language skills were essential for success in Literæ
Humaniores because students were expected to pass an oral examina-
tion (known as a viva voce) that involved translating Classical texts on
the spot, in front of examiners and an audience of students.27 It was
8 L. GRECH
necessary to ensure that students had a rudimentary grasp of the subject

matter before they were subjected to the public viva, and so, in 1808,
the Responsions exam was introduced. Responsions was a preliminary
viva that (in L. W. B. Brockliss’s words) “tested a candidate on at least
two works of Greek and Latin, the rudiments of logic, and Euclid’s
Elements.”28 The Responsions exam could be taken during the first year
of study or early in the second year. For students of Wilde’s generation,
Responsions functioned more like an unofficial entrance exam. It could
be taken before commencing the Arts degree, or within the first term
of residence, and was used to confirm that new students had mastered
enough Greek, Latin, and mathematics at school, before they began their
studies in earnest.
As student numbers began to increase, it became impossible for the
university to continue with the time consuming, not to mention stress-
ful, process of running individual oral examinations. Written exam
papers were introduced in 1825, but standardized exam papers for
Literæ Humaniores were issued in 1831. 29 From this point on, essay
writing became integral to the exam system and the study of philoso-
phy gained much more importance at Oxford. It was around this time
(following the 1830 Exam Statute) that Greek and Roman history were
added to the curriculum. This was a significant change because the study
of history created an opportunity for students to draw on the work of
contemporary historians to inform their interpretation of Classical
sources. The combination of ancient and modern texts was to become
a defining feature of Greats, especially as philosophy began to dominate
the curriculum in the latter half of the nineteenth century.
Students’ academic performance was largely determined through
written exam papers, but they still had to complete a viva. In 1830, the
viva had transformed into a religious exam, known as Divinity (or
“Divvers”), and, until 1883, it was conducted in front of an audience,
much like the early Greats exam.30 In order to pass this exam, students
needed to demonstrate their knowledge of the Thirty-Nine Articles,
biblical history, and make use of quotes from the scriptures. 31 Although
Oxford was no longer operating as a religious institution by the end of
the nineteenth century, Arts students were not allowed to graduate
unless they had passed Divinity.32
When Wilde took the Divinity exam in 1876, he failed spectacularly.
It started off badly because he had confused the dates of his exams and
had to be summoned from bed by the Clerk of Schools.33 When he met
with the examiner, W. H. Spooner, he offered a nonchalant apology:

“You must excuse me. I have no experience of these pass examina-
tions.”34 This response suggests that Wilde was a proud honours student
who probably viewed the exam as a waste of time. Honours students
had to manage much heavier reading loads than pass students, who were
assessed with shorter question and answer based exams. The other main
difference was that honours students had their results published and
ranked in classes ranging from first, second, third, and fourth, whereas
“pass men” obtained either a pass or fail on their exams.
Spooner was not impressed with Wilde’s candour, and as a pun-
ishment, he ordered him to copy Chapter 27 from the Acts of the
Apostles.35 To his surprise, Wilde happily took to the task and continued
copying the text when he was instructed to stop. When Spooner quizzed
him about this behaviour, Wilde explained that he was so engrossed in
the story of Paul’s shipwreck that he wanted to find out whether Paul
had survived. The joke did not end there. Wilde followed up with a
cheeky remark: “[D]o you know, Mr Spooner, he was saved; and when
I found that he was saved, I thought of coming to tell you.” 36 Spooner
was not impressed and failed Wilde for his antics.
The Classical curriculum underwent one more major change in 1850,
when Moderations (“Mods.”) was established as a precursor to Greats.
Moderations focused on composition in Greek and Latin, rhetoric, logic,
and mathematics. Mathematics remained as an optional subject, but, as
Richard Jenkyns has pointed out, “the core of it was the study of lit-
erary texts, principally the poets and orators.”37 Moderations was taken
towards the end of the second year, but it was generally regarded as an
introductory exam, compared to Greats. Students who opted for the
pass exam were tested on one Greek and one Latin author, but for hon-
ours students like Wilde, the reading load increased fourfold. 38 A com-
pulsory reading list was introduced in 1872, which meant that honours
students needed to concentrate on reading Homer, Virgil, Demosthenes,
and Cicero’s speeches.39 A further adjustment was made in 1886, when
it was decided that students should also know about the stylistic features
and literary history associated with the set texts.40
The range of Greek literature had expanded considerably by the
time that Wilde was preparing for Mods. He was examined in 1876 and
had the option of studying Classical drama (Aeschylus, Euripides, and
Sophocles), comedy (Aristophanes), lyric poetry (Pindar), pastoral
poetry (Theocritus), philosophy (Plato), or historical writing
(Thucydides), but
10 L. GRECH
no Roman authors were included on the list. 41 Wilde wrote a paper on

the history of Greek drama (in which he referred to Aristotle’s Poetics),
and he also produced a paper on Logic.42 We know more about Wilde’s
viva because he described it in a letter to his friend Ward. When Wilde
was questioned about Homer’s Odyssey in the exam, he spoke about
“epic poetry in general, dogs, and women.”43 Afterwards, when the topic
of Aeschylus’s plays was raised, Wilde and his examiner shared an enjoy-
able conversation about “Shakespeare, Walt Whitman and the Poetics.”44
From Wilde’s account, we can see that the Moderations exam gave
students the licence to approach Ancient Greek literature as part of the
broader corpus of Western poetry. The result was that Aeschylus and
Aristotle could be grouped together with Shakespeare and Whitman.
This type of discourse, however, was in keeping with the style of analysis
that was expected of students in Greats.
By all accounts, Greats was the most rigorous part of the Oxford
Classical curriculum and it was undertaken in the third or fourth year
of study. This final series of exams mainly focused on history and phi-
losophy; however, Greats also included a language component which
involved commenting on the philological features of an ancient liter-
ary work. Richard Jenkyns suggests that Greats can be summed up as
a history of ideas based on “the reading and analysis of classical texts
that were acknowledged to be masterpieces.”45 It aimed to provide
students with a broad knowledge of ancient thought and Classical civ-
ilization. This generalist programme of study was considered to be a
valuable character-building exercise that provided young men with the
moral and intellectual make-up to serve their society and succeed in
any profession.46 Greats remained compulsory until 1864, although
the old system of mandatory Classical education was still maintained
through the Moderations exam.47 From 1850 onwards, students had to
pass Moderations in order to obtain their Arts degree, and this ensured
that they spent their first year studying Classics, whether they wanted to
continue with Greats or not.48
Both Plato’s Republic and Aristotle’s Ethics were the core Classical
texts studied in philosophy, but these sources were supplemented with
a wide range of modern authors that included Enlightenment philoso-
phers from England and Germany, as well as nineteenth-century econ-
omists, political theorists, and some scientific writers. The emphasis on
Plato and Aristotle is evident in the Philosophy Notebook that Wilde
used as he was studying for Greats, between 1876 and 1877. The most
mentioned source in the notebook is Aristotle’s Ethics, and, according to

Simon Reader, this source “forms the background against which Wilde
compares other philosophies, in particular those of Plato and Francis
Bacon.”49 The Philosophy Notebook also features Wilde’s responses to
the ideas of John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer, Immanuel Kant, and
David Hume, among many others.50 The combination of ancient and
modern sources invited students to reflect on contemporary political
and social issues through the lens of Classical studies. In some cases, the
exam questions overtly reflected the contemporary focus of Greats. For
example, the exam paper for 1870 (Trinity term) instructed students to
comment on the ways in which “Plato’s Republic anticipate[d] the prob-
lems of modern society.”51
Ancient history was studied along similar lines, using historical
writers from antiquity (Thucydides was a key source) alongside modern
histories of Ancient Greece and Rome. Students needed to write one
paper on a period from Greek history and another on a period from
Roman history, and, despite the new advances in archaeology and
epigraphy, the study of ancient history was still anchored in literary
evidence.52 But, by 1878, which is the year that Wilde was examined in
Greats, it was possible for students to mention ancient artefacts in their
history paper.53
Unfortunately, Wilde does not say very much about his final exams in
his letters. In most of the correspondence that survives from this period,
we see Wilde’s replies to congratulatory messages about his First. We
know that Wilde was preparing to write on the Ethics and the Republic
because he asked for Ward’s notes on these two texts (see Chapter 4).
This request is not surprising, given that Plato and Aristotle were the
pillars of the Greats curriculum. Interestingly, Wilde provided an evocative
description of Greats when he wrote to James Rennell Rodd (who was
another Oxford friend), in 1880.54 Rodd had just won the Newdigate
poetry prize and this achievement prompted Wilde to remember Greats
as “the only sphere of thought where one can be, simultaneously, brilliant
and unreasonable, speculative and well-informed, creative as well as
critical, and write with all the passion of youth about the truths which
belong to the august serenity of old age.”55 In a light-hearted way, Wilde
encapsulated the student’s desire to sound “brilliant” and “well-
informed” on the written exams. He did not care to mention the immense
volume of reading and years of preparation that were needed to achieve
this end. Added to this was the “speculative,” “creative” knack for finding
plausible parallels between Ancient Greece and Rome and Britain’s age of
industrial and imperial expansion.
12 L. GRECH
When commenting on Wilde’s letter, Dowling recognizes the signs of

the “Oxford temper”: a phrase that Wilde would later use to denote the
type of intellect that was acquired through Greats. 56 For Dowling, the
“Oxford temper” is characterized by the ability to hold opposing points
of view and to play with ideas in an “insouciant, apparently effortless”
manner.57 Yet, the influence of Oxford is often downplayed in Wilde
scholarship, possibly because (as William F. Shuter states) “the qualities
that Wilde admired in Greats resemble so closely the qualities he culti-
vated in his own critical prose.” 58 In Oscar Wilde’s Aesthetic Education, I
hope to make this intellectual exchange more visible through an in-depth
study that links Wilde’s aestheticism with the legacy of the Oxford
Classical curriculum.
3 WILDE SCHOLARSHIP AND THE CLASSICS

Since the 1990s, scholars have started to consider the role that Classical
studies have played in Victorian literature and culture. Dowling’s
research on the reformers and writers who were involved in shaping the
Greats curriculum has been most influential in positioning Wilde as an
intellectual who fits within the milieu of Victorian Oxford. Dowling’s
study acknowledges the role that Benjamin Jowett, the Regius Professor
of Greek, played in paving the way for the English Platonic revival. The
mid-century reforms to the Greats exam heralded a shift towards a secu-
larized Classical curriculum and radically increased the level of personal
interaction between tutors and students. Dowling argues that this transi-
tion inspired a positive homosexual discourse that emerged in the
writing of Oxford intellectuals such as Walter Pater, John Addington
Symonds, and Wilde. She identifies Wilde as an author who appropriates
the imperialist, socially regenerative ideology of Greats in order “to
justify male love in ideal or transcendental terms: [as] the ‘spiritual
procreancy’ associated specifically with Plato’s Symposium and more
generally with Ancient Greece itself.” 59 On the one hand, my book builds
on Dowling’s research by addressing Benjamin Jowett’s connection with
the Indian Civil Service (ICS), as well as exploring the rhetoric of empire
that Wilde deploys in works like “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of
Man. On the other hand, my reading of The Picture of Dorian Gray and
Wilde’s prison letter challenges Dowling’s argument, as I believe that
Wilde evokes this positive discourse to undermine the Victorian
construct of eros (or Platonic love) as a “noble” and “intellectual”
friendship.60
Dowling’s research has generated a new wave of scholarship which

focuses on the correlation between Victorian Classicism and Wilde’s
sexual politics. By comparison, Evangelista positions Wilde’s
aestheticism in relation to other homosexual and lesbian authors of the
Victorian era, including Walter Pater, Vernon Lee, and Michael Field (the
professional name of the co-authors Katharine Bradley and Edith
Cooper). In particular, Evangelista recognizes the influence that Pater’s
and Symonds’s respective works of aesthetic scholarship had on Wilde. 61
Their writings provided Wilde with examples of ways to discuss male
homoeroticism in a legitimate manner, through pioneering scholarship
on Ancient Greek culture and Classical aesthetics. According to
Evangelista, Wilde drew on Classical and contemporary literary sources
to create a language of homosexual desire that he filtered through a
coded aesthetic discourse. I would add that such claims can be extended
to include Jowett’s role as a popular commentator and translator of
Plato’s dialogues. My analysis of Jowett’s introduction to The Symposium
will show that Jowett contributed to the positive homoerotic discourse
that Dowling and Evangelista have noted.
Our knowledge of Wilde’s engagement with contemporary debates
relating to archaeology and Classical scholarship has been greatly
enhanced through Ross’s research in Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece.
Ross draws on archival sources (including manuscripts, notes, anno-
tated books, and reading lists) relating to the curriculum at Trinity and
Magdalen to provide a historical overview of the books and ideas that
Wilde was exposed to as an undergraduate. Ross also addresses Wilde’s
attempts to pursue and support archaeological research in the 1870s. He
argues that Wilde helped to popularize this emerging science through
his journalistic work, although it seemed to “[threaten] the romantic,
humanist, text-based Hellenism to which he claimed allegiance” as a
student of the Classics.62 In Wilde’s critical prose, however, the atten-
tion shifts from archaeology towards the philosophies of Aristotle and
Plato. Interestingly, Ross’s study of “The Critic as Artist,” The Soul of
Man, and The Picture of Dorian Gray emphasizes “Wilde’s indebted-
ness to Aristotle” because he believes that the link with Plato has been
adequately covered by Evangelista and Dowling. 63 I disagree with Ross
on this point, as my book offers a different overview of Wilde’s literary
career and acknowledges the ways in which Wilde’s relationship with
Oxford and Plato’s philosophy changed as he continued to modify his
ideas about aesthetic theory and practice.
14 L. GRECH
A further notable area of research relates to the process of gender

formation that was instilled at English public schools and universities.
Daniel Orrells’s Classical Culture and Modern Masculinity (2011) is
a significant work which examines the reception of Plato’s dialogues
in literature that was produced by classically educated men in England
and Germany, between 1750 and 1930. Orrells’s research encompasses
a broader cultural-historical framework, as he maps the evolution of
German historicist scholarship. In addition to Dowling’s work, this study
offers a good basis for understanding the trajectory of Jowett’s academic
history, given that Jowett began his career as a historicist theologian
and was instrumental in promoting the rise of historicist scholarship at
Oxford. The English and German styles of theorizing masculinity and
sexuality have led Orrells to question whether the modern terms “homo-
sexual” and “heterosexual” should be applied to writers like Wilde.
Orrells departs from the approaches that Dowling and Evangelista have
adopted, as he is critical of the objective to “[uncover] a continuous
history of covert, secretive (even subversive), homosexual identification
with antiquity.”64 Instead, Orrells proposes “that Greek pederastic ped-
agogy permitted many sorts of men to admire and reproduce in various
modes that highly intense form of education.” 65 He draws attention to
the symbolic licence that is attached to the ambiguous, classicized lan-
guage that Wilde employs when referring to male-male relations, as an
author, and in his court testimony.
I have chosen to blend these approaches when addressing Wilde’s
sexual politics. I prefer to adopt terms that relate to Platonic eros when
discussing male desire in The Picture of Dorian Gray and also when ana-
lysing Wilde’s relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas (a much younger
Scottish aristocrat and poet who was also educated at Oxford). In many
cases, I use the expressions “male love,” “male-male desire,” or “intel-
lectual friendship,” rather than homosexual. Orrells is right to question
this terminology, and my vocabulary reinforces the idea that Wilde was
responding to Oxford culture and the language of Plato to describe rela-
tionships that we retrospectively identify as homosexual. Bearing that in
mind, I agree with Dowling’s and Evangelista’s opinion that Wilde is
an author who manipulates the language of aestheticism to express and
portray male-male desire in coded terms. There are points when I refer
to Basil Hallward as a homosexual figure, as my study of The Picture of
Dorian Gray is influenced by the notion of the homosexual gaze. While
I am contributing to an established queer discourse, my study invites
scholars and readers to move beyond the traditional impulse to inter-

pret Hellenism as a code for homosexuality. Wilde was also inspired by
the religious culture that was fostered among the student community at
Oxford, and he was keenly aware of the political advantages of receiving
an elite Classical education. His writing also responds to the moderniza-
tion of the university, as it implies that the world of the academy could
not satisfy the aesthete’s longing to learn (at his own pace, and on his
own terms) from the contemplation of beautiful objects.
4 CHAPTER OUTLINES
The chapters that follow investigate how Wilde’s aestheticism responds
to different cultural formations that relate to Greats and the world of
Victorian Oxford. A considerable amount of research has been generated
about Wilde’s work as a writer of aesthetic fiction and criticism, but his
identity as a poet, public lecturer, and media celebrity in the 1870s and
1880s has received much less critical attention. My analysis opens with
these earlier sources because Wilde used his media exposure to present
himself as a poet and an Oxford intellectual. Most of his early poems
were first published in periodicals from Ireland, England, and America.
In 1882, he gained even more exposure through the newspaper coverage
of his North American lecture tour. Although these are ephemeral texts,
they have been included in this study to contextualize the evolution of
Wilde’s distinctive style of aestheticism. The poems and lectures intro-
duce key ideas that Wilde would revisit and develop in his later writings.
The utopian aesthetics of “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of Man
emerge in the American lectures and interviews. Likewise, the aesthet-
icization of Christ, which features in both The Soul of Man and Wilde’s
prison letter, is anticipated in poems which position Christ as a literary
figure.
Chapter 2 begins with a study of the letters and travel poems that
Wilde produced while he was a student at Magdalen. 66 These texts
reflect the prolonged spiritual crisis that he underwent as he consid-
ered the possibility of converting to Roman Catholicism. The Roman
Catholic culture at Oxford is historically linked with the Tractarian
Movement, which was religious movement that contributed to the
revival of Catholic worship in England. In the 1820s, the Tractarians
used their roles as fellows to facilitate more personal interaction with
their students, and they also reinforced the tutor’s duty as a spiritual
16 L. GRECH
teacher. After addressing Wilde’s Oxford letters, my analysis moves to a

selection of poems that mention specific sites that Wilde visited in
Greece and Rome in 1877. Wilde’s travel poetry evokes the mythic and
cultural heritage of Greece as a counterpoint to the aesthetic tradition of
the Roman Catholic Church. The Greek landscape elicits wistful elegies to
the Greek gods, tragic poets, and the mythical personae who haunt the
ancient ruins and natural scenery. At this stage, Wilde’s aestheticism was
chiefly grounded in an exploration of spiritual concerns and the
appreciation of Catholic ritual.
Chapter 3 concentrates on the transitional period following Wilde’s
graduation from Oxford. It was in London that Wilde gained recogni-
tion as an aesthete, and his fame was established through popular cari-
catures that circulated in the press and on stage. Gilbert and Sullivan’s
operetta, Patience; or Bunthorne’s Bride (1881), was the most successful
parody of the Aesthetic Movement, as personified by two self-admiring
poets named Reginald Bunthorne and Algernon Grosvenor. The char-
acterization of both Bunthorne and Grosvenor was partly inspired by
Wilde’s aestheticism. In 1882, Wilde spent ten months travelling across
North America and Canada as a touring lecturer. He was invited to lec-
ture on the English Aesthetic Movement to cross-promote the American
production of Patience.67
This chapter integrates material from Kevin O’Brien’s 1982 recon-
struction of “The Decorative Arts” and “The House Beautiful” lectures,
Hofer and Scharnhorst’s 2010 collection of Wilde’s interviews, and the
lecture notes that were first published in 1908. 68 As part of his lecturing
contract, Wilde was expected to wear an aesthetic costume that would
remind people of Bunthorne. The costume design for the New York pro-
duction of Patience also strengthened the resemblance between Wilde
and Bunthorne. The association with Bunthorne created some problems
for Wilde because Bunthorne merely assumes the identity of an aesthete
in order to impress women. I will discuss some images and newspaper
reports about Wilde’s clothing to evaluate the implications of the visual
parallel between Wilde and Bunthorne. Taken together, these sources
reveal that Wilde used the medium of fashion to communicate the design
philosophy of craftsmen and theorists associated with the Aesthetic and
Decorative Arts Movements.
The literary component of Chapter 3 draws on the published inter-
views and lectures to explore Wilde’s efforts to promote aesthetic con-
sumption to middle-class audiences. While on tour, Wilde began to speak
of the social and personal benefits of introducing aesthetic decoration

into the home. He also advertised his connection to Oxford and made
a point of mentioning that his philosophy was strongly influenced by
his encounters with the art critic John Ruskin. The 1882 tour also pre-
sented Wilde with an opportunity to define himself as an intellectual in
his own right. Contrary to Ruskin, Wilde was conscious of the important
role that consumers played in ensuring the survival of traditional forms
of craftsmanship. The mission to promote aesthetic production and con-
sumption also led Wilde to make suggestions about practical ways to
expose children to the arts and crafts at home and in schools.
Chapter 4 addresses the conflicting representations of Oxford that
arise in Wilde’s critical dialogue, “The Critic as Artist,” and in his essay,
The Soul of Man (which was originally titled “The Soul of Man under
Socialism”).69 “The Critic as Artist” is structured as a critical dialogue
between two aesthetes named Gilbert and Ernest. The work featured in
the July and September 1890 issues of the Nineteenth Century before it
was revised and re-issued in Intentions (1891): a volume that included
four critical works by Wilde. The Soul of Man is political essay that par-
odies contemporary debates between individualist and socialist writers.
The essay featured in the Fortnightly Review, in February 1891; at the
time, the journal was edited by Wilde’s friend and future biographer,
Harris (mentioned above). The Soul of Man was privately published on
30 May 1895—five days after Wilde was convicted of gross indecency.
Wilde fondly remembered Oxford as the place where young men had
the freedom to contemplate. The university, however, was not immune
to the influences of professionalization and imperialism. This aspect of
Oxford’s history is addressed through my account of Jowett’s involve-
ment in reforming the Greats syllabus in the 1850s. During this period,
Plato was officially included in the Classical curriculum and the study
of ancient history and philosophy gained prominence at Oxford. These
changes were designed to provide students with a strong philosoph-
ical education that would prepare them for leadership roles in govern-
ment administration. Jowett also influenced the development of the first
recruitment exam for the ICS. His recommendations to the ICS created
a bias in the system, which ensured that classically educated English men
would be favoured over Indian applicants.
My analysis focuses on the use of imperialist rhetoric in “The Critic
as Artist” and The Soul of Man, as both of these works question whether
England is truly a civilized nation. Importantly, I will draw attention
18 L. GRECH
to the ways that Wilde’s cultural critique corresponds with the model
of leadership that was promoted through the Greats curriculum. By
the 1890s, Wilde’s views on education had drastically changed. He
rejected the notion of practical education, and his representation of
Oxford accentuated the conflict between professional work and the aes-
thete’s devotion to beauty, a conflict that is raised in the playful dialogue
between Gilbert and Ernest in “The Critic as Artist.” This part of my
discussion points to the instances where Wilde uses his knowledge of the
Classics and Oxford culture to promote the aesthetic lifestyle.
Chapter 5 extends the history of the Platonic revival by examining
Wilde’s representation of male friendships in the revised edition of The
Picture of Dorian Gray.70 Wilde’s aesthetic novel focuses on the life of a
young aristocrat named Dorian Gray and his relationship with a super-
natural portrait that enables him to retain his youthful appearance. The
portrait becomes a shameful double that Dorian keeps hidden in the
attic of his London home. The themes of secrecy and shame are explored
in relation to the portrait, which develops hideous features that reflect
Dorian’s actual age, as well as the moral and spiritual corruption that
result from his hedonistic lifestyle. My analysis of The Picture of Dorian
Gray explores the tension between homosexual desire and the Victorian
construct of Platonic love (or eros). The love dialogues in the Symposium
reflect the Athenian cultural practice known as paiderastia (“the love
of boys”), which was a relationship involving a mature adult man and
an adolescent youth. The erastes (lover)—an elder, socially experienced
man—assumed the responsibility of teaching the boy how to be a wise
and virtuous man, and in return, the eromenos (beloved) would gratify
his lover with sexual acts. Although the paiderastic relationship served
an educational and sexual function, Victorian Classical scholars tended
to emphasize the intellectual and spiritual nature of Plato’s discourse
on male-male love. This interpretation was popularized in the 1870s
through the work of Jowett and Pater.
My discussion addresses the extent to which Wilde’s novel is influ-
enced by Jowett’s translation of Plato’s Symposium (the revised 1875
edition) and Pater’s biographical essay on the German art historian,
Winckelmann (1867), which was later included in Studies in the History
of the Renaissance (1873). But, I argue that Wilde goes a step further
than Jowett and Pater, as his portrayal of Platonic love dramatizes the
potential for failure. When I turn to an analysis of The Picture of Dorian
Gray, I focus exclusively on the dialogue interaction between Basil
Hallward and Dorian Gray. Basil repeatedly evokes the ideal of Platonic
love when he discusses his feelings for Dorian, but this premise is under-
mined by the fact that he and Dorian struggle to engage in any intel-
lectual dialogue when they are together. The relationship between Basil
and Dorian is defined by an artistic process (painting and modelling for
a portrait) that necessitates stillness and silence, and this dynamic
prefig- ures the breakdown in communication that ultimately results in
Basil’s murder.
The dialogues in The Picture of Dorian Gray provide the foundation
for the final chapter, which concentrates on Wilde’s personal approach
to Platonic love. Chapter 6 examines how Wilde elaborates on the theme
of intellectual friendship when describing his relationship with Lord
Alfred Douglas. After Wilde and Douglas met in 1891, they became lov-
ers and explored London’s elicit homosexual subculture together. Wilde
and Douglas were often seen together in public and rumours circulated
about Wilde’s homosexuality. Douglas’s father, John Sholto Douglas, the
9th Marquess of Queensberry, was infuriated when he learned about his
son’s involvement with Wilde, and he hoped to bring an end to the rela-
tionship by threatening and harassing Wilde. Queensberry’s behaviour
led Wilde to file a lawsuit against him for libel (in April 1895). The case
was withdrawn because Queensberry’s defence included witnesses who
were prepared to speak about Wilde’s sexual relationships with young
men. At the time, it was illegal for men to engage in male-male sex acts;
therefore, the evidence from the libel case led to Wilde’s arrest and pros-
ecution for committing acts of gross indecency. After enduring two crim-
inal trials, Wilde was convicted (on 25 May 1895) and sentenced to two
years imprisonment with hard labour.
Chapter 6 presents a study of Wilde’s court testimony, his love let-
ters, and his lengthy prison letter to Doulgas. My aim is to investigate
how Wilde reconciled his sexual desire for Douglas with the
Socratic/Oxonian aspiration to foster a purely intellectual and spiritual
form of intimacy. The prison letter is a unique piece of literature because
Wilde expresses his anger towards Douglas in this work, but he also
engages in a critical discussion on the aesthetics of sorrow. Several ver-
sions of the prison letter have been published over the course of the
twentieth century. The earliest version of this text was released by
Robert Ross (Wilde’s friend and literary executor) in 1905 and 1908,
under the title, De Profundis. In these editions, Ross reproduced Wilde’s
reflections on Christ and omitted the details relating to his tumultuous
20 L. GRECH
affair with Douglas. For a long time, the entire text was not available
to scholars because it was stored in the British Museum Library for fifty
years.71 Wilde’s account of his relationship with Douglas was first made
public when Wilde’s youngest son, Vyvyan Holland published Epistola,
In Carcere et Vinculis in 1949. This book was based on a typed copy
of Wilde’s original manuscript. In 1962, Rupert Hart-Davis released a
new edition based on Wilde’s handwritten manuscript; this publication
marked the point when scholars and readers were able to access a com-
plete version of Wilde’s text. I will be referring to Hart-Davis’s text,
which is reproduced in The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde (2000).
When Wilde was questioned about his relationship with Douglas in
all of the three criminal cases, he emphasized that he admired Douglas
because he was a poet and an intellectual. As the trials were taking
place, Wilde wrote passionate love letters to Douglas and reflected on
the artistic inspiration that he derived from the relationship. The love
letters from this period also position Douglas as a Christ-like beloved.
This is a significant detail, as it shows that Wilde was encompassing the
figure of Christ in his Platonic discourse before he was sent to prison.
My analysis of Wilde’s prison letter suggests that Christ supplants
Douglas’s role as the poet-lover who inspires Wilde’s art. In this work,
Wilde’s intention is to dramatize his suffering and create a compelling
narrative about the events leading up to his imprisonment. This means
that some of the accusations against Douglas are unreliable, and in some
cases, untrue. Yet, there is a prevailing sense that Wilde wanted to
forgive Douglas. In addressing the prison letter to Douglas, Wilde
endeavoured to share some of the important spiritual realizations that
he discovered in prison.
I have chosen a selection of texts that situate Wilde as an Oxford
intellectual who inhabited the domain of mainstream popular culture.
As an undergraduate, Wilde launched his literary career by publishing
religious poetry in periodicals that targeted an audience of Irish
Catholic readers, such as the Pilot in Boston and the Irish Monthly in
Dublin. But, Wilde’s notion of “aesthetic education” began to take
shape when he was in America. The 1882 lecture tour gave Wilde the
chance to utilize popular entertainment platforms like newspaper inter-
views and public lectures to inform Americans about the philosophical
message of the Aesthetic Movement. When Wilde spoke about the dec-
orative arts, he endeavoured to show Americans that aestheticism could
be embraced as a vehicle for social change. This message was somewhat

distorted by the commercialized incarnation of aestheticism, which
spawned characters like Bunthorne and generated a demand for Wilde’s
public appearances across America. For this reason, it was necessary
for Wilde to modify his celebrity image by referring to his history at
Oxford.
By the 1890s, Wilde did not need to explicitly state this connection
in his writing. In both “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of Man, the
university is inextricably linked with empire, and as such, it symbolizes
the Establishment. In these works, Wilde challenges the authority of
Oxford by urging individuals to take charge of their own education. Of
course, aesthetic education had to take place in a beautiful domestic set-
ting which could stimulate the mind and the senses. It is also crucial to
acknowledge that Wilde staged his transition from being an anonymous
journalistic critic to a published literary author by reissuing criticism and
fiction that first appeared in periodicals as books that were designed to
be consumed as aesthetic objects. Both “The Critic as Artist” and The
Picture of Dorian Gray are two works that helped to position Wilde as
a key player who contributed to the literary culture of aestheticism. In
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde’s pedagogical trajectory takes a darker
turn. Although the ideal of “intellectual love” is at the heart of Basil’s
aesthetic theory, the novel subtly responds to the education culture at
Oxford: a culture that encouraged teacher–student intimacy and, at
the same time, prohibited the expression of homosexual desire. Wilde’s
novel implies that this culture of prohibition warped Basil’s understand-
ing of eros, to such an extent that he could effectively use Plato to justify
his objectification of Dorian.
Wilde’s prison letter to Douglas represents the end of Wilde’s life
in the public eye, but, it is also a work that represents the culmination
of Wilde’s aesthetic philosophy. The lesson here is very personal as the
silences in this work reveal that Wilde could not live up to the Oxford
ideal. Wilde returned to spiritual writing to make sense of the tremen-
dous suffering he experienced because of his love for Douglas. The
experience of being imprisoned compelled Wilde to return to spiritual
inquiry and to re-establish his relationship with Christ. Although Wilde
provides an unflattering representation of Douglas, the memory of
his lover is forever enshrined in this incredibly personal and profound
aesthetic text.
22 L. GRECH
NOTES
1. Wilde was in Ireland when he completed this questionnaire. He had been
sent down from Oxford for six months after missing the beginning of
the Easter term. See Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New York: Alfred A.
Knopf, 1988 [c. 1984]), 77–78. Peter Vernier has dated this document
to September 1877. See Vernier, comp., Oscar Wilde at Magdalen: By
Himself and His Contemporaries (Self-Published), 7. For the complete list
of Wilde’s answers in the “Confessions Album,” see Merlin Holland, The
Wilde Album (London: Fourth Estate, 1997), 44–45.
2. Holland, Wilde Album, 45.
3. Linda Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford (Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1994), 122–23.
4. Iain Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2012).
5. See Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality; Stefano Evangelista, British
Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism, Reception, Gods in Exile
(Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009); and Daniel Orrells, Classical
Culture and Modern Masculinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2011). The publication of the Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017) has consolidated the view of
Wilde a writer who facilitates Classical reception scholarship.
6. Gregory Castle also adopts the term “aesthetic education” in his article,
‘Misrecognising Wilde: Media and Performance on the American Tour
of 1882’, in Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories, Archives, ed. Joseph
Bristow (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013). Castle’s use of
this term differs from mine, as it relates to Wilde’s influence on the reviv-
alist discourse in twentieth-century Irish literature.
7. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 22; Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 21.
8. Davis Coakley, Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Irish (Dublin: Town
House, 1994), 149.
9. Oscar Wilde, ‘To William Ward’, 11 July 1878, in The Complete Letters
of Oscar Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis (London:
Fourth Estate, 2000), 69. In this letter, Wilde was referring to a court
case over a property he had inherited from his father. Wilde was being
sued because the property was mistakenly sold to two different buyers,
and he feared that a loss would ruin him financially. In the end, the court
ruled in Wilde’s favour. See also Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 103.
10. James Bowen, ‘Education, Ideology, and the Ruling Class: Hellenism
and English Public Schools in the Nineteenth Century’, in Rediscovering
Hellenism: The Hellenic Inheritance and the English Imagination, eds. G.
W. Clarke with J. C. Eade (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press),
169.
11. David Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days and Other Papers (New York:
Longmans, 1939); reproduced in Oscar Wilde: Interviews and
Recollections, ed. E. H. Mikhail (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1979), 5.
See also Vernier, By Himself and His Contemporaries, 7.
12. Shuter provides an insight into the teaching conditions at Oxford through
a study of Walter Pater’s career at Brasenose College. See William F.
Shuter, ‘Pater as Don’, Prose Studies: History, Theory, Criticism 11, no.
1 (1988): 41–58. See also L. W. B. Brockliss, The University of Oxford: A
History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 413–18.
13. In 1877, Wilde and Macmillan toured Greece together with Mahaffy and
a young Irish student named William Goulding. I provide more detail on
this point in Chapter 2.
14. Oscar Wilde, ‘To George Macmillan’, 22 March 1879, in The Complete
Letters of Oscar Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis
(London: Fourth Estate, 2000), 78.
15. For more information about Wilde’s book proposal, see Anya Clayworth,
‘Oscar Wilde and Macmillan and Co.: The Publisher and the Iconoclast’,
English Literature in Transition (1880–1920) 44, no. 1 (2001): 64–78.
16. Smith and Helfand discuss this essay in their Introduction (‘The Rise’
and ‘The Notebooks and Historical Criticism’): Philip E. Smith II and
Michael S. Helfand, eds., Oscar Wilde’s Oxford Notebooks: A Portrait of
Mind in the Making (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 37–42.
This essay has also been discussed by Evangelista, British Aestheticism,
137–38; Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 58–62. More recently,
Smith has transcribed and edited Oscar Wilde’s Historical Criticism
Notebook, which contains Wilde’s research notes for the “Historical
Criticism” essay: Oscar Wilde’s Historical Criticism Notebook, ed. Phillip
E. Smith II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). For an analysis
of the material contained in Wilde’s Historical Criticism Notebook, see
Phillip E. Smith II, ‘Oscar Wilde’s Philosophy of History’, in Philosophy
and Oscar Wilde, ed. Michael Y. Bennett (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2017), 29–51.
17. Oscar Wilde, ‘Historical Criticism’, in Criticism: Historical Criticism,
Intentions, the Soul of Man, ed. Josephine M. Guy in The Complete Works
of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing), 4: 123–228.
18. John Dougill, Oxford in English Literature: The Making, and Undoing,
of ‘The English Athens’ (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press,
1988), 5–6.
19. Frank Harris, Oscar Wilde: His Life and Confessions, vol. 1 (New York:
Brentano’s Publishers, 1916), 44–46.
20. Marillier studied Classics at Peterhouse College, Cambridge.
24 L. GRECH
21. Oscar Wilde, ‘To H. C. Marillier’, 27 November 1885, in Complete

Letters, 269.
22. Josephine M. Guy and Ian Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession: Writing and
the Culture Industry in the Late Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000), 10. Here, Guy and Small note that “Wilde’s
writing and publishing practices also confirm the suspicion that the late
nineteenth-century literary market was ruthlessly competitive and com-
mercial, and that professional writers who needed to earn a living with
their pen were in no place to resist or even contest those values”: Oscar
Wilde’s Profession, 10. They argue that Wilde “was happy to tailor publi-
cations to the requirements of particular markets; Wilde was remarkably
willing to take account of ‘public opinion,’ even if he was not always suc-
cessful in pleasing it”: Guy and Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession, 12.
23. Harris, Oscar Wilde, 45–46.
24. See Bowen, ‘Education, Ideology, and the Ruling Class’, 161–86.
25. Evangelista, British Aestheticism, 9–10.
26. Most students were not tested in mathematics and physics because there
was not enough time to adequately prepare for these subjects. In 1825,
students were given the option of taking a separate exam. See Brockliss,
The University of Oxford, 238.
27. M. C. Curthoys, ‘The Examination System’, in Nineteenth Century
Oxford, Part 1, eds. M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, in The History of
the University of Oxford (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 6: 348–49.
28. Brockliss, The University of Oxford, 237.
29. Curthoys, ‘The Examination System’, 6: 347.
31. The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion are a set of statements that define
the doctrinal beliefs of the Church of England. The Thirty-Nine Articles
were finalized in 1571 and were intended to position the beliefs of
Anglican faith in relation to those of the Roman Catholic Church and
other Protestant denominations.
33. Ellman, Oscar Wilde, 64. Exams were commonly referred to as Schools
because of the location where they were held. The first exam in Literæ
Humaniores was held at the Metaphysical and Music Schools, which
were located in the Bodleian quadrangle. See Brockliss, The University of
Oxford, 237.
34. Ellman, Oscar Wilde, 64. This anecdote is recorded in Douglas Sladen’s
autobiography, Twenty Years of My Life (1914), and is reproduced in
Recollections, 21–22.
35. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 64.
36. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 64–65.
37. Richard Jenkyns, ‘The Beginnings of Greats, 1800–1872: Classical

Studies’, in Nineteenth Century Oxford, Part 1, eds. M. G. Brock and
M. C. Curthoys, in The History of the University of Oxford (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1997), 6: 514.
38. Jenkyns, ‘The Beginnings of Greats’, 6: 514.
39. Richard Jenkyns, ‘Classical Studies, 1872–1914’, in Nineteenth Century
Oxford, Part 2, eds. M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, in The History of
the University of Oxford (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 7: 327.
40. Jenkyns, ‘Classical Studies’, 7: 372.
41. Iain Ross has compiled a list of the prescribed authors and texts from the
1874 Exam Statute. This source reveals that no Roman authors were on
the list. See ‘Appendix B’ in Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 197.
42. Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 36.
43. Oscar Wilde, ‘To William Ward’, 10 July 1876, in Complete Letters, 20.
Original emphasis.
45. Jenkyns, ‘The Beginnings of Greats’, 6: 518.
46. Brockliss, University of Oxford, 335. It was thought that Classical stud-
ies (including philosophy and ethics) “trained the mind, discouraged idle
speculation, and created solid citizens who would not abuse liberty or
undermine property and could profitably turn their hand to any business
of life”: Brockliss, University of Oxford, 334–35.
47. Curthoys, ‘The Examination System’, 352–53.
48. By the 1880s, there was more room for academic specialization as
the newer disciplines grew and began to offer their own preliminary
exams, as was the case with Natural Science, Mathematics, and Law. See
Curthoys, ‘The Examination System’, 6: 354–55.
49. Simon Reader, ‘Wilde at Oxford: A Truce with Facts’, in Philosophy and
Oscar Wilde, ed. Michael Y. Bennett (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2017), 12. This source is held in the William Andrews Clark Memorial
Library in Los Angeles (item number W6721M3 N9113). There are
plans to edit and publish this source in the near future.
50. Reader, ‘Wilde at Oxford’, 11.
51. William F. Shuter, ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’,
English Literature in Transition 1880–1920 44, no. 3 (2003): 255.
52. Jenkyns, ‘The Beginnings of Greats’, 6: 518; Ross, Oscar Wilde and
Ancient Greece, 37.
53. This is conveyed in the 1878 Exam Statue, which recognizes that “the
study of the histories of ancient Greece and Rome shall be taken to
include Classical Archaeology and Art … Candidates will be expected
to show such a knowledge of Classical Geography and Antiquities,
and of the general history of Greece and Rome”: Oxford University
26 L. GRECH
Examination Statute, 1878, 54–58; as quoted by Ross, Oscar Wilde and

Ancient Greece, 198.
54. James Rennell Rodd, first Baron Rennell (1858–1941), was a student at
Balliol College who shared Wilde’s interest in poetry and aestheticism.
Rodd went on to become a notable diplomat, although he continued to
write poetry and produced several works of Classical scholarship in his
lifetime. Wilde assisted Rodd with the publication arrangements for Rose
Leaf and Apple Leaf (1882), which was the American edition of Rodd’s
first volume of poetry (previously titled Songs in the South [1881]).
Wilde also dedicated the book to himself and wrote a lengthy intro-
duction (entitled “L’Envoi”) which doubled as his own aesthetic mani-
festo. Wilde’s additions to the book positioned Rodd as his disciple, and
reviewers began to raise questions the about the nature of Rodd’s rela-
tionship with Wilde. The publication embarrassed Rodd and ultimately
led to the demise of his friendship with Wilde. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde,
104, 198–200; Michèle Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2018), 140–49; Rennell Rodd, Rose Leaf and
Apple Leaf, with an Introduction by Oscar Wilde (Philadelphia: J. M.
Stoddart and Co., 1882).
55. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Rennell Rodd’, 4 December 1880, in Complete Letters,
102–3. Original emphasis.
56. The expression “Oxford temper” is first mentioned by Wilde in his prison
letter to Lord Alfred Douglas, which is also known as De Profundis. I
will address this idea in greater detail in Chapter 6. See Oscar Wilde, ‘To
Lord Alfred Douglas’, January to March 1897, in Complete Letters, 686.
57. Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality, 118.
58. Shuter, ‘Greats’, 260.
59. Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality, xiii.
60. Eros is generally translated as “love” in English, but the Ancient Greek
word has a much stronger sexual connotation. Nineteenth-century
translators like Jowett relied on general, gender neutral terms (such as
“love”, “lover”, and “beloved”) to obscure the homosexual implications
in Plato’s love dialogues. I will examine this point in greater detail in
Chapter 5.
61. Evangelista draws on unpublished sources such as Wilde’s Oxford note-
books, an incomplete review of John Addington Symonds’s, Greek Poets
(1876), and Wilde’s unpublished essays on “Hellenism” (1877) and
“Historical Criticism” (1879). See Evangelista, British Aestheticism, 130,
136–37.

64. Orrells, Classical Culture, 17.
65. Orrells, Classical Culture, 17.
66. In most cases, I refer to the periodical versions of the poems, which are
reproduced in Stuart Mason’s [Christopher Sclater Millard], Bibliography
of Oscar Wilde (London: T. W. Laurie, 1914). For the works that were
published in Wilde’s Poems (1881) collection, I refer to Poems and
Poems in Prose, eds. Bobby Fong and Karl Beckson, in The Complete
Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2000–continuing).
67. Patience was an international success and the production toured Britain,
Europe, Australia, and the USA. Michèle Mendelssohn also notes that
unofficial versions of Patience and spin-offs that mocked Wilde were also
performed in the USA, alongside the official Gilbert and Sullivan produc-
tion. Some of the more successful productions adopted the style of black-
face minstrel shows. See Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde, 150–56.
68. Wilde’s lecture notes were included in the Miscellanies and Essays and
Lectures volumes of the Collected Edition of Wilde’s literature. Both of
these editions were first published by Methuen in 1908. I will be refer-
ring to the lectures that are included in Miscellanies.
69. I will be working with Josephine M. Guy’s 2007 edition of Wilde’s crit-
ical works: Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions, the Soul of Man,
ed. Josephine M. Guy, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to
date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing). Throughout
this book I will refer to The Soul of Man, rather than “The Soul of Man
Under Socialism,” because that is the title Guy has adopted. The Soul of
Man is the title of the book version of the essay, which was published in
1895. It is unlikely that Wilde had any involvement with the preparation
of the later publication. See the Introduction to Chapter 4, where I dis-
cuss the publication history of this work.
70. I will be working with Joseph Bristow’s edition of the 1891 text: The
Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890 and 1891 Texts, ed. Joseph Bristow,
in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000–continuing).
71. Wilde intended for Douglas to receive the original handwritten copy of
the letter, but Ross sent him a typed copy instead. Douglas, however,
claimed that he never received the document. Ross entrusted the original
manuscript to the British Library and kept it out of the public domain in
order to avoid legal action from Douglas and his relatives.
28 L. GRECH
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bowen, James. ‘Education, Ideology, and the Ruling Class: Hellenism and
English Public Schools in the Nineteenth Century’. In Rediscovering
Hellenism: The Hellenic Inheritance and the English Imagination. Edited by
G. W. Clarke with J. C. Eade, 161–86. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1989.
Bristow, Joseph, ed. The Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890 and 1891 Texts.
Vol. 3. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2000–continuing.
Brockliss, L. W. B. The University of Oxford: A History. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2016.
Castle, Gregory. ‘Misrecognising Wilde: Media and Performance on the
American Tour of 1882’. In Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories, Archives.
Edited by Joseph Bristow, 74–93. Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
2013.
Clayworth, Anya. ‘Oscar Wilde and Macmillan and Co.: The Publisher and the
Iconoclast’. English Literature in Transition (1880–1920) 44, no. 1 (2001):
64–78.
Coakley, Davis. Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Irish. Dublin: Town
House, 1994.
Curthoys, M. C. ‘The Examination System’. In Nineteenth Century Oxford. Part
1. Edited by M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, 339–69. Vol. 6. The History
of the University of Oxford. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997.
Dougill, John. Oxford in English Literature: The Making, and Undoing, of ‘The
English Athens’. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1988.
Dowling, Linda. Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1994.
Ellmann, Richard. Oscar Wilde. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988 [c. 1984].
Evangelista, Stefano. British Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism,
Reception, Gods in Exile. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
Fong, Bobby, and Karl Beckson, eds. Poems and Poems in Prose. Vol. 1.
The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing.
Guy, Josephine M., ed. Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions, the Soul of
Man. Vol. 4. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000–continuing.
Guy, Josephine M., and Ian Small. Oscar Wilde’s Profession: Writing and the
Culture Industry in the Late Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000.
Harris, Frank. Oscar Wilde: His Life and Confessions. Vol. 1. New York:
Brentano’s Publishers, 1916.
Holland, Merlin. The Wilde Album. London: Fourth Estate, 1997.

Holland, Merlin, and Rupert Hart-Davis, eds. The Complete Letters of Oscar
Wilde. London: Fourth Estate, 2000.
Hunter-Blair, David. In Victorian Days and Other Papers. London: Longmans,
1939.
Jenkyns, Richard. ‘Classical Studies, 1872–1914’. In Nineteenth Century
Oxford. Part 2. Edited by M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, 326–31. Vol. 7.
The History of the University of Oxford, 8 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press,
2000.
Jenkyns, Richard. ‘The Beginnings of Greats, 1800–1872: Classical Studies’.
In Nineteenth Century Oxford. Part 1. Edited by M. G. Brock and M. C.
Curthoys, 513–20. Vol. 6. The History of the University of Oxford. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1997.
Jowett, Benjamin, trans. The Dialogues of Plato. 2nd ed., Vol. 2. Oxford:
Mason, Stuart [Millard, Christopher Sclater]. Bibliography of Oscar Wilde.
London: T.W. Laurie, 1914.
Mendelssohn, Michèle. Making Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2018.
Mikhail, E. H., ed. Oscar Wilde, Interviews and Recollections. New York: Barnes
and Noble, 1979.
Orrells, Daniel. Classical Culture and Modern Masculinity. Oxford: Oxford
Pater, Walter. The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry—The 1893 Texts.
Edited by Donald L. Hill. Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of
California Press, 1980.
Reader, Simon. ‘Wilde at Oxford: A Truce with Facts’. In Philosophy and Oscar
Wilde. Edited by Michael Y. Bennett, 9–27. New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2017.
Rodd, Rennell. Rose Leaf and Apple Leaf. With an Introduction by Oscar Wilde.
Philadelphia: J. M. Stoddart and Co., 1882.
Ross, Iain. Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2012.
Shuter, William F. ‘Pater as Don’. Prose Studies: History, Theory, Criticism 11,
no. 1 (1988): 41–58.
Shuter, William F. ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’. English
Literature in Transition 1880–1920 46, no. 3 (2003): 250–78.
Smith II, Philip E., ed. Oscar Wilde’s Historical Criticism Notebook. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2016.
Smith II, Phillip E. ‘Oscar Wilde’s Philosophy of History’. In Philosophy and
Oscar Wilde. Edited by Michael Y. Bennett, 29–51. New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2017.
30 L. GRECH
Smith II, Philip E., and Michael S. Helfand, eds. Oscar Wilde’s Oxford
Notebooks: A Portrait of Mind in the Making. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1989.
Vernier, Peter (comp.). Oscar Wilde at Magdalen: By Himself and His
Contemporaries. Self-Published, 2000.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Historical Criticism’. In Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions,
the Soul of Man. Edited by Josephine M. Guy, 123–228. Vol. 4. The Complete
Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Wilde, Oscar. Miscellanies. London: Methuen, 1908.
CHAPTER 2
Popery and Paganism: Divided Loyalties

in the Travel Poems
In 1874, Oscar Wilde made his way to Oxford to compete for a Classics
scholarship (known as a demyship) at Magdalen College. He was close
to completing his degree at Trinity College Dublin, but he looked for
opportunities at Oxford because he suspected that he would not be
offered a fellowship at Trinity College. Wilde easily secured the schol-
arship, and by October he was comfortably installed in his rooms at
Magdalen. In the years that followed, he continued to return to Ireland
during holiday periods and maintained contact with his former ancient
history tutor, John Pentland Mahaffy. This relationship also created
opportunities for Wilde to join Mahaffy on his travels overseas. Together,
they ventured to Northern Italy in 1875 and embarked on a tour of
Greece in 1877; these experiences inspired Wilde to compose poems
about the places he visited with his former tutor. This chapter presents
an analysis of the letters and travel poems that Wilde produced while he
was studying at Magdalen College, between 1875 and 1878. Together
with Wilde’s Oxford letters, these poems document the prolonged
spiritual crisis that Wilde underwent as his fascination with Roman
Catholic ritual and doctrine escalated.
Although I refer to Wilde as an Oxford intellectual, the publication
history of his poetry shows that he capitalized on his links with the Irish
intellectual community. Wilde began his foray into the literary market-
place by publishing in Irish periodicals, such as the Dublin University
Magazine, the Irish Monthly, and Kottabos. 1877 was a particularly

32 L.
significant year for Wilde, not only because of his travel and subsequent
rustication from Oxford but also because he succeeded in publish-
ing eleven poems in local and international periodicals. 1 As Ian Small
has acknowledged, Wilde succeeded in placing “forty poems in Irish,
American, and English periodicals” before he released his first volume
of poetry.2 The Poems collection was first published by David Bogue
at Wilde’s expense in 1881.3 Seven hundred and fifty copies of Poems
were printed, but the initial print run was divided up and packaged as
the first, second, and third editions.4 It appears that Wilde wanted to
target his poetry towards a wealthy readership, as he opted to have his
poems printed on handmade paper and bound in white vellum. The
first edition also featured an impressive gold-stamped floral design on
the covers and spine of the book. In 1882, Bogue published the revised
edition of Wilde’s Poems (in a print run of five hundred). The revised
version was reissued in 1892 by Elkin Mathews and John Lane at the
Bodley Head, a publisher that had a strong association with literary
aestheticism because it was known for producing expensive designer
books in a limited supply.5
Contemporary responses to the 1881 edition of Poems were quite
mixed. English reviewers were especially hostile towards Wilde, most
likely because he was famous for his aestheticism and had not produced
any other substantial literary works. As Richard Ellmann points out,
“Wilde was accused of all the available vices, from plagiarism to insin-
cerity to indecency, heavy charges against a first book.” 6 For example,
Punch magazine hinted at the unoriginal tenor of Wilde’s debut work by
calling it “a volume of echoes, it is Swinburne and water.”7 By contrast,
a reviewer for the New York Times was appalled by the English press’s
unfair treatment of Wilde: “In Wilde England has a new poet who, if not
of the first order of power, is so true a poet underneath whatever eccen-
tricity of conduct or cant of school that his further persecution in the
press must be held contemptible.”8
The renowned English poet, critic, and Classical scholar, John
Addington Symonds, also responded favourably when he received a com-
plimentary copy of Poems from Wilde. Symonds recognized Wilde’s lit-
erary talent and expressed his initial thoughts on the volume in a letter
to Wilde: “I should not write to you about them [the poems] if they had
not raised deep interest [and] sympathy. I feel the poet’s gift in them.”9
Wilde’s travel poems are particularly significant because they add
a new dimension to the narrative of Wilde’s relationship with Roman
2 POPERY AND PAGANISM: DIVIDED LOYALTIES IN THE TRAVEL POEMS
Catholicism. Where possible, my analysis will refer to the earliest ver-

sions of the poems that featured in periodicals, instead of those which
were later revised and included in Poems.10 In order to contextualize the
religious culture of Oxford in the 1870s, I investigate the formation of
the Tractarian Movement, which is a religious movement that emerged
between 1830s and 1840s. John Henry Newman, who was a leader of
the Tractarian Movement, worked with his fellow tutors at Oriel College
to reform the teaching culture of the college. The Tractarians wanted to
minister to the spiritual needs of their students, and so, they set out to
increase the level of personal interaction between teachers and students.
In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the Tractarian Movement
inspired a culture of intimate friendship within the colleges at Oxford.
This development coincided with the period of curricular reforms that
placed Ancient Greek philosophy the centre of the Greats curriculum. 11
The Tractarians also helped to establish a growing Roman Catholic com-
munity at Oxford by producing religious tracts that questioned the theo-
logical basis of the Protestant Reformation.
There is no evidence to suggest that Wilde formed any attachment to
his tutors while he was at Magdalen, but his Oxford letters indicate that
he fostered strong friendships with other students there. Wilde sounded
the idea of converting to Catholicism in his letters and informed his
friends of his tentative plans to resolve his spiritual conflict by meet-
ing with Newman and by travelling to Rome. As a poet, Wilde engages
with the Church of Rome in the same manner that he engages with
Classicism: as an aesthetic subject. He maintains an ambivalent stance
towards these competing aesthetic phenomena, as he shifts between
the two traditions, sometimes favouring the one over the other. The
poems that contemplate the material splendour of Catholic ritual also
express a nostalgia for the Greek gods who were displaced by the rise
of Christianity. Likewise, the worship of Mary and Christ is undermined
through Wilde’s wistful allusions to the gods, the landscape, and the
archaeological remnants of Ancient Greece.
1 ROMAN CATHOLICISM IN CONTEXT

The story of Oscar Wilde’s enduring fascination with Roman
Catholicism begins in Ireland. He was introduced to Catholic wor-
ship by his mother, the famed nationalist poet, Jane Wilde, who wrote
under the pen name “Speranza.” Oscar was born into an Anglo-Irish
34 L.
Protestant family, and some of his maternal relatives were ordained

Protestant clergymen. The Wilde family had benefited from Ireland’s
colonial history, which endowed Protestants with the right to own con-
fiscated land. Between 1695 and 1756, Penal Laws were introduced in
Ireland. These laws prevented Irish Catholics from purchasing and inher-
iting land, excluded them from legal professions, and denied them access
to university education.12 Given their Protestant heritage, the Wilde
family were able to acquire two country estates, such as a fishing lodge
in Connemara, Moytura House in County Mayo, a house in Bray, and
the family home in Merrion Square, Dublin.13 Regardless of the social,
political, and economic divisions that separated Irish Protestants and
Catholics, Jane introduced her two sons to Catholic worship while they
were holidaying together on the South Coast of Ireland. She befriended
the Reverend Father L. C. Prideaux Fox, who was chaplain at the
Glencree reformatory for Catholic boys, and began to attend his masses,
along with Oscar and his elder brother William. 14 Through this personal
connection, Jane arranged for her sons to be baptized as Catholics—
Oscar was between the age of eight or nine when his induction into
Catholicism took place.15
Several scholars have expressed doubts as to whether Wilde’s
Catholic baptism actually took place because it was not formally
registered.16 But, in 1905, the Reverend Father Fox mentioned the
baptism in an article for Donahoe’s Magazine. Remarkably, his account
reveals that Oscar and William did not simply attend mass; they were
effectively serving as altar boys:
[O]ne day she [Lady Wilde] asked my permission to bring her children to
our chapel to assist at Mass on Sundays … I readily acceded to her request,
and after the Mass was over, I enjoyed many a pleasant hour with this
excellent lady. I am not sure whether she ever became a Catholic herself,
but it was not long before she asked me to instruct two of her children,
one of them being that future erratic genius, Oscar Wilde. After a few
weeks I baptized these two children, Lady Wilde herself being present on
the occasion.17
The baptism of Oscar and William was symbolic and did not lead to any
lasting change in their religious practices.18 Although, Davis Coakley
suspects that this personal event inspired the “second baptism” plot in
Oscar Wilde’s most famous society comedy, The Importance of Being
Earnest (1895).19 In his late adolescent years, Wilde rekindled his con-
nection with the Catholic Church while he was at Trinity College. He
befriended a group of Jesuits and started attending Catholic masses in
Ireland. By the time Wilde was at Oxford, he began to express an inter-
est in converting to Catholicism. His eventual conversion, however, took
place shortly before his death in 1900. Towards the end of his life, Wilde
was attending Catholic mass on a daily basis and had received blessings
from the Pope on seven separate occasions. 20 Yet, Wilde’s conversion
came about through his close friend Robert Ross’s intervention. Ross,
a Catholic himself, arranged for an Irish priest named Father Cuthbert
Dunne to baptize Wilde again and administer the last rites. By this point,
Wilde was so ill that he was unable to speak and was drifting in and out
of consciousness, so he probably did not know that he had been received
into the Church.21
Wilde’s relationship with Roman Catholicism can be understood as an
“impossible desire,” which is an expression that he later adopted in The
Picture of Dorian Gray to allude to homosexual desire. Throughout his
undergraduate years at Oxford, Wilde was irresistibly drawn towards
the Catholic faith. His father, Sir William Robert Wilde, strongly objected
and threatened to disinherit him if he converted. 22 Although Sir William
did not follow through with this threat, Wilde did lose a substan-
tial part of his inheritance from his half-brother, Henry Wilson. Wilde
was bequeathed £100 on the condition that he remained a Protestant
and stood to lose Wilson’s share in the Connemara fishing lodge if he
became a Catholic.23 When remarking on his father’s interference in
his spiritual affairs, Wilde wryly pointed out that his father mistakenly
assumed that he would have fewer chances of fraternizing with Catholics
at Oxford:
I am sure … that if I had become a Catholic at that time [while at Trinity]

he would have cast me off altogether, and that he would do the same
to-day. That is why he rejoiced at my winning a scholarship at Oxford,
where I should not be exposed to these pernicious influences. And now
my best friend turns out to be a Papist – perhaps, for anything I know, a
“Jesuit in disguise,” a real wolf in sheep’s clothing!”24
The so-called Papist that Wilde referred to was a fellow Magdalen stu-
dent named David Hunter-Blair. Hunter-Blair converted to Catholicism
in 1875, after Henry Edward Manning was made a Cardinal, and
36 L.
became a Benedictine monk three years later. Hunter-Blair and Wilde

attended mass together at Saint Aloysius, which was a newly established
Jesuit Church in Oxford. As we will see, Hunter-Blair also provided
Wilde with the finances to travel to Rome in 1877. 25 Interestingly, Wilde
mentioned his interest in Catholic ritual and theology in numerous let-
ters that were addressed to his friend, William Ward. Unlike Hunter-
Blair, Ward was a firm Protestant.
Wilde was right to suggest that 1870s Oxford was the wrong place
to escape from Catholic influences. The reason was that the Tractarian
Movement, also known as the Oxford Movement, had inspired a cul-
ture of Catholic conversion among some members of the undergraduate
community. When Wilde was at Oxford, Roman Catholics were still a
minority group because the university did not officially accept Catholic
students until 1896.26 In the first half of the nineteenth century, Oxford
operated as religious intuition and most of the college fellows were
ordained clergymen. As L. W. B. Brockliss points out in his history of
Oxford University, “[Oxford’s] primary function was to provide the next
generation of Anglican clergy and landowners’ elder sons with an educa-
tion in either classics or mathematics.” 27 At that point in time, Oxford
only admitted Anglican students and required them to swear obedience
to Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion upon matriculating.28
In its early stages, the Tractarian Movement responded to concerns
about university reform. In the mid-1830s, the Tractarians spoke out
against liberal reformers who believed it was time for the university to
allow the admission of dissenters. By contrast, the Tractarians thought it
was vital that students continued to subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles
because this established their willingness to obey the church and their
teachers during their undergraduate years. The Tractarians also expressed
concerns about the government’s involvement in the church’s finan-
cial affairs. John Keble, a clergyman, poet, and former tutor at Oriel
College, called for more independence between the Church and State
in his influential sermon on “National Apostasy” (delivered on 14 July
1833). Keble’s sermon is generally considered as the starting point of
the Tractarian Movement because Keble publicly expressed his concerns
about the 1832 Reform Act, which was passed by the Whig government.
This legislation resulted in the loss of ten Anglican Bishoprics in Ireland,
and it was interpreted as an attempt to weaken the strength of the
Anglican Church in Ireland.29 When Newman reflected on this period
in his autobiography, Apologia Pro Vita Sua (1864, revised 1865), he
emphasized the urgency that was felt by the Tractarians: “No time was
to be lost, for the Whigs had come to do their worst, and the rescue might
come too late. … We knew enough to begin preaching upon, and there
was no one else to preach.”30
The most controversial aspect of the movement was the Tractarians’s
willingness to question the authority of Anglican doctrine. Between
1833 and 1844, John Henry Newman, John Keble, and Edward Pusey
produced a series of ninety religious tracts known as Tracts for the
Times. The tracts acknowledged the shared heritage and theological
similarities that united the Anglican and Catholic Churches. When
outlining the key aims of the movement, G. R. Evans explains that
“[the Tractarians] wanted the Church of England to awaken to what they
now saw as its profound continuity with the ancient Church; they
wanted the restoration of medieval liturgical elements; they wanted it
accepted that there had been no fundamental division of theological
opinion in the sixteenth century.”31 The release of Tract XC in 1841
was particularly shocking because Newman believed that it was
possible to “subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles and
simultaneously hold Catholic beliefs.”32 For Newman, this realization
strengthened his resolve to convert to Catholicism, although, his
official conversion took place several years later, in 1845. Support for
the Tractarian Movement continued to grow, but the next generation
of Tractarians were known for incorpo- rating Catholic rituals into
the Anglican mass. They challenged the aus- terity and rationalism of
the Protestant faith by introducing the use of candles, incense and
decorative vestments to expose worshippers to the poetry and symbols
of the ancient Church.33 Through their writing, rit- ualist practices, and
the conversions of key figures such as Newman and Manning, the
Tractarians laid the foundations for a revival of Roman Catholic
worship in England.
The Tractarians also influenced the culture of Oxford by exploring
ways to strengthen the relationship between teachers and students.
While teaching at Oriel College, between 1828 and 1830, Newman,
Richard Hurrell Froude, and Robert Isaac Wilberforce grew frustrated
with the existing tutorial system because it did not address the spiritual
needs of their students. Froude and Wilberforce were also clergymen
who had studied at Oriel College (under Keble) and they were both
appointed to fellowships at the college in 1826. 34 The introduction of the
Greats examination fostered more competition and created more of an
incentive for students to apply themselves to their studies, but the
teaching
38 L.
culture had not yet adapted to suit the increased demand for academic
supervision. Tutors were responsible for directing students’ reading, but
this guidance was delivered during group lessons that included students
with varying academic abilities. Consequently, it was difficult for tutors
to introduce material that would benefit the more advanced students.
According to Brockliss, “[t]he inadequacy of college lectures in the first
half of the nineteenth century encouraged the intellectually ambitious
to seek deeper enlightenment from private teachers even in mainstream
subjects.”35 Of course, not all students were serious about their stud-
ies. Attending Oxford was a still rite of passage for many young aristo-
crats and allowances were made for those who were more interested in
leisurely activities. These students could obtain a pass degree by com-
pleting a question and answer based exam, which involved less reading
than the broader-ranging honours exams.36 The Oriel fellows resisted
these imperfect teaching conditions by choosing to provide moral and
academic guidance to a small number of serious students or “reading
men.” Newman and his colleagues set out to reform the university, but
as Linda Dowling reminds us, they achieved this “not by proposing any
new change, but simply by recalling the tutorial to its original religious
purpose.”37
Newman, Wilberforce, and Froude practised a form of instruction
that centred on the tutor’s role as a spiritual teacher. They believed that
students could be influenced by simply being in the presence of their
tutor: an elder man in religious orders who was trained to teach (in
Dowling’s words) “in a spirit of unconscious holiness.” 38 When Newman
wrote about his teaching experiences forty years later, he revealed that
he approached this duty as a spiritual vocation:
[W] hen I was a Public Tutor of my college at Oxford, I maintained, even

fiercely, that my employment was distinctly pastoral. I considered that,
by the Statutes of the University, a Tutor’s profession was of a religious
nature. I never would allow that, in teaching the classics, I was absolved
from carrying on, by means of them, in the minds of my pupils, an ethical
training; I considered a College Tutor to have the care of souls. 39
The Tractarians were not so concerned with their students’ academic

performance because they were intent on using their position within
the college to influence the moral development of the young. William
Sewell, a friend and follower of the Tractarians, recognized this influence
as a key tenant of the Tractarian education philosophy: “[we] do not

consider the communication of knowledge as the chief design of our
post, or the grand end of education … our consideration is to form
and fashion and bring them [students] to that model of human nature,
which in our conscience we think is perfection.” 40 At first, the governing
board of the university (known as the Hebdomadal Board) supported
the Tractarians’s tutorial revolution because it promised to neutralize
the threat of radical political activity among the undergraduate cohort.
But, as Heather Ellis notes, this changed within a few years because there
was “a growing sense of unease about the degree of personal influence
which Newman, Hurrell Froude and R. I. Wilberforce were exercising
over undergraduates in their capacity as tutors.” 41 The Tractarians were
seen to be operating the college as if it were a brotherhood of equals;
this was problematic because it undermined the authority of the college
Provost, Edward Hawkins, and overlooked the privileged status that
was afforded to aristocratic students.42 In turn, Hawkins responded by
refusing to assign new students to the Oriel Fellows. By 1831, Newman,
Froude, and Wilberforce lost their tutorial positions, but the Tractarians
continued to influence students through their preaching and religious
publications.
The Tractarian style of teaching became more widespread through
the work of Benjamin Jowett, who is chiefly remembered as the Master
of Balliol College, and for his English translations of Plato. Jowett is a
significant figure in the history of Oxford University because he paved
the way for the Platonic revival in the late 1840s when he began to
present lectures on Plato’s Republic to his students at Balliol.43 Jowett
wanted to recreate the atmosphere of a Classical symposium within the
college tutorial and drew on the Tractarian culture of teacher–student
intimacy to support his teaching of Plato’s philosophy. He assisted his
students by conducting private discussions with them and setting writ-
ten tasks. Jowett was a generous teacher who always made time for his
students Brockliss notes that Jowett was known to “offer advice on
pupils’ work day or night, even if he was not their official tutor and
they were not natural scholars.”44 As Jowett’s students gained a repu-
tation for achieving Firsts in Greats, his teaching style was adopted by
other tutors who wanted to increase the chances of success for their own
students.
Surprisingly, Wilde’s experience as a student at Magdalen did not
correspond with the tutorial ideal that Newman and Jowett had set in
40 L.
motion. Wilde did not develop a good personal relationship with his
ancient history tutor, William Dennis Allen, and he raised doubts about
Allen’s competence when the entire college community had gathered
for the Collections assembly in March 1877. When asked to report on
his student’s progress, Allen complained: “Mr. Wilde absents himself
without apology from my lectures; his work is most unsatisfactory.” 45
The college President, Dr. Frederick Bulley, gently censured Wilde,
reminding him that this was “hardly the way to treat a gentleman.”46
In turn, Wilde boldly replied, “But, Mr President, Mr Allen is not a
gentleman!”47 This response clearly demonstrates Wilde’s rebellious,
headstrong character, as he refused to defer to the college hierarchy
by playing the part of the apologetic student. Instead, he replied with
a tactful insult that directed the President to consider Allen’s failings.
When commenting on this episode, Peter Vernier reveals that Wilde was
actually “understating the case,” given Allen’s tendency to neglect his
teaching responsibilities.48 Allen conducted lectures from his bedroom,
while his students sat with his dog in an adjoining room. 49 He was also
the sort of teacher who would cancel classes to allow more time for
ice-skating.50 It is also worth noting that Allen was a relatively young
scholar, only five years older than Wilde, which may be another reason
why Wilde found it so difficult to accept Allen as an academic mentor.
Iain Ross reminds us that this strained relationship led Wilde to seek
out the company of other established scholars like Max Muller, John
Ruskin, and Walter Pater, as if he were “[searching] for a tutor-surro-
gate, a Sokrates for his Alkibiades.” 51 It also explains why Wilde main-
tained his relationship with Mahaffy while he was at Oxford. 52 Wilde
appreciated Mahaffy’s flair for conversation and remembered his teacher
as “a delightful talker,” “an artist in vivid words and eloquent pauses.” 53
Mahaffy recognized that Wilde was a gifted classicist, and respected him
enough to enlist his help when he was preparing a manuscript for pub-
lication. In the preface to Social Life in Greece from Homer to Menander
(1874), Mahaffy credits Wilde for having “made improvements and
corrections all through the book.”54 This study contained a controver-
sial chapter that compared the Ancient Greek culture of male love with
the modern-day style of heterosexual courtship. In this respect, Ross is
right to describe Mahaffy as “a natural Jowett-substitute” because he
also produced popular scholarship which aimed to make the foreign
aspects of Classical culture seem more familiar to the nineteenth-century
reader.55
2 GOING OVER TO ROME

Although Wilde did not hold much regard for his tutor, his Oxford let-
ters reveal that he formed strong friendships with other students and
turned to them for support as he endured a long and anguished period
of spiritual conflict. From Hunter-Blair’s memoir (In Victorian Days and
Other Papers, 1939), we learn that Wilde bonded with his closest friends
by sharing intimate conversations with them. When Wilde had finished
hosting one of his regular Sunday night gatherings, he would settle into
a late-night discussion with Hunter-Blair and Ward:
Round the fire gathered Wilde, W. Ward – known to us all as “Bouncer” –

and I; just we three, and talked and talked as boys will … about everything
and other things as well. Oscar was always the protagonist in these
midnight conversations, pouring out a flood of paradoxes, untenable
propositions, quaint comments on men and things; and sometimes, like
Silas Wegg, “dropping into poetry,” spouting yards of verse, either his
own, or that of other poets whom he favoured, and spouting it
uncommonly well. We listened and applauded and protested against some
of his preposterous theories. Our talk was quite unrestrained, and ranged
over a vast variety of topics.56
Hunter-Blair captures how joyous it was to be with Wilde, as he played

with ideas and recited the poems he loved. In this instance, Hunter-Blair
is drawing attention to the lighter side of Wilde’s nature; he is young,
carefree, and a consummate entertainer. After Hunter-Blair converted to
Roman Catholicism, he discovered that Wilde was also a spiritual person.
He reflects that “Oscar was greatly interested in the step I had taken, and
asked me many questions, and shewed [sic.] me what I had not known
before, how deep, and I am sure genuine, was his own sympathy with
Catholicism.”57
Ward adds another dimension to this characterization of Wilde, as he
notes the connection between Wilde’s Irish ethnicity and his remarkable
intellect:
[W]e were a little dazzled by his directness and surprised by the

unexpected angle from which he looked at things. There was something
foreign to us, and inconsequential, in his modes of thought, just as there
was a suspicion of a brogue in his pronunciation, and an unfamiliar turn in
his phrasing. His qualities were not ordinary and we, his intimate friends,
did not judge him by ordinary standards.58
42 L.
It is so fitting that Wilde, himself a foreigner in England, should

be drawn to Roman Catholicism, at a time when (as Jarlath Killeen
writes) “Catholics remained exotic creatures in England.” 59 In nine-
teenth-century England and Ireland, Evangelical Protestants denounced
Catholicism for being un-English, unmanly, idolatrous, sexually perverse,
and a threat to England’s sovereignty.60 The tide of anti-Catholic senti-
ment intensified along with the rise of the Tractarian Movement.
If we turn to the letters and early poetry that survive from Wilde’s
undergraduate years at Oxford, it is evident that his feelings towards
conversion were divided. From his letters to Ward, we learn that he
was engaging with Newman’s writing in 1876, and by 1877 he had
started to absorb Newman into his spiritual fantasies. Being so capti-
vated, Wilde confided in Ward, who was in Rome at the time: “[I] am
caught in the fowler’s snare, in the wiles of the Scarlet Woman – I may
go over in the vac. I have dreams of a visit to Newman, of the holy sac-
rament in a new Church, and of a quiet and peace afterwards in my
soul.”61 Both Frederick S. Roden and Ellis Hanson have noted Wilde’s
reversal of anti-Catholic rhetoric in this particular letter. 62 Protestant
campaigners denounced Catholicism by referring to the Church as the
whore of Babylon from the Book of Revelation. 63 But Wilde adopted
anti-Catholic language to express his fascination with this religion and
English church figures, namely Newman. As the letter continues, Wilde
confessed that the attractions of the “Scarlet Woman” were not strong
enough to settle his restless mind: “If I could hope that the Church would
wake in me some earnestness and purity I would go over as a luxury, if
for no better reasons. But I can hardly hope it would.” 64 Despite the
seductive power of Catholicism, Wilde could not help but reflect on his
situation in pragmatic terms. Ultimately, he conceded that “[going] over
to Rome would be to sacrifice and give up my two great gods ‘Money
and Ambition.’”65
Although Wilde doubted whether he could ever surrender himself to
a life of faith, this hesitation did not stop him from courting Catholicism.
As Easter was drawing closer in 1877, Wilde expressed his desire to
meet Newman once again: “I am going first to see Newman at
Birmingham to burn my fingers a little more.” 66 This vivid imagery
positions Newman as a seductive churchman who tempted Wilde to
play with fire; in other words, to test whether he would remain non-
committal in the presence of his Catholic idol. Based on the experience
of a fellow student named Henry Wise, Wilde knew that Newman
fostered intellectual friendships
with young men through correspondence and personal interaction:

“[Wise] wrote to Newman about several things: and received the most
charming letters back and invitations to come and see him.” 67 Was Wilde
hoping that Newman would give him the same degree of attention if he
actively sought it? He wrote, “I am awfully keen for an interview, not of
course to argue, but merely to be in the presence of that divine man.” 68
Given that the Tractarian education philosophy emphasized the role of
personal influence in the teacher–student relationship, Wilde’s eager-
ness to be in Newman’s presence aligns with his history as an Oxford
educator and spiritual teacher. The desire to be near Newman may be
interpreted as a desire to give up his control over the situation, to go to
Newman as a student who is open to receiving spiritual guidance from
him. But, as Roden has argued, Wilde simultaneously “longed for and
resisted a meeting with Newman.”69 Although Wilde entertained the
idea of converting, he was reluctant to formalize his association with the
Catholic Church, and so his “dream of a visit to Newman” never eventu-
ated. Even as Wilde wrote of his intention to see Newman, he doubted
whether he would follow through with the plan: “perhaps my courage
will fail, as I could hardly resist Newman I am afraid.”70
A similar pattern of attraction and resistance emerges in Wilde’s writ-
ing about the city of Rome. He came close to seeing Rome in 1875,
when he toured the north of Italy with Mahaffy. During this trip, Wilde
took in the sights of Florence, Bologna, Verona, and Venice, but he
did not have the resources to join Mahaffy in Rome, so he returned
to Ireland for the remainder of the summer vacation. This experi-
ence inspired his poem, “Graffiti d’Italia,” which is believed to have
been drafted in 1875. The poem was first published in the September
1876 issue of the Month and Catholic Review.71 In the same period,
Wilde published a shorter revised version called “Rome Unvisited” in
the Boston Pilot. According to Bobby Fong, the Pilot was an American
newspaper “of distinct Catholic and Irish nationalist sympathies.” 72
Interestingly, Wilde sent a copy of “Rome Unvisited” to Newman, who
greeted the poem with praise.73
The following analysis will refer to the manuscript version of “Graffiti
d’Italia” (reproduced in Christopher Sclater Millard’s Bibliography of
Oscar Wilde, 1914) because it is one of the earliest poems in Wilde’s
oeuvre that addresses the theme of conversion. Wilde believed it was
necessary to visit Rome in order to resolve his spiritual indecision.
But the earliest reference about his travel plans appears in a letter to
44 L.
Ward, dating from the 17 July 1876. In this letter, Wilde candidly wrote:
“I wish you would come to Rome with me and test the whole matter.
I am afraid to go alone.”74 Wilde anticipated that he would be swept
up in the romance and pageantry of Roman Catholicism if he went
to Rome alone, but he denied himself this pleasure to avoid the pres-
sure of testing his faith. In “Graffiti d’Italia,” however, Wilde dram-
atizes the disappointment of a devout traveller who stops short of
Rome:
And here I set my face towards home,

Alas! My pilgrimage is done—
Although, methinks, yon bloodred sun
Marshalls the way to Holy Rome.75
Wilde’s opening stanza captures the tragedy of being so close to Rome,

and yet far enough to prevent him from seeing the pilgrimage to its
completion. As the traveller prepares to turn away, to begin the return
leg of the journey, the rising sun gently evokes the red-and-gold rega-
lia of the Pope. Early in the poem, Wilde’s poetic voice addresses the
city with a lamentation: “O Roma, Roma, at thy feet / I lay this barren
gift of song, / For ah! the way is steep and long / That leads unto the
sacred street.”76 Taken literally, this line not only expresses geographical
distance but also reflects the steep and long spiritual journey that Wilde
examined in his poetry and personal correspondence.
At Oxford, Wilde continued to enjoy the symbolism and iconography
of Roman Catholicism from a distance. He decorated his rooms with pic-
tures of Newman, Cardinal Manning, and Pope Pius IX.77 He also used
his poetry to approximate the pleasure of gazing at the Pope and attend-
ing mass in Rome. In part III of “Graffiti d’Italia,” the Pope features as
a majestic, godlike man, who is raised above the crowd by his clerical
retinue:
When bright with purple and with gold

Come priest and holy Cardinal
And [high] borne above the heads of all
The gentle Shepherd of the Fold—
O joy to see before I die
The only God-anointed King,
And hear the silver trumpets
ring A Triumph as He passeth
by.
Or at the altar of the shrine

Holds high the mystic sacrifice,
And shows a God to human eyes,
From the dead fruit of corn and vine.78
In this Catholic reverie, Wilde elaborates on the material splendour that

surrounds the Pope: the purple and gold vestments, and the sounding
trumpets. Nonetheless, the attraction of seeing the Pope is not entirely
aesthetic, as his presence is most powerful when he is seen preparing
the sacraments of the Eucharist. According to the doctrine of transub-
stantiation, Catholic worshippers ritually consume the body and blood
of Christ when they share in the Eucharist. To witness the blessing of
the sacraments is to see God’s work close at hand, as the “dead fruit of
corn and vine” are infused with life. Yet, the ritual consumption of the
Eucharist does not warrant any attention in Wilde’s poem. This omission
may reflect the fact that the persona in Wilde’s poem does not imagine
himself as a Catholic convert. Rather than joining in the celebration of
the Eucharist, he remains as an admiring outsider, one who is content to
watch and appreciate the symbolic resurrection of Christ, without being
involved in the communion.
The fourth stanza of “Graffiti d’Italia” is important as it reflects on
the impossibility of conversion. This stanza was omitted from the pub-
lished versions of the poem, possibly because it introduces a heavier,
despondent tone which is not consistent with the overall feel of the
poem.79 While the opening stanza is somewhat melancholic, the nar-
rative becomes more jubilant as Wilde imagines the pleasure of seeing
the Pope in all of his aesthetic grandeur. But in the excised stanza, the
would-be pilgrim doubts the strength of his faith:
What idle hope have I to win,

Or pass beyond the sacred gate—?
Enough for me to sit and wait
Till God’s own hand shall lead me in.80
The final couplet is almost an admission of defeat. As Rome slips fur-

ther out of reach, the persona admits that he lacks the courage to “pass
beyond the sacred gate” of his own accord. Instead, he chooses to sit
and wait for God to intervene on his behalf, to manifest and physically
shepherd him towards conversion.81 When “Graffiti d’Italia” appeared in
print for the first time, Wilde was still undecided about his allegiance to
46 L.
the Roman Catholic Church. Was he waiting for a moment of grace to

arise and settle his doubts?
The abba rhyme scheme and eight-syllable metre in “Graffiti d’Italia”
is another significant feature because it evokes Alfred Tennyson’s
famous poem, In Memoriam A. H. H. (1850).82 Tennyson also
addressed the subject of religious doubt in this work, although his
spiritual enquiry was staged in response to the sudden death of his
close friend, Arthur H. Hallam. Although Tennyson and Wilde adopt
different narrative contexts to explore how faith is tested, Wilde’s final
stanza gestures towards the resolution that is achieved at the end of In
Memoriam. Throughout his poem, Tennyson marks the lapse of years
following Hallam’s early death by documenting the cycle of changing
seasons, holidays, and personal milestones, including weddings and
anniversaries. Over time, Tennyson’s love for Hallam transforms into a
spiritual relationship that triumphs over death. In the final cantos
(CXXI–CXXX), he is comforted by the thought of Hallam’s eternal,
spiritual presence:
My love involves the love before;

My love is vaster passion now;
Tho’ mixed with God and Nature thou,
I seem to love thee more and more.
Far off thou art, but ever nigh;
I have thee still, and I rejoice;
I prosper, circled with thy voice;
I shall not lose thee though I die.83
Tennyson’s doubts about the existence of God are replaced with the
certain belief that Hallam exists as a divine, ever-present being who is
“mix’d with God and Nature.” Similarly, the persona in “Graffiti d’Ita-
lia” imagines that the “cycle of revolving years” will diminish the doubts
that hindered him from following the path to Rome and beginning a
new life as a practising Catholic:
For lo! what changes time can bring—

The cycle of revolving years
May free my heart from all its fears,
And teach my lips a song to sing—84
Here, Wilde evokes the peaceful state of mind that we see in Tennyson’s
canto above, as it anticipates the relief that would come at the end of
his torturous spiritual crisis. Conversion is imagined as a happy

resolution that would allow the character in Wilde’s poem to
participate in the Eucharist and receive the blessing of the Pope as a
member of the Catholic congregation. Of course, an element of
uncertainty remains in the hope that this difficult situation may
improve with time. At the very end of “Graffiti d’Italia,” it is clear that
the Wilde’s persona wants to settle his religious doubts before the
summer fades into autumn: “Before yon troubled sea of gold / The
reapers garner into sheaves, / Or e’en the autumns scarlet leaves /
Flutter as birds adown the wold.”85 The slow, circumspect rationale
that Tennyson presents in In Memoriam does not console the character
in Wilde’s poem. He is left wondering if he will ever see Rome while the
intensity of his religious fervour is still strong: “I may have run the
glorious race / And caught the torch while yet a-flame.”86
3 IMPRESSIONS OF GREECE AND ROME

Until recently, scholars have tended to avoid or dismiss Wilde’s early
poetry as derivative works that are not in keeping with his mature aes-
thetic prose. In his introduction to the Oxford edition of Wilde’s Poems
and Poems in Prose (2000), Ian Small acknowledges that Wilde’s poetry
has not been well received by his contemporaries and modern com-
mentators.87 From the outset, the decision to self-publish a volume of
poetry was economically risky because Wilde was trying to enter a lit-
erary market that was considerably different to that of the broad-rang-
ing periodicals where he had previously published individual poems. 88
As Small explains, “the reading and buying public, as well as the pub-
lishing industry, enforced a very strong distinction between ‘literary art’
and journalism, one which was based on taste, money, and the contrast
between popular and élite readerships.”89 Wilde’s reputation as a poet
has also been overshadowed by accusations of plagiarism, beginning
with the Oxford Union scandal.90 The secretary of the Oxford Union
wrote to Wilde and requested a signed copy of his first volume of poetry
for the Union library. Embarrassingly, the signed edition was returned to
Wilde after members of the Union vetoed the acquisition. In a speech to
the Oxford Union members, a student named Oliver Elton argued: “[the
poems] are for the most part not by their putative father at all, but by
a number of better known and more deservedly reputed authors … the
volume which we are offered is theirs, not Mr Wilde’s: and I move that
48 L.
it be not accepted.”91 Wilde received a written apology from the secre-

tary, and in his reply, he that suggested that Union should ensure that
no other writers were subjected to “the coarse impertinence of having a
work officially rejected which has been no less officially sought for.” 92
A relatively small number of scholars have considered Wilde’s early
poetry and much of the existing research on this topic concentrates on
the prevalence of religious themes. Frederick S. Roden, Ellis Hanson,
Karl Beckson, and Bobby Fong have all explored the tension between
Wilde’s use of Catholic and Classical imagery. Each of these commen-
tators agrees that Wilde’s allegiance towards Hellenism is stronger. For
example, Hanson contends that Wilde’s poetry and letters from the
1870s “resound with his torn allegiance between Greece and Rome,
with his instincts straining more toward the bright sunlight of the for-
mer rather than the exquisite guilt and sorrows of the latter.” 93 Similarly,
Fong and Beckson conclude that Wilde’s decision to join Mahaffy
in Greece “would lead to a gradual waning of interest in Roman
Catholicism and a growing enthusiasm for things Greek.” 94 By contrast,
Roden explores the presence of homosexual themes in Wilde’s religious
poetry and also in earlier spiritual literature produced by the
Tractarians. The common link between Wilde and the Tractarians is the
importance they placed on Christ’s human incarnation. 95 Roden suggests
that it was possible for Wilde allude to homoeroticism via the subject of
Roman Catholicism because his understanding of “Christianity requires a
body” (i.e. the body of Christ).96 The following analysis draws on this
selection of scholarship, however, I argue that Wilde’s particular fusion
of Catholic and Classical aesthetics should be considered as a defining
feature of his travel poetry.
In 1877, Wilde continued to sound the idea of travelling to Rome in
his letters. He had given up on the prospect of spending Easter in
Rome because he was in debt and sent his apologies to Ward: “I am
sorry to say that I will not see the Holy City this Easter at any rate.”97
Regardless of his situation, Wilde urged Ward to be open to
Catholicism: “Do be touched by it, feel the awful fascination of the
Church, its extreme beauty and sentiment, and let every part of your
nature have play and room.”98 Although Wilde believed he was not in
the position to feel all of this for himself, he fancied that if Ward felt
the urge to convert, that would be enough to resolve his own spiritual
dilemma: “for you to feel the fascination of Rome would to me be the
greatest of pleasures: I think it would settle me.”99 In this time of
crisis, Hunter-Blair intervened by providing
Wilde with the money to travel to Rome, as planned. On his way to

Rome, Hunter-Blair stopped at Monte Carlo and placed a £2 bet to raise
money for Wilde’s travel expenses; luckily for Wilde, he left with almost
£60 in winnings.100
When Wilde received the good news, he made his way to Genoa
with Mahaffy, who was accompanied by two young men: George
Macmillan and William Goulding. Macmillan had just completed his
studies at Eton and was about to join his family’s publishing business,
and Goulding was an Irish student who was attending Cambridge
University.101 Wilde was set to travel directly to Rome and mentioned
his travel plans in a note to another Oxford friend named Reginald
Harding: “I start for Rome on Sunday; Mahaffy comes as far as Genoa
with me: and I hope to see the golden dome of St Peter’s and the
Eternal City by Tuesday night. This is an era in my life, a crisis. I wish
I could look into the seeds of time and see what is coming.”102 There
is hint of trepidation in this message, as Wilde was advancing towards
Rome and the possibility of a life-changing religious experience. Given
his background as a Protestant clergyman, Mahaffy was concerned
that his former pupil was on the brink of conversion. While they were
together, Mahaffy tried to dissuade Wilde from meeting his friends in
Rome. When Macmillan described the situation in a letter to his
father, he observed that “[Wilde] is just now rather fas- cinated by
Roman Catholicism, and is indeed on his way to Rome, in order to see
all the glories of the religion which seems to him the highest and
most sentimental. Mahaffy is quite determined to prevent this if
possible, and is using every argument he can to check him.”103
Mahaffy succeeded by offering the perfect diversion—a trip to
Greece. Mahaffy boasted of his triumph in a letter to his wife: “we
have taken Oscar Wilde with us, who has of course come round under
the influence of the moment from Popery to Paganism … I think it is a
fair case of cheating the Devil.”104
Mahaffy’s and Macmillan’s respective descriptions of Wilde
suggest that he was passing through a transitory Catholic phase. On
the one hand, Macmillan understood it as a recent development, as a
fascination that had “just now” taken hold of Wilde. On the other
hand, Mahaffy gathered that Wilde was a capricious young man who
would set aside his Romish leanings with the right encouragement.
Although Wilde followed Mahaffy to Greece, he still intended to see
Rome. From Corfu, Wilde sent a postcard to Harding and explained
the unexpected change in his travel itinerary: “I never went to Rome
at all! What a changeable
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fellow you must think me, but Mahaffy my old tutor carried me off to
Greece with him to see Mykenae and Athens. I am awfully ashamed of
myself but I could not help it and will take Rome on my way back.” 105
Wilde alluded to the fact that he was using Hunter-Blair’s money to
travel to Greece, but the excitement of being swept off course towards
the grand ruins of Hellas made it a worthy betrayal. We cannot overes-
timate the rare opportunity that Mahaffy extended to Wilde. It was not
common for tourists to venture to Greece because the nation was still
reeling from the effects of civil war, government corruption, and political
instability.106 Greece was a dangerous travel destination, so dangerous,
that Wilde and his companions needed to arm themselves with guns. 107
Wilde’s sonnet, “Impression de Voyage,” expresses the thrill of sailing
towards the mainland of Greece. The poem first appeared, like “Rome
Unvisited,” in the Boston Pilot (28 July 1877) as “Hellas! Hellas!”
Wilde adopted the French title when it was published in Waifs and Strays
(March 1880), which was an Oxford-based poetry magazine, and again,
when he included it in his volume of poetry. Wilde’s French title creates
a strong parallel with Arthur Hugh Clough’s travel poem, Amours de
Voyage (1858, revised 1862). Clough’s narrative poem is structured as a
series of letters written by English tourists who visit Rome in 1849,
while the city is besieged by French forces. At a crucial juncture in the
poem, the main character, Claude, realizes that he is in love with a fellow
traveller named Mary Trevelyan. Claude only comes to this realization
when Mary leaves for Florence; after this point, the narrative follows his
failed attempts to reunite with Mary. Just as Claude is about to depart
from Rome, Clough presents a striking image the city, as seen from a
distance:
Therefore farewell, ye hills, and ye, ye envineyarded ruins.

Therefore farewell, ye walls, palaces, pillars, and domes!
Therefore farewell, far seen, ye peaks of the mythic Albano,
Seen from Montorio’s height, Tibur and Æsula’s hills!
Ah, could we once, ere we go, could we stand, while, to ocean
descending, Sinks o’er the yellow dark plain slowly the yellow broad
sun,
Stand, from the forest emerging at sunset, …108,109
Clough’s poem highlights the wonderful variety of the Mediterranean

landscape. The English traveller distinguishes the famed hills that sur-
round Rome, as well as its rich architectural heritage. In this vista,
ancient ruins and pillars that survived from the Roman Empire stand
beside Renaissance palaces and domes. As Claude lingers on the

outskirts of the city, he wishes that he could pause to watch the sunset as
it tints the landscape in spectacular hues of yellow.
By contrast, Wilde’s poem is directed towards the pleasure of finally
arriving in Greece and captures the natural features of the
Mediterranean coastline:
The sea was sapphire coloured, and the sky

Burned like a heated opal through the air;
We hoisted sail: the wind was blowing fair
For the blue lands that to the Eastward lie.
From the steep prow I marked with quickening eye
Zakynthos, every olive grove and creek,
Ithaca’s cliff, Lycaon’s snowy peak,
And all the flower-strewn hills of Arkady.
… —when ’gan the West to burn,
And a red sun upon the seas to ride,
I stood upon the strand of Greece at last!
Katakolo 1877110
This vision of Greece reveals a rocky and mountainous terrain, a land

that is burgeoning with olive groves and blossom-covered hills. Yet the
Greek landscape is imbued with competing meanings, as the names
Zakynthos, Ithaca, and Mount Lycaon evoke the darker mythic themes
of war, death, and divine retribution. Ithaca is famed as the island home
of Odysseus. In the Iliad, Odysseus arrives at Troy with an army of
men from this region, including a contingent from Zakynthos.111 In
the Odyssey, Ithaca becomes the site of a violent domestic battle when
Odysseus reasserts his position as head of the household by killing all
of Penelope’s suitors.112 Wilde’s reference to Mount Lycaon alludes to
the metamorphosis of King Lycaon, who was transformed into a wolf
after offering Zeus a meal made from human flesh. 113 These places are
enshrined in epic poetry as sites associated with bloodshed and con-
flict, but this mythic legacy does not disturb the leisurely mood of the
cruise to Katakolo. Wilde also revives the sunset imagery that we see in
Clough’s poem, but the traveller in “Impression de Voyage” is eager to
occupy the landscape. Clough’s sunset signals the end of the traveller’s
time in Rome and promises the chance of a budding romance. In Wilde’s
poem, however, the sunset brings the voyage to a glorious end and cre-
ates a powerful ambience to mark the beginning of the grand tour.
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In “Santa Decca,” which also dates from the journey that Wilde made
to Greece, the sense of place is not as prominent, as the landscape of
Corfu elicits a meditation on the demise of the Pagan gods. Unlike most
of Wilde’s travel poems, “Santa Decca” was not published in a periodi-
cal. This sonnet first appeared in Poems, with the postscript “Corfu.”114
In this work, Wilde dramatically pronounces the death of the Athena,
Persephone, and, above all, Pan:
The Gods are dead: no longer do we bring

To grey-eyed Pallas crowns of olive-leaves!
Demeter’s child no more hath tithe of sheaves,
And in the noon the careless shepherds sing,
For Pan is dead, and all the wantoning
By secret glade and devious haunt is o’er:
Young Hylas seeks the water-springs no more;
Great Pan is dead, and Mary’s Son is King.115
The repetition of Pan’s name suggests that the landscape reflects the
absence of this divinity, more so than the goddesses who are mentioned
at the beginning of the poem. The sudden shift from the general demise
of the gods to the specific loss of Pan is unexpected, given that Pan is not
an Olympian god; he is a fertility deity, associated with nature, music,
and revelry, a protector of shepherds and their flocks. In his absence,
the mountainside is no longer the setting for sexual interludes between
divinities and mortals. As we discover in the eighth line, the coming of
Christ has displaced Pan: “Great Pan is dead, and Mary’s son is King.”
It is significant that Wilde does not name Christ, and only refers to him
through his relationship with Mary, the Virgin Mother. This familial con-
nection emphasizes Christ’s humanity and gestures towards the Catholic
veneration of the Virgin Mary. The statement, “Mary’s Son is King,”
also reminds us of the grief that Mary suffered as her son was taunted as
the “King of the Jews” and condemned to death by crucifixion.
According to Fong and Beckson, the phrase “Great Pan is dead”
doubles as a reference to Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poem, “The
Dead Pan” (1844), as well as Plutarch’s treatise, On the Obsolescence
of the Oracles.116 Plutarch recounts the story of an Egyptian sailor
named Thamus when discussing the existence of demons. According
to Plutarch, Thamus was summoned by a voice which instructed him
to “announce that Great Pan is dead” when he arrived at Palodes. 117
Philosophers interpreted this event as a sign of the existence of one
eternal god, but in Barrett Browning’s poem, the mysterious voice is

associated with the crucifixion of Christ. She prefaces her poem by stat-
ing that it is “partly founded on a well-known tradition mentioned in a
treatise of Plutarch (“De Oraculorum Defectu”), according to which, at the
hour of the Saviour’s agony, a cry of ‘Great Pan is dead!’ swept across the
waves in the hearing of certain mariners,—and the oracles ceased.”118
A further useful source for comparison is Algernon Swinburne’s
“Hymn to Proserpine” from Poems and Ballads (1866). Wilde was
exposed to this volume while he was at Trinity, and he rated Swinburne
as one of his favourite poets.119 Poems and Ballads was a radical work
because Swinburne drew on themes associated with Greek and Roman
antiquity to explore the darker side of feminine sexuality. In his “Hymn
to Proserpine,” Swinburne contrasts Venus and Mary to denounce the
rise of Christianity. Like Wilde, Swinburne also conceptualizes this tran-
sition as a form of death and casts Mary and Christ as interlopers who
usurp the honours that rightfully belong to Venus:
Though these that were Gods are dead, and thou being dead
art a God,
Though before thee the throned Cytherean be fallen, and
hidden her head,
Yet thy kingdom shall pass, Galilean, thy dead shall go
down to thee dead.
Of the maiden thy mother men sing as a goddess with
grace clad around;
Thou art throned where another was king; where another
was queen she is crowned.120
The passage above reminds us that Christ’s divinity is tied to his human
life and resurrection from death (“thou being dead art a God”). Where
Wilde refers to Christ as the undisputed King, Swinburne adopts the
contemptuous, pagan designation for Christ, “Galilean.”121 Swinburne’s
poem asserts that Christ’s kingdom will fall and that no one can
escape death by believing in the resurrection of Christ. When
Swinburne’s focus turns to the worship of Mary, he is equally
dismissive. Although Mary has gained the status of a “goddess” and a
“queen” through her maternal relationship with Christ, she is a poor
substitute for Venus. It is also difficult to believe in the divine power of
Mary because she is such a lowly figure: “For thine [mother] came
pale and a maiden, and sister to sorrow; / … / For thine came
weeping, a slave among slaves, and
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rejected.”122 By comparison, Venus, the mother of the mighty Roman

Empire, is far more majestic and seductive: “Clothed round with the
world’s desire as with raiment, /… / and a goddess, and mother of
Rome.”123 Swinburne’s Venus is a symbol of feminine beauty, sexual-
ity, and fertility, and in “Hymn to Proserpine,” these powerful
feminine attributes have no place whatsoever within the Christian
tradition.
Wilde’s response to the incarnation of Christ and the advent of
Christianity is much more ambiguous than Swinburne’s, yet, as “Santa
Decca” draws to an end, Wilde also questions the lasting influence of
Christ’s ministry. It may seem as though “Santa Decca” celebrates
Christ, given that the “Great Pan” is cancelled out by a god who
enters the world as an infant and is dependent on the care of the Virgin
Mother. But, just as the first stanza announces that Christ is King, the
second stanza diverts our attention away from Mary and Christ. The
absolute assertion that “The Gods are dead” becomes more questionable
as the persona in Wilde’s poem is excited by the possibility that “Some
god” if not Pan himself, is still residing on the mountain: “And yet—
perchance in this sea-trancѐd isle, / Chewing the bitter fruit of memory,
/ Some God lies hidden in the asphodel. / … / but see / The leaves
are stirring: let us watch a-while.” 124 Instead of waiting for an encounter
with the Christian God, as in “Graffiti d’Italia,” the persona in “Santa
Decca” watches and waits for a pagan god to appear. By the end of the
poem, Christ disappears altogether.
At the time of Wilde’s vacation, German archaeologists were excavat-
ing the temple of Zeus at Olympia, and so, Mahaffy made arrangements
to visit this site. There are no written records of Wilde’s impression of
Olympia, but as Ross has shown, we can gain some valuable insights
from the accounts of his travel companions.125 In 1878, Macmillan
wrote about his travels in Greece in an article called “A Ride Across
the Peloponnese,” as did Mahaffy in the second edition of Rambles
and Studies in Greece. In 1877, the Temple of Zeus consisted of no
more than a basement and part of a wall, with broken columns laying
on the ground beside the temple’s foundations. Macmillan thought
the site was “profoundly disappointing,” and Mahaffy was displeased
with the “exceedingly ugly” mounds of earth, trenches, wheelbar-
rows, and planks that “defaced” the landscape. 126 Both Mahaffy and
Macmillan were astounded by the beauty of the west pediment sculp-
tures of the Centaurs and Lapiths, and the fragmentary metopes depict-
ing the labours of Heracles, although it was difficult to get a clear view
of the artefacts. As Mahaffy recalled, “[a]ll these great figures and

fragments were huddled together, when we visited them, in wretched
sheds, where it was difficult to see them, or dwell with satisfaction
upon their beauty.”127 Nonetheless, Mahaffy saw enough to declare that
“the splendid pediment sculptures … will henceforth rank with the
grandest relics of the highest and purist Greek art.” 128 Likewise,
Macmillan realized that “[t]he importance of this find can hardly be
exaggerated” because the sculptors Paiô nios and Alkamenê s “were
mere names to us” before the Olympian marbles were unearthed.129
Wilde shared this unique experience and claimed to have witnessed
the unearthing of the white arm of Apollo and a statue of Hermes by
Praxiteles.130 But, as far as we know, the significant archaeological dis-
coveries at Olympia did not inspire him to write any poetry. Perhaps
he was put off by the practicalities of the excavation work? After
all, Mahaffy’s and Macmillan’s respective responses to Olympia did
not match the romantic, pastoral construct of Greece that we see in
“Impression de Voyage” and “Santa Decca.”
After watching the archaeological excavations at Olympia, Wilde and
his companions set out on a ten-day journey on horseback through
the Peloponnese. During this expedition, they stopped to explore a
Hellenistic theatre which became the subject of Wilde’s poem, “The
Theatre at Argos.”131 This poem also featured in the Boston Pilot (21
July 1877), but it was omitted from Wilde’s Poems. The first stanza
of “The Theatre at Argos” bears no sign of Roman Catholic or even
Christian imagery. Rather, Wilde focuses on the emptiness and silence of
the ancient performance space:
Nettles and poppy mar each rock-hewn seat:

No poet crowned with olive deathlessly
Chants his glad song, nor clamorous Tragedy
Startles the air; green corn is waving sweet
Where once the Chorus danced to measures fleet;
Far to the East a purple stretch of sea,
The cliffs of gold that prisoned Danae;
And desecrated Argos at my feet.132
Initially, Wilde highlights the decay that has taken hold of this site as he
focuses on the wild vegetation that has damaged the structure of the the-
atre. When commenting on the disjuncture between the imagined ideal
of Greece and the actual landscape, Ross remarks that “[a] voyage to
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Hellas could be experienced as a loss as much as a recovery.” 133 This is

an illuminating comment because it reflects the thought process behind
Wilde’s poem. As he contemplates this loss, Wilde reanimates the ruined
space by reminding us of the music and dances that were performed
there in the past. The poem also evokes the emotional cries of the tragic
heroes and heroines who startled the audience with their “clamorous”
outbursts. At the same time, the lost sounds of Greek tragedy are inter-
mingled with natural, picturesque scenery to show that there is beauty
still left in the abandoned site. The eye is first drawn to the calming
motion of the corn waving in the wind before it is dazzled by the purple
and golden horizon. Just as we begin to picture the theatre, in its past
and present forms, we reach a point of departure in the narrative of the
poem.
In the second stanza, the attention shifts from the peaceful theatre
at Argos to the perspective of a devout Christian who is anxious about
the prevalence of spiritual decay. The decision to target “The Theatre at
Argos” towards a Catholic audience implies that the Christian message is
of greater importance than the sense of loss and recovery that is elicited
from the Greek landscape. From what we have seen in “Santa Decca,”
we might expect the reference to Danae (the mythical princess of Argos)
would introduce an elaborate elegy for the culture and mythology of
Ancient Greece. Danae was imprisoned in a bronze underground cham-
ber by her father, Acrisius, because he learned of a prophecy that
foretold he would die at the hands of his daughter’s son. Zeus visited
Danae in the form of a rain of gold, and this encounter resulted in the
birth of the hero, Perseus. 134 In “The Theatre at Argos,” Wilde urges his
readers to maintain their relationship with God:
No season now to mourn the days of old,

A nation’s shipwreck on the rocks of Time,
Or the dread storms of all-devouring Fate,
For now the peoples clamor at our gate,
The world is full of plague and sin and crime,
And God Himself is half-dethroned for Gold!
Argos 1877.135
In this final stanza, the song of the tragic chorus is supplanted by

the clamour of non-believers who bear down upon the community of the
faithful. Likewise, the melancholy beauty of Argos is replaced with the
image of a fallen world, where “plague and sin and crime” run rampant.
There are no beautiful rituals, charismatic churchmen, or finely crafted
religious objects to validate religious devotion. Moreover, Wilde does
not even attempt to comfort his audience by acknowledging that Christ
has given humanity the power to transcend all forms of sin. An inter-
esting reversal is at play here: the first stanza elaborates on the decay of
theatre, and second suggests that God’s creation has been marred by a
culture that is increasingly materialistic. Wilde ends his poem with the
alarming cry, “God is half-dethroned for Gold!”—as if to say that there
is no stopping the advance of secularization and worse is still to come.
From Argos, Wilde travelled to Aegina, Nauplio, and Athens. He
ended his expedition of Greece in Mykenae and departed on 21 April
1877 to meet Hunter-Blair and Ward in Rome. 136 Hunter-Blair still
hoped to make a convert of Wilde and arranged a private audience with
Pope Pius IX. Not even an audience with the Pope was enough to sway
Wilde, but this meeting did prompt him to write another sonnet, “Urbs
Sacra Æterna,” which also pays tribute to Rome and the Pope. “Urbs
Sacra Æterna” featured in the Dublin-based publication, Illustrated
Monitor: A Monthly Magazine of Catholic Literature, in June 1877, a
month before the “The Theatre at Argos” and “Impression de Voyage”
appeared in print.137 Wilde included another postscript, “Rome 1877,”
indicating that this work was part of his growing corpus of travel poetry.
“Urbs Sacra Æterna” differs from the works that I have discussed so far
because it views Roman Catholicism in terms of a political allegiance to
the Pope. In this particular poem, Wilde opposes the Italian nationalist
movement because it stripped the Pope of his power to govern over the
Papal States of Italy in 1870. The poem addresses the city of Rome and
charts the major political shifts that have shaped its history. For Wilde,
the glorious legacy of Rome includes the Republican era, the rise of the
Roman Empire, and even the sack of Rome by Germanic tribes. By con-
trast, the modern unification of Italy is symbolized by the Italian flag,
which stands as an affront to the rightful leadership of Pope Pius IX:
“And now upon thy walls the breezes fan / (Ah! city crowned by God,
discrowned by man): / The hated flag of red and white and green.” 138
Rather than accepting the authority of the newly formed Italian govern-
ment, Pope Pius IX confined himself within the Vatican. The concluding
lines of “Urbs Sacra Æterna” reinforce the orthodox political stance of
the poem, which implies that the entire history of Rome has been lead-
ing up to this grand gesture of defiance: “Nay, glory rather in the present
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hour, / When pilgrims kneel before the Holy One, / The prisoned shep-
herd of the Church of God.”139 The Pope still embodies the power and
majesty of the Catholic Church, but “Urbs Sacra Æterna” adds a new
dimension to Wilde’s poetic representation of the Pope by honouring his
political integrity.
On the whole, Wilde’s poetic representation of Catholic aesthetics,
Church doctrine, and the leadership of the Pope are favourable, but this
pattern is contradicted in “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” (“Hail Mary Full
of Grace”). In this poem, the persona struggles to sustain his interest
when viewing an image of the Annunciation, however, this did not pre-
vent Wilde from publishing it in another Catholic magazine called the
Irish Monthly (July 1878). Wilde revised and renamed “Ave Maria Gratia
Plena” several times and modified the postscript with each revision, but
the Irish Monthly version locates the poet at the “Vatican Gallery Rome,
1877.”140 The opening lines of “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” suggest that
the human incarnation of Christ was an anticlimactic affair:
Was this His coming? I had hoped to see

A scene of wondrous glory, as was told
Of some great god who in a rain of gold
Broke-open bars and fell on Danaé;
Or a dread vision, as when Semelé,
Sickening for love and unappeased desire,
Prayed to see God’s clear body, and the fire
Caught her fair limbs and slew her
utterly.141
Wilde presents us with a mischievous proposition: the persona has con-

fused Christ with Zeus and has gone to the Vatican Gallery expecting
to see a “wondrous” Classical tableau. Once again, Wilde returns to
the myth of Danae and provides more detail about the conception of
Perseus. There is an air of indifference towards Christ, given that most
of the first stanza is devoted to Zeus’s divine manifestation as the “rain
of gold” that impregnated Danae, and the “dread vision” that killed
Semele, the mortal mother of Dionysus. Zeus’s divine form was too
powerful for humans to bear, and when Semele looked upon her lover,
she suffered a horrific death by conflagration. The seductive and dan-
gerous nature of Zeus’s power is also reinforced through the rhyme of
“desire” and “fire.” Wilde appears to be dismissing Christ and the Virgin
Mary, but we should not forget that Zeus’s sons can be viewed as Christ-
like figures. The rain of gold is a Classical example of a virgin conception,
and like Christ, Dionysus was born of a mortal mother and resurrected
from death by his father. Zeus rescued his unborn child from Semele’s
burning body and gestated his son in his thigh, therefore, Zeus served as
both a divine mother and father to Dionysus.
In “Ave Maria Gratia Plena,” we see that Mary, the Virgin Mother,
simply cannot compete with the scintillating violence and sexual energy
that features in Zeus’s mythology. When the persona focuses on the
image of Mary, he sees a comparatively dull image: “A kneeling girl with
passionless, pale face, / An angel with a lily in his hand, / And over
both, with outstretched wings, the Dove.” 142 In their commentary to
Poems and Poems in Prose, Fong and Beckson interpret Wilde’s refer-
ence to the Vatican Gallery as an indication that Wilde was responding
to an Annunciation painting by Raphael, or possibly, Baraccio. 143 They
also suggest that Fra Angelico’s frescos at San Marco may be another
likely source because Wilde changed the postscript to San Marco in the
1879 version, and then to Florence in the 1881 and 1882 editions of
Poems. But these artworks do not include all of the features that Wilde
describes in his poem, and this inconsistency has led Fong and Beckson
to believe that the poem derived from “a recollected experience and was
not composed in either Rome or Florence.” 144 The change in the post-
script may point towards another explanation. If we accept that Wilde’s
poem relates to a fictional artwork, it follows that this reference point
draws attention to the generic nature of the Annunciation scene. 145 This
reading is also supported by the voice of the art critic (note the quo-
tation marks) who is unimpressed with the passionless, pallid image of
Mary. The composition proves to be an aesthetic failure, and ironically,
the nondescript image of the Virgin negates Wilde’s title, “Hail Mary
Full of Grace.”
The focus of “Easter Day,” which appeared in the June 1879 issue
of Waifs and Strays, is divided between Catholic aesthetics and the por-
trayal of Jesus’s humility. Wilde spent his Easter travelling to Greece
with Mahaffy, but the postscript (“Rome 1877”) suggests the poem was
inspired by his time in Rome.146 Much like “Graffiti d’Italia,” “Easter
Day” is also preoccupied with the appearance of the Pope as he arrives to
celebrate the Easter mass. The key difference is that the Pope is entirely
defined by his regalia in “Easter Day”:
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Priest-like he wore a robe more white than foam,

And king-like swathed himself in Nero’s red;
Three crowns of gold rose high above his head:
In splendour and in light the Pope passed home.147
Wilde creates a perplexing juxtaposition between Catholic Rome and

Imperial Rome. Considering the Easter context, it is surprising that the
Pope’s red garments are associated with the Emperor Nero instead of
Christ. Wilde may be evoking Nero to signal that the Pope is carrying
on the line of Roman emperors as the leader of the Catholic Church.
Alternatively, the rich aesthetic detail of the papal garments could be
deployed as a symbol of Neronian decadence. Nero is generally famed
for playing music as he watched his city burn, which makes the refer-
ence to the Pope all the more unsettling. Hanson regards Wilde’s “ten-
dency to find the pagan in the Catholic and the Catholic in the pagan”
as a reflection of “the commonplace Evangelical belief that the Roman
Catholic Church had gone seriously astray and busied itself with idola-
trous rituals.”148 Hanson’s observation is fair, but “Easter Day” seems to
delight in the elaborate Papal processions that take place in Rome.
As we move into the second stanza of “Easter Day,” the focus dra-
matically shifts from the Pope to Christ, the man of sorrow. The material
wealth of the Catholic Church is contrasted with the example of Jesus,
who lived without the comfort of a home:
My heart stole back across wide wastes of years

To One who wandered by a lonely sea,
And sought in vain for any place of rest.
“Foxes have holes, and every bird it’s nest,
I, only I, must travel wearily,
And bruise my feet, and drink wine salt with tears.”
Rome 1877.149
Isobel Murray identifies this quotation as a reference to Luke 9:58.150

In this parable, Jesus responds to people who wish to follow him, but
are reluctant to leave without settling family affairs or saying goodbye
their relatives. Jesus turns to a would-be follower and explains that his
home is with God, not here on earth: “Foxes have holes, and birds have
nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lie down and rest” (Luke 9:58,
Matthew 9:20). When quoting Scripture, Wilde deliberately expands on
the text to emphasize Jesus’s isolation: “I, only I, must travel wearily.”
In Luke’s account, Jesus is not alone: he travels with his disciples and is
approached by more people who are eager to join him. Wilde’s quota-
tion therefore obscures Jesus’s mission to find others who will help him
“proclaim the Kingdom of God” (Luke 9:60). This contrasts with the
first stanza of “Easter Day,” which suggests that the material opulence
of the Vatican has come to define the Catholic Church. Through this
disjuncture, Wilde illustrates that the symbols and spectacles of Roman
Catholicism are splendid and enjoyable to watch, but they ultimately
have little to do with the teachings and life of Christ.
Upon his return from Rome, Wilde was punished for missing the first
three weeks of the Easter term and was ordered to leave Oxford for
six months, until the start of the October term. 151 During his exile
from Oxford, Wilde published “Ποντος Ατρυγετος” (Pontos Atrugetos)
in the December 1877 issue of the Irish Monthly. Instead of including
a geographical postscript, Wilde added a date to the poem, “June
1877.” The title derives from a Homeric epithet, which is often
translated as “barren sea.”152 In the first line of the poem, Wilde
translates this epithet as “unvintageable sea,” which cleverly evokes
another well-known Homeric expression, “the wine-dark sea.”153 The
sea of the Greek imagination takes on new meaning as Wilde
transforms it into the site of a miraculous encounter between a
fisherman and Jesus Christ. Before this meeting takes place, the
fisherman cries out to the sea: “‘Alas!’ I cried, ‘My life is full of pain, /
And who can gather fruit or golden grain / From these waste fields
that travail ceaselessly?’”154 Wilde recreates the scene that he
established in “Easter Day,” but this time it is the fisherman who appears
alone on the seashore. He looks to the sea as a vast wasteland that
exhausts him and thwarts his efforts to earn a living. But the appari- tion
of Christ alters the fisherman’s perspective and transforms the tone of
the poem:
My nets gaped wide with many a break and flaw,

Nathless I threw them as my final cast
Into the sea: and waited for the end.
When lo! a sudden brightness! and I saw
Christ walking on the waters! fear was
past; I knew that I had found my Perfect
Friend.
June 1877.155
Jesus reveals himself in all of his glory, and his divinity is not doubted
or rivalled by any of the Pagan gods, as it is in “Ave Maria Gratia Plena”
and “Santa Decca.” The fisherman’s despair is alleviated, as his attention
62 L.
turns to the vision of Christ, although, he only believes in the presence

of the risen Lord after seeing him. He is like the disciple Thomas, who
refuses to believe in the resurrection until he is able to see Jesus with
his own eyes and touch his wounds (John 20:24). The fantastic scenario
that Wilde creates in “Ποντος Ατρυγετος” can be interpreted as another
meditation on the limits of faith. Those who worship Christ must believe
in his existence without the reassurance of seeing him manifest before
their eyes. Yet, it is uncertain if the fisherman is a trustworthy witness.
The initial reference to the Odyssey reminds us of Odysseus’s role as a
poet-storyteller, a masterful speaker who can persuade or manipulate
his audience with ease. When Odysseus sings of his own heroic exploits,
we can never be sure if he is telling the truth or spinning a beautiful lie:
the same can be said of the fisherman’s story.
Four years after “Ποντος Ατρυγετος” appeared in the Irish Monthly,
Wilde revised and renamed the poem “Vita Nuova” (“New Life”) and
included it in Poems. As we can see, the original Greek title was
replaced with an Italian phrase that doubles as the title of Dante’s
collection of love poetry. In the revised poem, the fisherman’s role in
the narrative is unchanged; however, Wilde eliminated the overt
reference to Christ in the final stanza. Instead of seeing Christ, the
fisherman is met with an indistinct white-limbed being or object:
“When lo! a sudden glory! and I saw / From the black waters of my
tortured past / The argent splendour of white limbs ascend!” Murray
suggests that the white limbs belong to Venus, since the primordial
goddess of love was born from the sea.156 It is impossible to know
whether it is Venus because Wilde teases us with the partial revelation
of a body; the limbs may belong to either a divinity or a piece of
broken sculpture.157 The decision to excise Christ from “Vita Nuova”
creates an interpretive gap which prevents us from defining the white-
limbed thing, and this makes the poem darker, stranger, and more
seductive than “Ποντος Ατρυγετος.” The revised ending also indicates
Wilde’s non-committal approach towards religious subjects. As a poet, he
did not need to define himself as a Catholic or a Protestant, and he
was free to excise Christ from his work to achieve a different poetic
effect.
En route to Greece, Mahaffy remarked that his young protégé Wilde
had made the shift from Popery to Paganism, but Wilde’s relationship
with Catholicism did not end there. As Ward understood it, Wilde’s faith
persisted like a passionate lifelong romance: “his final decision to find
ref- uge in the Roman Church was not the sudden clutch of the drowning
man at the plank in the shipwreck, but a return to a first love, a love
rejected, it is true … yet one that had haunted him from early days with
a persistent spell.”158 The tutorial culture at Oxford made it possible for

Wilde to engage in a spiritual dialogue with his friends, a dialogue which
he continued in many of his letters to Ward. For a time, Wilde believed
that he could settle his spiritual dilemma by spending time in Rome,
but he allowed Mahaffy to divert him just as he was about to achieve his
dream of experiencing Easter in Rome.
Travelling to Greece helped to calm Wilde’s Catholic fervour; at least,
Hunter-Blair noticed that his friend “had become Hellenized, somewhat
Paganized” and that “Rome had retired into the background” by the
time he had returned to Oxford.159 It is quite possible that Wilde found
some consolation in writing his travel poetry, which deploys Catholic and
Classical aesthetics as a productive site of conflict. Both “Impression de
Voyage” and “The Theatre at Argos” entice us with the vivid colours and
picturesque sights that are so unique to the Greek landscape. In “Santa
Decca,” however, the distinction between Christ and Pan becomes indef-
inite, as the narrative of death and resurrection can apply to either one of
these divinities. “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” is possibly the most audacious
of Wilde’s poems because it implies that God’s manifestation through the
Virgin Mary is much less exciting than Zeus’s divine, but deadly, form. At
times Wilde revels in the materiality of Catholic ritual (as seen in “Graffiti
d’Italia” and “Urbs Sacra Æterna”), but he also raises questions about
the tremendous wealth that was in the hands of the Pope and the Roman
Catholic Church in “Easter Day.” By comparison, “Ποντος Ατρυγετος”
expresses the sceptic’s desire to see evidence of Christ’s divinity,
although he replaces Christ with an ambiguous pagan counterpart in the
revised version of this poem. While at Oxford, Wilde embarked upon a
“steep and long” journey towards Rome and the Roman Catholic faith
that remained unresolved until his dying moments. Yet, this deeply
personal spiritual conflict also inspired him to write and publish
numerous poems where he responded to the historically significant sites,
scenes, and art objects that he encountered in Greece and Rome.
NOTES
1. Ian Small, ‘Introduction’, in Poems and Poems in Prose, eds. Bobby Fong
and Karl Beckson, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 1: xi. According
to Small, Wilde “published nine poems in Ireland and at least two (and
perhaps three) in the United States”: ‘Introduction’, 1: xi.
2. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xi.
64 L.
3. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xv. Small has reproduced the clauses relating

to publication expenses in the publishing contract between Bogue and
Wilde. See Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xiv–xv, n. 9. An official American
edition of Poems was also produced in 1881 by Roberts Brothers, which
was a publishing firm based in Boston. As Michèle Mendelssohn has
noted, the American edition of Poems “sold out in a matter of days”:
Making Oscar Wilde (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), 88.
Pirate copies of Wilde’s volume proliferated the American market
because “the demand for Wilde’s Poems far exceeded what Roberts
Brothers could supply”: Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde, 88. See also
Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xvi, n. 12.
4. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xv. See also Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New
York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988 [c. 1984]), 137–38.
5. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xvii. The Bodley Head released two hundred
and twenty copies of Poems; this edition sold out within a few days. By
1892, Wilde had established himself as a writer, and Small suggests that
the recent success of Lady Windermere’s Fan (1892) contributed to the
growing public interest in Wilde’s literature. See Small, ‘Introduction’,
1: xvii, xx.
7. H. Montgomery Hyde, Oscar Wilde: A Biography (New York: De Capo
Press, 1981 [c. 1975]), 48. See also Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 144.
8. Hyde, A Biography, 49.
9. This text is taken from a draft of Symonds’s letter to Wilde; as quoted
by Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 145. Symonds also mentions Wilde’s travel
poetry in this letter and gently critiques these earlier works as follows:
“I feel that they represent a stage already rather overlived by you. As
such there is a somewhat painful contrast between their airy
insouciance, their Keatsian openness at all pores to beauty, & the
intensity of personal experience of the later, so murderous to the play
of mere fancy, so gripping on reality”: Symonds; as quoted by Ellmann,
Oscar Wilde, 145.
10. There are two exceptions: “The Theatre at Argos” (1877) was only pub-
lished in The Pilot, and “Santa Decca” first appeared as part of the 1881
collection.
11. See the Introduction to this volume for an overview of the evolution
of the Oxford Classical curriculum (commonly known as Greats). See
Chapter 4 for further information about the philosophical content that
was covered on the Greats examination and Wilde’s experience as a stu-
dent of Greats.
12. Marianne Elliot, When God Took Sides: Religion and Identity in Ireland—
Unfinished History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 163–67.
13. The death Sir William Wilde brought financial hardship to the fam-
ily. As Mendelssohn explains, two of the properties (1 Merrion Square
and Moytura House) were not owned outright, and the income gener-
ated from the properties at Connemara and Bray needed to be shared.
By 1879, Lady Jane Wilde and her eldest son William left Ireland and
joined Oscar in London. See Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde, 44–45.
14. Davis Coakley, Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Irish (Dublin:
Town House, 1994), 112–13.
15. Horst Schroeder, Additions and Corrections to Richard Ellmann’s Oscar
Wilde (Self-Published, 2002), 10. Ellmann suggests that the baptism
took place in 1859, but Schroeder has revised this information, offer-
ing 1862 or 1863 as a more likely date. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 19;
Schroeder, Additions and Corrections, 10.
16. Frederick S. Roden, Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture
(New York: Palgrave, 2002). Roden acknowledges that this rumoured
anecdote could be true or false, whereas Coakley is convinced that
the baptism took place, given that Lady Wilde openly admired the
Roman Catholic Church. See Roden, Same-Sex Desire, 131; Coakley,
Importance of Being Irish, 112.
17. Reverend Lawrence Charles Prideaux Fox, ‘People I Have Met’,
Donahoe’s Magazine, April 1905, 397; as quoted by Stuart Mason
[Christopher Sclater Millard], Bibliography of Oscar Wilde (London: T.
W. Laurie, 1914), 118–19.
18. According to a report published in The Month and Catholic Review,
Wilde is said to have “declared more than once to intimate friends that
he had a distinct recollection as a child of being christened in a Catholic
church”: Mason, Bibliography, 118.
19. Coakley, Importance of Being Irish, 114–15.
20. Ellis Hanson, Decadence and Catholicism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1997), 259.
21. When describing this scene, Robert Whelan specifies that “[Father
Cuthbert Dunne] arrived and asked the already comatose Oscar if he
wished to be received into the Church. Wilde made a movement with
his hand which was taken as assent, whereupon Fr Dunne baptised,
absolved and anointed him”: ‘Are Catholics Decadent or Are Decadents
Catholic?’ The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 19 (2001): 19.
22. Coakley, Importance of Being Irish, 19; Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 10–11. Sir
William Wilde was a distinguished eye and ear surgeon, and he received
a knighthood in 1864 for overseeing the collection of social and medical
data during several censuses of Ireland. As Coakley notes, Sir William
“was appointed medical adviser for the Irish census of 1841 and assis-
tant commissioner for the 1851, 1861 and 1871 censuses … His work
on the 1851 census has been described as one of the greatest demo-
graphic studies ever conducted and has become a standard work of ref-
erence on the Great Famine”: Importance of Being Irish, 19.
66 L.
23. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Reginald Harding’, 16 June 1877, in The Complete
Letters of Oscar Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis
(London: Fourth Estate, 2000), 54. Wilde expected that he and his
elder brother William would receive an equal share of Wilson’s estate.
This was not the case, as £8000 was bequeathed to St. Mark’s Hospital
and William received £2000. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 86. When this
occurred, Wilde confided in Harding, writing: “He was, poor fellow,
bigotedly intolerant of the Catholics and seeing me ‘on the brink’ struck
me out of his will”: ‘To Reginald Harding’, 16 June 1877, in Complete
Letters, 54.
24. David Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days and Other Papers (New York:
Longmans, 1939); reproduced in Oscar Wilde: Interviews and
Recollections, ed. E. H. Mikhail (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1979), 6.
This passage is also quoted by Ellmann, but there is some variation
in Ellmann’s phrasing. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 54.
25. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 53, 73; Hunter-Blair, ‘Oscar Wilde’, in
Recollections, 8–9; and Ronald Schuchard, ‘Wilde’s Dark Angel
and the Spell of Decadent Catholicism’, in Rediscovering Oscar
Wilde, ed. C. George Sandulescu (Gerrards Cross, UK: Colin Smythe,
1994), 372, 374.
26. The ban on Catholics was not always enforced. It is estimated that “a
dozen Roman Catholics were up at Oxford between 1854 and 1863,”
and ten Catholic students attended Oxford in 1883: Peter Hinchliff,
‘Religious Issues’, in Nineteenth Century Oxford, Part 2, eds. M. G.
Brock and M. C. Curthoys, in The History of the University of Oxford
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000), 7: 104 n. 37, 104.
27. L. W. B. Brockliss, The University of Oxford: A History (Oxford: Oxford
28. The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion (commonly known as the Thirty-
Nine Articles) are a set of statements outlining the doctrinal beliefs of
the Church of England. The Thirty-Nine Articles include beliefs that are
commonly shared by Protestants and Roman Catholics, as well as points
of disagreement between the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches.
29. P. B. Nockles, ‘An Academic Counter-Revolution: Newman and
Tractarian Oxford’s Idea of a University’, History of Universities, 10
(1991), 140.
30. John Henry Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua, ed. Ian Ker (London:
Penguin), 57.
31. G. R. Evans, The University of Oxford: A New History (London: I. B.
Taurus, 2010), 250.
32. Evans, Oxford, 253.
33. David Hilliard, ‘UnEnglish and Unmanly: Anglo-Catholicism and
Homosexuality’, Victorian Studies 25 (1982): 184.
34. Richard Hurrell Froude (1803–1836) was a close friend to both

Newman and Keble, and he is credited for bringing Newman and
Keble together. Froude also wrote some of the religious tracts that were
released by the Tractarians. Robert Isaac Wilberforce (1802–1857) is
not regarded as a Tractarian, but he did produce a number of theolog-
ical works and converted to Catholicism in 1854 (a few years after his
friend Henry Manning).
35. Brockliss, University of Oxford, 248. Newman himself had some expe-
rience with this as he also sought assistance from private tutors when
he was reading for Greats. Newman overworked himself and performed
poorly on his exams, gaining a Fourth in Classics, which was the lowest
mark. See Evans, Oxford, 246.
36. M. C. Curthoys, ‘The Examination System’, in Nineteenth Century
Oxford, Part 1, eds. M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, in The History
of the University of Oxford (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 6: 354.
37. Linda Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994), 41.
39. This quote was originally published in Addresses to Cardinal
Newman, with His Replies, 1879–81, ed. W. P. Neville (London:
Longmans, Green, 1905), 184; as quoted by Nockles, ‘An Academic
Counter- Revolution’, 153. See also Brockliss, University of Oxford,
254.
40. William Sewell, Thoughts on the Admission of Dissenters to the University
of Oxford: And on the Establishment of a State Religion (Oxford: D. A.
Talboys, 1834), 7; as quoted by Nockles, ‘An Academic Counter-
Revolution’, 153.
41. Heather Ellis, Generational Conflict and University Reform: Oxford in
the Age of Revolution (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 189.
42. Nockles, ‘An Academic Counter-Revolution’, 168.
44. Brockliss, University of Oxford, 415.
45. Peter Vernier, comp., Oscar Wilde at Magdalen: By Himself and His
Contemporaries (Self-Published, 2000), 13. This incident was recorded
by G. K. Atkinson, a student who witnessed the exchange between Dr.
Bulley, Allen, and Wilde. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 67; Peter Vernier,
‘Oscar Wilde at Magdalen’, The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde
Studies 19 (2001): 28.
46. Vernier, By Himself and His Contemporaries, 13.
47. I have substituted Allen’s name here, as Atkinson refers to him as Mr. Z,
“our history expert”: Vernier, By Himself and His Contemporaries, 13.
48. Vernier, ‘Oscar Wilde at Magdalen’, 28.
68 L.

University Press), 34.
53. Oscar Wilde; as quoted by Frank Harris, Oscar Wilde: His Life and
Confessions, vol. 1 (New York: Brentano’s, 1916), 41.
54. J. P. Mahaffy, Social Life in Greece: From Homer to Menander, 1st
ed. (London: Macmillan and Co., 1874), viii.
55. This is also true of the commentaries that Jowett included in his trans-
lations of Plato’s dialogues (see Chapter 5). For more on Wilde’s rela-
tionship with Mahaffy and their travel in Greece, see: Alastair J. L.
Blanshard, ‘Mahaffy and Wilde: A Study in Provocation’, in Oscar Wilde
and Classical Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard,
and Iarla Manny (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 19–35.
56. Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days, in Recollections, 4. Silas Wegg is a char-
acter from Charles Dickens’s novel, Our Mutual Friend (1865). Wegg
has a wooden leg and sells ballades on a street corner. Although he is
semi-literate, he is hired to read to the newly wealthy couple, Mr. and
Mrs. Boffin. Wegg discovers a will that undermines the Boffins’s recent
inheritance and resorts to blackmail to advance his own prospects.
57. Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days, in Recollections, 6.
58. William Ward, ‘Oscar Wilde: An Oxford Reminiscence’, in Son of Oscar
Wilde, ed. Vyvyan Holland (London: Rupert Hart-Davis, 1954); repro-
duced in Recollections, 12–13.
59. Jarlath Killeen, The Faiths of Oscar Wilde: Catholicism, Folklore and
Ireland (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 38.
60. Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 42.
61. Oscar Wilde, ‘To William Ward’, 3 March 1877, in Complete Letters,
39. Wilde also refers to the Catholic Church as a Scarlet Woman in an
earlier letter to Ward: “I am more than ever in the toils of the Scarlet
Woman”: ‘To William Ward’, 20 March 1876, in Complete Letters, 15.
62. See Hanson, Decadence and Catholicism, 267; Roden, Same-Sex Desire,
130.
63. See Revelation 17: 1–6. Hanson quotes from the King James Bible
(1885) to discuss this passage and remarks on the decadent style
used to describe the whore of Babylon. See Hanson, Decadence and
Catholicism, 264–65.
64. Oscar Wilde, ‘To William Ward’, 3 March 1877, in Complete Letters, 39.
Wilde’s emphasis.
41.
41.
69. Roden, Same-Sex Desire, 130.
41.
71. Bobby Fong and Karl Beckson, ‘Commentary’, in Poems and Poems in
Prose, eds. Bobby Fong and Karl Beckson, in The Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing), 1: 222–23. Mason, Bibliography, 113–15 is the earliest
source for this publication.
72. Bobby Fong, ‘Oscar Wilde: Five Fugitive Poems’, English Literature in
Transition (1880–1920) 22, no. 1 (1979): 8.
73. Mason cites an excerpt from the Biograph and Review (August 1880),
which mentions that “Rome Unvisited” had “attracted considerable
attention and high praise from Cardinal Newman”: Bibliography, 113.
When Wilde published his Poems, he split the stanzas from “Graffiti
d’Italia” into two separate poems. Part I formed the basis of “San
Miniato,” and Parts II and III were placed together in “By the Arno.”
See Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xxii.
75. Oscar Wilde, ‘Graffiti d’Italia’, Month and Catholic Review, September
1876, 77–78, in Mason, Bibliography, 114.
76. Wilde, ‘Graffiti d’Italia’, in Mason, Bibliography, 114.
77. This detail derives from Ronald Gower’s memoir, My Reminiscences
(1895). In this work, Gower notes that Wilde’s room was “filled with
photographs of the Pope and Cardinal Manning”: Gower; as quoted by
Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days, in Recollections, 8. See also Hanson,
Decadence and Catholicism, 259.
78. Wilde, ‘Graffiti d’Italia’, in Mason, Bibliography, 114–15.
79. These stanzas have been recovered from a manuscript of the poem that
is included in Mason, Bibliography, 113–15.
81. When reading this stanza, I am reminded of Hunter-Blair’s warning to
Wilde: “You will be damned, you will be damned, for you see the light
and will not follow it”: In Victorian Days, in Recollections, 13–14. See
also Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 59.
82. I am grateful to Stefano Evangelista for alerting me to this similarity.
83. Alfred Tennyson first Baron Tennyson, In Memoriam A. H. H., in The
Poems of Tennyson, ed. Christopher Ricks (Harlow: Longmans, Green,
1969), 980.
70 L.

87. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: ix–x.
88. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xi–xii.
89. Small, ‘Introduction’, 1: xii.
90. Florina Tufescu has reassessed Wilde’s identity as a plagiarist. She
regards Wilde as a neo-Classicist who subscribed to Classical philoso-
phies of authorship, which validated the author’s success in concealing
the textual sources that aided the creative process. See Florina Tufescu,
Oscar Wilde’s Plagiarism: The Triumph of Art Over Ego (Dublin: Irish
Academic, 2008), 5.
91. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 146. Ellmann is quoting Henry Newbolt’s
account of Elton’s speech. See Henry Newbolt, My World as in My Time
—Memoirs of Sir Henry Newbolt, 1862–1932 (London: Faber and Faber,
1932), 96–97.
92. Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Librarian of the Oxford Union Society’, November
1881, in Complete Letters, 116.
93. Hanson, Decadence and Catholicism, 258.
94. Karl Beckson and Bobby Fong, ‘Wilde as Poet’, in Cambridge
Companion to Oscar Wilde, ed. Peter Raby (Cambridge: Cambridge
41.
Original emphasis.
Original emphasis.
101. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 70. See also Hyde, A Biography, 20.
102. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Reginald Harding’, 22 March 1877, in Complete
Letters, 43.
103. George Macmillan, ‘To His Father’, 28 March 1877, in Complete Letters,
44.
104. Mahaffy; as quoted by W. B. Stanford and R. B. McDowell, Mahaffy: A
Biography of an Anglo-Irishman (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul,
1971), 41.
105. Oscar Wilde, ‘Postcard: To Reginald Harding’, 2 April 1877, in
Complete Letters, 44.
106. See J. P. Mahaffy, Rambles and Studies in Greece, 2nd ed. (London:
Macmillan and Co., 1878), v–ix.
107. Hyde, A Biography, 28. In ‘A Ride Across the Peloponnese’, George

Macmillan mentions an incident where one of his travelling compan-
ions drew his gun after being threatened with a knife. Hyde suggests
that Macmillan was referring to Wilde, but Iain Ross has questioned
this assertion because the details in Macmillan’s account are unclear on
this point. See Hyde, Oscar Wilde, 28; Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient
Greece, 43.
108. Wilde’s “Graffiti d’Italia” (lines 23–28) includes a similar scene,
although the scenery depicts the view that travellers see as they
approach Rome. See Wilde, ‘Graffiti d’Italia’, in Mason, Bibliography,
114.
109. Arthur Hugh Clough, ‘Amours de Voyage’, in The Poems of Arthur
Hugh Clough, 2nd ed., ed. F. L. Mulhauser (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1974), 123.
110. Oscar Wilde, ‘Impression de Voyage’, Waifs and Strays: A Terminal
Magazine of Oxford Poetry, March 1880, 77, in Mason, Bibliography,
218.
111. Homer, Iliad, trans. Richmond Lattimore (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1961), 2: 634.
112. Homer, Odyssey, trans. Richmond Lattimore (New York: Perennial
Classics, 1999), 22: 34–389.
113. See Ovid, Metamorphoses, trans. David Raeburn (London: Penguin
Books, 2004), 1: 163–39.
114. Fong and Beckson, ‘Commentary’, 1: 244–45.
115. Oscar Wilde, ‘Santa Decca’, in Poems, 1: 43.
116. Fong and Beckson, ‘Commentary’, 1: 244–45.
117. Plutarch, ‘Obsolescence of Oracles’, in Plutarch’s Moralia, trans. Frank
Cole Babbitt, vol. 5 (London: William Heinemann, 1936), 17.B–C.
118. Elizabeth Barrett Browning, ‘The Dead Pan’, in Poems by Elizabeth
Barrett Browning (London: Blackie and Son, 1904), 210.
120. Algernon Charles Swinburne, ‘Hymn to Proserpine’, in Poems and
Ballades (London: John Camden Hotten, 1866), 81–82.
121. Kenneth Haynes, ‘Commentary’, in Algernon Charles Swinburne: Poems
and Ballades & Atlanta in Calydon (London: Penguin Books, 2000),
334.
122. Swinburne, ‘Hymn to Proserpine’, 81.
123. Swinburne, ‘Hymn to Proserpine’, 81.
124. Wilde, ‘Santa Decca’, in Poems, 1: 44. A similar idea is raised in Salomé
when the soldiers and servants of King Herod speak about the gods of
their native lands. The Cappadocian remarks: “In my country there are
no gods left … There are some who say that they have hidden them-
selves in the mountains, but I do not believe it. Three nights I have
been on the mountains seeking them everywhere. I did not find them,
72 L.
and at last I called them by their names, and they did not come. I think
they are dead”: Oscar Wilde, Salomé, Act l, 53–58, in Oscar Wilde: The
Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays, ed. Peter Raby, in Oxford
World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 66.
125. See Iain Ross, ‘Oscar Wilde in Greece: Topography and the Hellenist
Imagination’, International Journal of the Classical Tradition 16, no. 2
(2009): 185–88; Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 42–53. Our under-
standing of Wilde’s impression of Greece is limited to fragmentary
notes, a postcard, and three poems: “Impression de Voyage,” “The
Theatre at Argos,” and “Santa Decca.” Wilde’s notes on Greece are
reproduced in two publications by Ross: ‘Oscar Wilde in Greece’, 195–
96; also ‘Appendix C’ in Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 200–1.
126. George Macmillan, ‘A Ride Across the Peloponnese’, Blackwoods
Edinburgh Magazine 123 (January–June 1878): 553; Mahaffy, Rambles
and Studies, 287.
127. Mahaffy, Rambles and Studies, 296.
128. Mahaffy, Rambles and Studies, 290.
129. Macmillan, ‘A Ride Across the Peloponnese’, 555.
130. The head of Apollo was discovered days before Wilde arrived on site,
but the sculpture of Hermes was unearthed shortly after his departure.
See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 72; Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 52–
53.
131. In 1979, Bobby Fong identified this work as one of Wilde’s “fugitive
poems” because it was overlooked by Robert Ross and subsequent edi-
tors who compiled collections of Wilde’s poetry in the twentieth cen-
tury: Fong, Fugitive Poems, 8.
132. Oscar Wilde, ‘The Theatre at Argos’, in Poems, 1: 34.
134. When King Acrisius found out about the child, he locked Danae and
Perseus in a chest and cast them out to sea. They were both saved
through the intervention of Zeus and Poseidon and went on to live on
the island of Seriphos.
135. Wilde, ‘The Theatre at Argos’, in Poems, 1: 35
136. Ellmann provides this date and speculates that Wilde spent a week or
possibly ten days in Rome. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 73–74.
137. I am referring to the version that is reproduced in Mason, Bibliography,
75.
138. Oscar Wilde, ‘Urbs Sacra Æterna’, Illustrated Monitor, June 1877, 130,
in Mason, Bibliography, 75.
139. Wilde, ‘Urbs Sacra Æterna’, in Mason, Bibliography, 75.
140. “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” was also published in Kottabos (in 1879), how-
ever, the Kottabos version was renamed “Ave! Maria.” Kottabos was a
college magazine edited by Robert Yelverton Tyrrell, who was a fel-

low at Trinity College, Dublin. During Wilde’s time at Trinity, Tyrrell
was a professor of Latin; he was later appointed as Regius professor of
Greek (1880–1898). See Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 22–23.
When Wilde reissued the poem in Poems (1881), he chose the title ‘Ave
Maria Plena Gratia.’ See Fong and Beckson, ‘Commentary’, 1: 243. I
am referring to the earlier version of the poem, which is reproduced in
Mason, Bibliography, 89–90.
141. Oscar Wilde, ‘Ave Maria Gratia Plena’, Irish Monthly, July 1878, 412, in
Mason, Bibliography, 89.
142. Wilde, ‘Ave Maria Gratia Plena’, in Mason, Bibliography, 90.
143. Fong and Beckson, ‘Commentary’, 1: 243.
144. Fong and Beckson, ‘Commentary’, 1: 243.
145. Tufescu argues that “it would be possible to view this as not a poem
about a Renaissance painting at all, but as a commentary on Rossetti’s
representation of the Annunciation, or on the unimaginativeness of
Christian doctrine, or on the limitations of the aesthetic perspective
itself”: Oscar Wilde’s Plagiarism, 54.
146. This postscript is reproduced in Mason, Bibliography, 216.
147. Oscar Wilde, ‘Easter Day’, Waifs and Strays: A Terminal Magazine of
Oxford Poetry, June 1879, 2, in Mason, Bibliography, 217.
148. Hanson, Decadence and Catholicism, 259–60.
149. Wilde, ‘Easter Day’, in Mason, Bibliography, 217.
150. Isobel Murray, ‘Notes’, in Oscar Wilde: Complete Poetry (Oxford: Oxford
151. The six-week Easter term began on 4 April 1877. Wilde had asked for
a ten-day leave of absence, but he arrived much later, on the 26 April.
See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 77. In addition to the suspension, Wilde was
fined half the sum of his annual scholarship. See Mendelssohn, Making
Oscar, 32.
152. For a discussion of the use of the epithet in the Iliad and Odyssey, see R.
Rutherfurd-Dyer, ‘Homer’s Wine-Dark Sea’, Greece & Rome 30, no. 2
(October 1983): 125–28.
153. Hunter-Blair mentions this translation to emphasize Wilde’s talent as a
classicist. He remarks that critics of Wilde’s poetry were “profoundly
ignorant that he was an admirable and sensitive classical scholar … Can
one imagine a more perfect translation of Homer’s famous phrase, the
sea from which one gathers no grapes”: Hunter-Blair, In Victorian Days,
in Recollections, 5.
154. Oscar Wilde, ‘Ποντος Ατρυγετος’, Irish Monthly, Vol. 5, 1877, 774.
155. Wilde, ‘Ποντος Ατρυγετος’, 774.
74 L.
156. Murray, Complete Poetry, 178. Fong and Beckson also reach this conclu-
sion: see ‘Commentary’, 1: 241. In Wilde’s poem, “Charmides” (lines
241–270), Athena rises from the sea to punish Charmides for defiling
her statue. See Oscar Wilde, ‘Charmides’, in Poems, 1: 70–89.
157. Tufescu also raises this interpretation and cites the Hoxie Neale
Fairchild’s reading of the white limbs as “an ancient sculpture dredged
up from the Mediterranean”: Hoxie Neal Fairchild, Religious Trends in
English Poetry, vol. 5 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964),
184; as quoted by Tufescu, Oscar Wilde’s Plagiarism, 56.
158. Ward, ‘Oscar Wilde’, in Recollections, 13.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Barrett Browning, Elizabeth. ‘The Dead Pan’. In Poems by Elizabeth Barrett
Browning. London: Blackie and Son, 1904.
Beckson, Karl, and Bobby Fong. ‘Wilde as Poet’. In Cambridge Companion to
Oscar Wilde. Edited by Peter Raby. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1997.
Blanshard, Alastair J. L. ‘Mahaffy and Wilde: A Study in Provocation’. In
Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity. Edited by Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L.
Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 19–35. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2017.
Brockliss, L. W. B. The University of Oxford: A History. Oxford: Oxford
Clough, Arthur Hugh. ‘Amours de Voyage’. In The Poems of Arthur Hugh Clough.
2nd ed. Edited by F. L. Mulhauser, 94–133. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974.
Coakley, Davis. Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Irish. Dublin: Town
House, 1994.
Curthoys, M. C. ‘The Examination System’. In Nineteenth Century Oxford. Part
1. Edited by M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, 339–69. Vol. 6. The History
of the University of Oxford. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997.
Elliot, Marianne. When God Took Sides: Religion and Identity in Ireland—
Unfinished History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Ellis, Heather. Generational Conflict and University Reform: Oxford in the Age of
Revolution. Leiden: Brill, 2012.
Evans, G. R. The University of Oxford: A New History. London: I.B. Taurus,
2010.
Fairchild, Hoxie Neal. Religious Trends in English Poetry. Vol. 5. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1964.
Fong, Bobby. ‘Oscar Wilde: Five Fugitive Poems’. English Literature in

Transition (1880–1920) 22, no. 1 (1979): 7–16.
Fong, Bobby, and Karl Beckson. ‘Commentary’. In Poems and Poems in Prose.
Edited by Bobby Fong and Karl Beckson, 219–315. Vol. 1. The Complete
Fong, Bobby, and Karl Beckson, eds. Poems and Poems in Prose. Vol. 1.
The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing.
Good News Bible. Sydney, NSW: The Bible Society in Australia, 1992 [c. 1983].
Hanson, Ellis. Decadence and Catholicism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University
Press, 1997.
Harris, Frank. Oscar Wilde: His Life and Confessions. Vol. 1. New York:
Brentano’s, 1916.
Haynes, Kenneth, ed. Algernon Charles Swinburne: Poems and Ballades &
Atlanta in Calydon. London: Penguin Books, 2000.
Hilliard, David. ‘UnEnglish and Unmanly: Anglo-Catholicism and
Homosexuality’. Victorian Studies 25 (1982): 181–210.
Hinchliff, Peter. ‘Religious Issues’. In Nineteenth Century Oxford. Part 2. Edited
by M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, 97–112. Vol. 7. The History of the
University of Oxford, 8 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000.
Holland, Vyvyan. Son of Oscar Wilde. London: Rupert Hart-Davis, 1954.
Homer. Iliad. Translated with an Introduction by Richmond Lattimore.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961.
Homer. Odyssey. Translated with an Introduction by Richmond Lattimore. New
York: Perennial Classics, 1999 [c. 1965].
Hunter-Blair, David. In Victorian Days and Other Papers. New York: Longmans,
1939.
Hyde, H. Montgomery. Oscar Wilde: A Biography. New York: De Capo Press,
1981 [c. 1975].
Killeen, Jarlath. The Faiths of Oscar Wilde: Catholicism, Folklore and Ireland.
Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
Macmillan, George. ‘A Ride Across the Peloponnese’. Blackwoods Edinburgh
Magazine 123 (January–June 1878): 550–70.
Mahaffy, J. P. Social Life in Greece from Homer to Menander, 1st ed. London:
Macmillan, 1874.
Mahaffy, J. P. Rambles and Studies in Greece, 2nd ed. London: Macmillan and
Co., 1878.
Mason, Stuart [Millard, Christopher]. Bibliography of Oscar Wilde. London: T.W.
Laurie, 1914.
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2018.
Mikhail, E. H., ed. Oscar Wilde, Interviews and Recollections. New York: Barnes
& Noble, 1979.
Murray, Isobel. ‘Notes’. In Oscar Wilde: Complete Poetry. Edited by Isobel
Murray, 175–206. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Neville, W. P., ed. Addresses to Cardinal Newman, with His Replies, 1879–81.
London: Longmans, Green, 1905.
Newbolt, Henry. My World as in My Time—Memoirs of Sir Henry Newbolt, 1862–
1932. London: Faber and Faber, 1932.
Newman, John Henry. Apologia Pro Vita Sua. Edited by Ian Ker. London:
Penguin Books, 1994.
Nockles, P. B. ‘An Academic Counter-Revolution: Newman and Tractarian
Oxford’s Idea of a University’. History of Universities 10 (1991): 137–97.
Ovid. Metamorphoses. Translated by David Raeburn. London: Penguin Books,
2004.
Plutarch. ‘Obsolescence of Oracles’. In Plutarch’s Moralia. Vol. 5. Translated by
Frank Cole Babbitt. London: William Heinemann, 1936.
Press, 2013.
Ross, Iain. ‘Oscar Wilde in Greece: Topography and the Hellenist Imagination’.
International Journal of the Classical Tradition 16, no. 2 (2009): 176–96.
Roden, Frederick S. Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture. New York:
Palgrave, 2002.
Rutherfurd-Dyer, R. ‘Homer’s Wine-Dark Sea’. Greece & Rome 30, no. 2
(October 1983): 125–28.
Schroeder, Horst. Additions and Corrections to Richard Ellmann’s Oscar Wilde.
Self-Published, 2002.
Schuchard, Ronald. ‘Wilde’s Dark Angel and the Spell of Decadent
Catholicism’. In Rediscovering Oscar Wilde. Edited by C. George
Sandulescu, 371–96. Gerrards Cross, UK: Colin Smythe, 1994.
Small, Ian. ‘Introduction’. In Poems and Poems in Prose. Edited by Bobby Fong
and Karl Beckson, ix–xxvi. Vol. 1. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Sewell, William. Thoughts on the Admission of Dissenters to the University of
Oxford: And on the Establishment of a State Religion. Oxford: D. A. Talboys,
1834.
Stanford, W. B., and R. B. McDowell. Mahaffy: A Biography of an Anglo-
Irishman. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1971.
Swinburne, Algernon Charles. Poems and Ballades. London: John Camden
Hotten, 1866.
Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, first Baron. ‘In Memoriam A. H. H’. In The Poems
of Tennyson. Edited by Christopher Ricks, 853–988. Harlow: Longmans,
Green, 1969.
Tufescu, Florina. Oscar Wilde’s Plagiarism: The Triumph of Art Over Ego.
Dublin: Irish Academic, 2008.
Vernier, Peter, comp. Oscar Wilde at Magdalen: By Himself and His
Contemporaries. Self-Published, 2000.
Vernier, Peter. ‘Oscar Wilde at Magdalen’. The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar
Wilde Studies 19 (2001): 24–33.
Whelan, Robert. ‘Are Catholics Decadent or Are Decadents Catholic?’ The
Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 19 (2001): 19–23.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Ποντος Ατρυγετος’. Irish Monthly 5 (1877): 774.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Salomé’. In Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Earnest and
Other Plays. Edited by Peter Raby, 61–91. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1995.
CHAPTER 3
American Beauty:
Aestheticism Across the Atlantic
After taking his Bachelor of Arts in 1878, Oscar Wilde chose London as
the locale for his new life as a self-appointed “Professor of Aesthetics.” 1
There, he circulated among artists, actors, and aristocrats and stead-
ily gained a reputation as an arbiter of style. Initially, Wilde’s fame
rested on the popularity of fictional characters that were made-over in
his image. He was caricatured in Punch magazine from 1880 onwards,
and his iconic image inspired Gilbert and Sullivan’s characterization of
aesthetes in Patience; or Bunthorne’s Bride (1881).2 The production was
first staged in London, in April 1881, followed by the New York produc-
tion, which was launched the following September. The producer of the
American production, Richard D’Oyly Carte, was eager to capitalize on
Wilde’s celebrity, so he commissioned him to deliver a series of lectures
on the Aesthetic Movement in America. In accepting the offer, Wilde
seized the opportunity to present himself to an international audience.
By the time that Wilde arrived in America on 2 January 1882, he had
published his first volume of poetry and was recognized as a celebrity
aesthete; his ideas regarding the application of aesthetic design princi-
ples, however, were not widely known. The 1882 lecture tour provided
Wilde with the exposure to inform Americans about the social and per-
sonal gains that could be attained through aesthetic consumption. In
this regard, the tour gave Wilde the licence to perform the role of an
educator. For the moment, I defer the discussion of Wilde’s Classicism,

80 L.
since I am focusing instead on the connection between Wilde’s aestheti-

cism and his education at Oxford.
This analysis draws on Kevin O’Brien’s reconstruction of “The
Decorative Arts” and “The House Beautiful” lectures, which appeared
in 1982.3 I also refer to “The English Renaissance of Art” and other lec-
ture notes, which were first published in 1908, as part of the Miscellanies
volume in the Collected Edition of Wilde’s literary works.4 More recently,
in 2010, Matthew Hofer and Gary Scharnhorst edited a collection of
interviews that appeared in American and Canadian newspapers. 5 Most
studies that address Wilde’s 1882 tour tend to be biographical, and very
few studies offer a textual analysis of the ideas that are raised in Wilde’s
lectures and interviews.6 The present chapter, however, will show that
the North American lecture tour gave Wilde the impetus to develop
and refine his own style of aesthetic philosophy. In the interviews and
lectures, we see that Wilde negotiated his role as a promoter of Patience
with his ambition to be recognized as a legitimate authority on aesthetic
theory and design. Here I demonstrate that Wilde identified himself as
an Oxford aesthete in order to position himself as an intellectual figure.
My discussion begins with an analysis of Wilde’s aesthetic costume
and the intellectual concepts that shaped the Aesthetic Movement. His
combination of historical dress elements reflected the design
philosophy of the decorative arts reformers who were inspired by the
medieval Gothic tradition. At the same time, Wilde was under contract
to dress like Bunthorne to generate publicity for the American
production of Patience, although Bunthorne’s costume was inspired by
Wilde’s appearance. The connection with Bunthorne also raised
questions about Wilde’s integrity because Bunthorne is a character who
performs the role of an aesthete to make himself more attractive to
women. Within the broader narrative of the operetta, a rivalry ensues
between Bunthorne and a group of returning soldiers (“the Dragoon
Guards”), who discover that the women they love only have eyes for
Bunthorne. Likewise, American caricature artists implied that Wilde was
playing the part of an aesthete, but they suggested that his “performance”
was motivated by his desire for financial gain.7 The contract with Carte
meant that he was directly implicated in the commercialization of
aestheticism. Wilde was determined to overcome the negative publicity
associated with Bunthorne and Patience, therefore, he used his
interviews and lectures to publicize his connection with Oxford.
Within a week of his arrival in New York City, Wilde informed jour-
nalists that his theory of aestheticism “began to manifest itself” when
3 AMERICAN BEAUTY: AESTHETICISM ACROSS THE ATLANTIC
he entered Magdalen College.8 He spoke of aestheticism as if it were a

scholarly discipline that he had mastered and regaled audiences with
tales of his encounters with the English art critic, John Ruskin. “The
English Renaissance of Art” lecture was the first presentation that Wilde
delivered between January and early February, 1882. In this lecture,
Wilde expanded on Ruskin’s aestheticism, as he addressed the social
imperative to revive traditional, non-mechanized manufacturing
processes. Because Wilde’s aestheticism was directed towards an
audience of consumers, his lecture focused on the “buying power” of
consumers.
Early on in the tour, Wilde developed a new lecture on “The
Decorative Arts,” which became the primary lecture that he delivered
across America and Canada, between February and October, 1882. In
March, Wilde started to present his lecture on “The House Beautiful,”
but this presentation was reserved for occasions where he was
scheduled to give two lectures in one city. 9 “The Decorative Arts” lecture
introduces Wilde’s formative ideas on the application of aesthetic
education in homes, schools, and universities. During his time in
America, Wilde began to view the home as a site where learning takes
place. He encouraged parents to look to home decoration as an
extension of their children’s education, arguing that the moral
development of children was formed in relation to their everyday
surroundings. Wilde also reiterated this moral message when he
reflected on modern education and suggested that aestheticism would
give rise to an accessible, practical system of education that included
lessons in art and craft.
The experience of seeing the sights of America also led Wilde to
reconsider his understanding of aesthetic beauty. In “Impressions of
America,” a talk that he gave in 1883 on his return from New York City,
he admitted that his attitude towards machinery had shifted after wit-
nessing the beauty of the Chicago waterworks plant. Such an admission
suggests that aesthetic education is a learning process that can enable
individuals to see beauty in all places, even when faced with a functional,
industrial environment.
1 THE ARRIVAL
On 2 January 1882, Wilde arrived in New York aboard the steamship
Arizona, although he did not disembark from the vessel until the fol-
lowing morning because the ship remained in quarantine for the
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night.10 While Wilde was still aboard the Arizona, he was visited by a
team of reporters who boarded the ship to question him about his
reasons for journeying across the Atlantic.11 From the outset of the
tour, Wilde emphasized that his intention was to promote aestheticism
in America. In an interview published in the New York Evening Post
(4 January 1882), Wilde remarked: “I have defined it [aestheticism]
about two hundred times since last night … but I am here to diffuse
beauty, and I have no objection to saying that.”12 It is tempting to
think of Wilde as the first emissary of aestheticism to reach American
shores, considering that he spent the first twenty-four hours of his
arrival explaining the meaning of aestheticism to local journalists.
Contrary to Wilde’s assertions, Americans were well aware of the latest
developments in British interior decoration and arts and crafts design
because the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition had already paved
the way for the American wave of aestheticism.13
The Philadelphia Exposition was the first major international trade
fair to be held in America. The Great Exhibition (1851) in London was
the first exhibition of this kind, and its exhibits predominantly displayed
technological processes of manufacturing. To quote Paul Greenhalgh,
“the Great Exhibition, like virtually all its successors around the world,
fetishised the machine.”14 The poor quality of machine-made goods
generated a demand for handmade objects and supporters of the Arts
and Crafts Movement championed traditional, labour-intensive meth-
ods of production. A diverse group of artists and theorists engaged with
the Aesthetic Movement through a host of different creative avenues,
including art criticism, painting, interior decorating, architectural
design, homeware, and furniture production, as well as fashion. Michèle
Mendelssohn, therefore, urges us to use the term “movement” loosely,
as it encompassed a “heterogeneous aggregate of loosely connected
people whose accumulated efforts moulded the culture of the day.”15
The Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, meanwhile, provided a space
for companies to showcase the high quality of British craftsmanship. 16
Designs by James Abbott McNeill Whistler, William Morris, Edward
William Godwin, and Walter Crane were all represented at this his-
toric exhibition.17 According to Frank Norton’s Illustrated Historical
Register, Britain presented an “unusually strong display” of homewares
such as ceramics, crystal ware, and artistic furniture at the Philadelphia
Centennial Exposition.18 These displays inspired Americans artists,
design professionals, and amateur enthusiasts to participate in the
movement, and so Wilde was not alone in his ambition to “diffuse

beauty.”
Unlike many of the key figures associated with aestheticism, Wilde
could not claim to be a craftsman or an experienced interior designer.
Carte approached Wilde because he was already known as a popular
celebrity and his aestheticism had been established as a source of
humour on stage and in the English print media. The popularization of
lecture tours and celebrity interviews in the USA reflected the market’s
demand for lighter forms of intellectual entertainment. These two
entertainment platforms perfectly accommodated Wilde’s reputation as
a London wit and style icon and speedily transformed him into a
personality who warranted extensive media coverage. Moreover,
David M. Friedman asks us to appreciate the fact that Wilde was
launched into a new, unfamiliar journalistic culture that created news
around celebrities: “Public figures were now covered as personalities in
stories that often used interviews to present those stars ‘as they really
were’—or, at least, as they or the newspaper wished the public to think
they were … but the demand for lively copy soon led editors to seek out
travelling lecturers, speakers who, like newspapers, were expected to
entertain as well as to inform their audiences.”19
While the contract with Carte provided Wilde with a sizeable audience
to address and entertain, the obligation to dress like the character
Bunthorne created difficulties for Wilde because it primed Americans
to view him as “the Aesthetic Movement’s chief fool.” 20 O’Brien nicely
sums up the commercial paradigm of Wilde’s image when he notes that
“people expected [to see] Bunthorne; and when Wilde arrived with his
long hair and his black velvet suit, they thought they had him.” 21 Before
Wilde ventured to America, he was already a template for caricatures of
aesthetes that circulated in the English marketplace, beyond his con-
trol. This has led Lisa K. Hamilton to define Wilde as a “cultural icon
who stood for something both more than, and less than, himself.”22
As aestheticism gained popularity, a diverse range of American busi-
nesses unofficially used his image on trade cards and advertisements; he
appeared to endorse all sorts of commodities, ranging from confection-
ary, ice cream, women’s undergarments, to household appliances, like
sewing machines and stoves.23 These commercialized representations
of Wilde were problematic because they obscured the intellectual and
artistic origins of the Aesthetic Movement, as well as undermining his
identity as a budding young poet with Oxford credentials.
84 L.
The popular representation of Wilde’s aestheticism was also shaped

by his association with Whistler; a controversial London-based American
artist who was twenty years older than Wilde. Whistler promoted the
philosophy of “art for art’s sake” and railed against art critics (namely,
John Ruskin) who assigned moral value to artworks that presented a
realistic representation of nature.24 Wilde first encountered Whistler’s
work at the opening of the Grosvenor Gallery, on 30 April 1877,
which he reviewed in an article for the Dublin University Magazine.25
At this point in time, Wilde was not impressed by Whistler’s expression-
istic style. His assessment of Whistler’s works, “Nocturne in Black and
Gold” (also known as “The Falling Rocket”) and “Nocturne in Blue and
Silver,” was particularly harsh. Wilde remarked that “[t]hese pictures are
certainly worth looking at for about as long as one looks at a real rocket,
that is, for somewhat less than a quarter of a minute.” 26 Two years later,
when he reviewed another exhibition at the Grosvenor Gallery, Wilde
praised Whistler’s work and struck up a friendship with the artist. 27 The
pair became closer after 1880, as Whistler moved to Tite Street (Chelsea)
and became Wilde’s neighbour.28 When commenting on the intellec-
tual exchange between Wilde and Whistler, Anne Bruder suggests that
“[t]heir respective ideas became so entangled that it is often impossible
to tell which one is relying on the resonance of the other.” 29 The con-
nection between Wilde and Whistler was also reflected in the London
production of Patience, as the character of Bunthorne combined aspects
of Wilde’s and Whistler’s aesthetic personas. The original costume for
Bunthorne included a moustache, a monocle, and a voluminous hair
style, which was more in keeping with Whistler’s appearance. The
friendship between Wilde and Whistler continued for almost ten
years, but the relationship ultimately unravelled because Whistler
started to view Wilde as a rival and a plagiarist who was taking credit for
his ideas.30 This resentment led Whistler to publicly criticize Wilde in his
“Ten O’Clock” lecture (presented on 20 February 1885), and in letters to
Wilde that were published in popular periodicals like the World and
Truth.31
The influence of Whistler’s aestheticism was less apparent in the
American production of Patience because the costume for Bunthorne
was altered to strengthen the resemblance to Wilde. If we compare an
image of the actor, John Hanford Ryley, posing as Bunthorne, with an
image of Wilde, we can begin to see the visual parallels that linked these
two popular figures (See Figs. 1 and 2). In Napoleon Sarony’s portrait,
Wilde poses in knee-breeches and silk stockings, with a velvet
waistcoat and
Fig. 1 Portrait of Oscar Wilde, “number 16,” 1882 (Photograph by Napoleon

Sarony. Library of Congress, Washington)
86 L.
Fig. 2 J. H. Ryley in the role of Bunthorne from a production of Patience,

1881 (Photograph by Marc Gambier, University of Washington Libraries, Special
Collections, negative number UW36077)
matching jacket.32 There is a variation in the cut of jackets worn by Wilde

and Ryley, but both are made of dark velvet fabrics and are worn with a
contrasting white-collared shirt. The bottom half of Wilde’s regency-style
outfit is replicated in Marc Gambier’s photograph of Ryley, although
the velvet bottoms in Ryley’s costume make his outfit seem more garish
than Wilde’s. In this photograph, Ryley assumes a meditative pose that
suggests he is contemplating the beauty of a white lily. Similarly, Wilde
is captured with his head tilted in contemplative gesture, as if to sug-
gest that his thoughts are elsewhere: perhaps he is dreaming up a new
poem or mulling over ideas for a lecture. In some of the other portraits
by Sarony, Wilde’s literary background is signalled through the use of
props, such as a white, vellum bound edition of Wilde’s volume of poetry
(entitled Poems).33 The similarity between Ryley’s and Wilde’s respective
portraits consolidated the promotional purpose of Wilde’s aesthetic cos-
tume. At the same time, however, the portrait of Wilde created a space
for viewers to consider him in a different light: as a thoughtful, learned
man, an enigmatic poet, rather than a punchline.
Wilde’s connection with Patience and Bunthorne was somewhat
problematic, given that Bunthorne is portrayed as a disingenuous
character. Bunthorne pretends to be an aesthete is pursued by twenty
lovesick maidens who are irresistibly drawn to his aestheticism. The
audience is aware of the charade, all the while, as Bunthorne performs a
confessional libretto in the first act:
Let me confess!
A languid love for lilies does not blight me!
Lank limbs and haggard cheeks do not delight me!
I do not care for dirty greens
By any means.
I do not long for all one sees
That’s Japanese.
I am not fond of uttering platitudes
in stained-glass attitudes.
In short, my medievalism’s affectation
Born of a morbid love of admiration!34
Many of Bunthorne’s references to aestheticism reflect certain aspects

of Wilde’s popular identity. The lily was favoured by the Pre-Raphaelite
artists, and Wilde often remarked that he loved the design features of
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lilies, roses, and sunflowers, when he spoke of aestheticism in interviews

and lectures.35 The success of William Morris’s company, “Morris and
Co.,” made it easier for consumers to acquire furniture, wallpapers,
textiles, stained glass, and homewares that were inspired by
medieval designs.36 As we will see, Wilde drew on Morris’s ideas in
“The English Renaissance of Art” when he spoke of the need to
support the work of local craftsmen in order to foster the love of
beauty. He also urged consumers to consider the well-being of the
workers when purchasing furniture and decorative items for their
homes.37 Wilde also gained a reputation as a collector of blue-and-
white china at Oxford. When he acquired two large pots for his rooms
at Magdalen, he famously quipped, “I find it harder and harder every
day to live up to my blue china.” 38 Wilde also learned more about the
application of Japanese aesthetics in modern art and home furnishing
through his association with Whistler. Whistler’s design for “The
Peacock Room” is a good example of the English vogue for
Japonisme.39 In Gilbert’s libretto from Patience, however, these
interrelated fashion trends are evoked to imply that aestheticism is a
cultural formation that encourages self-indulgence, dishonesty, and
egotism.
By association, the characterization of Bunthorne undermined Wilde’s
credibility as a champion of aesthetic reform months before he had the
chance to express his ideas to journalists and live audiences. Soon after
Wilde’s arrival in America, critics accused him of being a poser who was
out to profit from the public’s interest in aestheticism. 40 A caricature
from the 11 January 1882 edition of the Daily Graphic consolidates the
view that Wilde and Bunthorne are one and the same (see Fig. 3). As
Friedman reveals, this New York tabloid “published twenty-two differ-
ent [news] items on Wilde” in January alone; most of these reports per-
petuated the satirical commentary on Wilde’s aestheticism (see Figs. 3
and 4).41 In the Daily Graphic caricature, Bunthorne and Wilde cre-
ate a mirror image as they gaze at each other with a smile that suggests
they are in cahoots. Both Wilde and Bunthorne wear the same aesthetic
costume, apart from the moneybag, which Wilde holds as evidence of
the profits he gained through the joint enterprise with Richard D’Oyly
Carte and the Gilbert and Sullivan Company. They are both physically
linked to Carte, the English entrepreneur who doubles as the producer
of Patience and the promoter of Wilde’s lecture tour.42 This business
connection explains the caption, “Have ‘Patience’ with Oscar and I’ll
manage the rest.” In fact, Wilde’s lecture tour was managed by Colonel
Fig. 3 Oscar Wilde with Richard D’Oyly Carte and Bunthorne. “Aestheticism
as Oscar Wilde understands it.” (Cover illustration from the Daily Graphic,
11 January 1882. New-York Historical Society, image number 47,832)
William Francis Morse: a retired army colonel who worked as a manager

and press agent at Carte’s New York office.43 The reference to Carte
as “D’oily cod” seems to imply that he is a crooked businessman (i.e.
a slippery fish) who “managed” to swindle the public, with the help of
Bunthorne and Wilde.44
In response to these unfavourable associations, Wilde made a
concerted effort to differentiate himself from Bunthorne. When inter-
viewers asked him to comment on Patience, he faulted the operetta for
misrepresenting the Aesthetic Movement: “I fail to see its point, sir, but
think it a very pretty opera with some charming music. As a satire on
the philosophy of the beautiful, sir, I think it is the veriest twaddle.” 45
This statement appeared in print on 4 January 1882, a week before the
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Fig. 4 Oscar Wilde

admiring the American
dollar. “Aestheticism as
Oscar Wilde understands
it.” (Cover illustration
from the Daily Graphic,
11 January 1882. New-
York Historical Society,
image number 47,832)
Daily Graphic caricature was published. When Wilde presented his first
lecture five days later, he asked his audience to refrain from forming
an opinion of the Aesthetic Movement based on Patience alone: “You
have listened to Patience for a hundred nights and you have heard me
only for one … but you must not judge of aestheticism by the satire of
Mr. Gilbert.”46 Wilde soon realized that he could distance himself from
the production by presenting himself as a scholar who had studied and
mastered the science of beauty. As he put it to one interviewer from the
New York Evening Post: “[t]here is a subtle relation between beauty and
everything—a correlation of one sensible beauty with another—that is
not seen or felt, except by—by—well, by persons who have studied the
matter.”47
In order to be considered as a serious representative of the Aesthetic
Movement, Wilde made a point of mentioning his Oxford credentials.
In another interview with the New York World (8 January 1882), Wilde
acknowledged that his entrance to Magdalen College was a defining
moment that established his commitment to the aesthetic cause:
In 1873 [sic.], [I went to Oxford] and entered Magdalen College.48 It was

at this time that this theory of the effect of beautiful associations began to
manifest itself to my mind. This town was by far the most beautiful one
that I had ever been in and I experienced its effect on myself. Ruskin was
there and I became a disciple of his, and his teachings gave impetus to this
thought. Every one of my theories are, if I may say so, Ruskin’s theories
developed.49
This reference to Ruskin and Oxford strategically bypasses the com-

mercial, satirical representation of aesthetes, as it affirms that Wilde’s
theory is a product of the intellectual culture of Oxford. Wilde had the
privilege of studying in “the most beautiful” location under the tute-
lage of Ruskin, who was not implicated in Gilbert and Sullivan’s oper-
atic send-up of the movement. When describing the operetta, Carte
was careful to state that the “authors of Patience have not desired to
cast ridicule on the true aesthetic spirit, but only to attack the unmanly
oddities which masquerade in its likeness.” 50 Based on Carte’s assess-
ment, the alternative to Ruskin’s aestheticism was a corrupt derivative
which appealed to unmanly, dishonest, pathological, and self-serving
individuals:
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Latterly, however, their [Ruskin and followers] pure and healthy teaching
has given place to the outpourings of a clique of professors of ultra-
refinement, who preach the gospel of morbid languor and sickly sensuous-
ness, which is half real and half affected by its high priests for the purpose
of gaining social notoriety.51
Wilde was not directly implicated in this statement, however, the

unflattering description of the new generation of aesthetes recalled the
negative press that was generated around Wilde via his connection with
Bunthorne.52 Ruskin and his followers were widely respected for their
efforts “to render our everyday existence more pleasant and more
beautiful”; at least, that is how Carte distinguished between the sham
aesthetes and Ruskin’s devotees.53 In the interview quoted above, we see
that Wilde was eager to capitalize on his ties with Ruskin in order to
position his aestheticism in a positive light. In declaring that his
theories were “Ruskin’s theories developed,” Wilde assured the public
that he was working with Ruskin, and not against him. As he aligned
himself with Ruskin and Oxford, Wilde worked to redefine himself as a
theorist who subscribed to the “pure and healthy” teachings of the true
school of aestheticism.
Before Wilde was recognized as a major contributor to literary
aestheticism, he started to promote the Aesthetic Movement by using
the medium of fashion to express his artistic sensibilities. Wilde’s aes-
thetic philosophy centred on the personal pleasure that could be gained
through various forms of aesthetic consumption. Although he mar-
keted himself as a “disciple” of Ruskin’s, he did not replicate Ruskin’s
social-political agenda to improve the lives of the working poor. This
contrast becomes clear if we compare Wilde’s attitude towards fashion
and dress reform with Ruskin’s argument on the subject in his lecture on
“The Relation of Art to Use.” Ruskin delivered this lecture at Oxford in
1870 and published it later that year when he released his collection of
Lectures on Art. Second to providing the poor with food, Ruskin spoke
of the importance of providing the poor with dignified clothing:
[A]fter recovering, for the poor, wholesomeness of food, your next step
towards founding schools of art in England must be in recovering, for the
poor, decency and wholesomeness of dress; thoroughly good in substance,
fitted for their daily work, becoming to their rank in life, and worn with
order and dignity. And this order and dignity must be taught them by the
women of the upper and middle classes …54
The plight of the poor was a pressing concern for artists and art lovers
alike, because, as Ruskin believed, fine art could not flourish in a culture
that tolerated abject poverty. For Ruskin, caring about art went hand-in-
hand with the social responsibility to care about the poor. Earlier in the
lecture, Ruskin establishes that “the beginning of art is in getting our
country clean and our people beautiful.”55 He saw poverty as a blight
on the English landscape, an eyesore that denied artists and craftsmen
the opportunity to be inspired by their everyday surroundings. Although
Ruskin was addressing an audience of male students, he saw women as
the ideal candidates to educate the poor in the art of dress. In assigning
this responsibility to women, Ruskin reflects the popular understanding
of fashion as the aesthetic domain of women. As Talia Schaffer has
pointed out: “male Aesthetes, especially Oscar Wilde, were often con-
demned for effeminacy, both because they worked in fields traditionally
associated with women and because they borrowed elements of
women’s attire.”56
During his North American lecture tour, Wilde downplayed the
philanthropic concerns that were voiced by Ruskin; instead, he concen-
trated on strategies to beautify the lives of middle-class American con-
sumers. Like many of the designers associated with the Arts and Crafts
Movement, Wilde took inspiration from the past when he assembled his
aesthetic costume. He endeavoured to popularize a style of fashion that
was self-consciously outdated in its blend of historical styles, colours,
and textures. Schaffer summarizes this eclecticism when she notes that
Wilde was famous for advocating and wearing “such old-fashioned
garments as breeches, a doublet, a cloak, and a wide-brimmed hat.” 57
She adds that “[h]is adoption of blues and lavenders, his use of satin and
velvet, also recall the great late eighteenth-century fops,” and his
penchant for lace, jewelled rings, and capes made him look “more like a
Cavalier than a sober Victorian gentleman.”58 Many of the historical
garments that Wilde wore were designed for the stage. He purchased a
fur overcoat from a theatrical costumier in London especially for his
lecture tour and supplemented his wardrobe by sourcing new coats and
stockings from American costume makers. 59 When Wilde was asked to
explain why he adopted this style of dress, he expressed a desire to
lead by example: “I have several reasons for it, but the more important
are these: the present evening dress of gentlemen is the most
objectionable possible, and then I should be glad to do something
towards introducing a better.”60
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Wilde’s fashion sense was also important because the American jour-
nalists focused on his appearance when they reported on his arrival.
Wilde styled himself as a fashion icon, and so, the press’s first impres-
sions of him were framed in relation to his clothing. An interview from
the 3 January 1882 edition of the New York World provides a detailed
description of the clothes that Wilde wore when he met with journalists
on board the Arizona. This account reveals that his aesthetic costume
warranted careful scrutiny:
Mr. Wilde is fully six feet three inches in height, straight as an arrow, and
with broad shoulders and long arms, indicating considerable strength. His
outer garment was a long ulster trimmed with two kinds of fur, which
reached almost to his feet. He wore patent-leather shoes, a smoking-cap
or turban, and his shirt might be termed ultra-Byronic, or perhaps—
décolleté. A sky-blue cravat of the sailor style hung well down upon the
chest.61
The journalist begins with a list of the specific articles of clothing and
their visible features—the fur-trimmed ulster, the patent-leather shoes
— and adds a level of personal interpretation, observing that Wilde
sported a low-cut “ultra-Byronic” shirt with a “sailor-style” cravat. The
combination of the Byronic shirt and the smoking cap evokes Thomas
Phillip’s 1814 portrait of Lord Byron in Albanian dress. In this portrait,
Byron wears a lavish costume which features a turban-like head wrap
and a V-necked shirt that is held together with a large pin, all of which
are seen in Wilde’s “ultra-Byronic” styling. Most newspaper accounts of
Wilde’s outfit refer to a seal-skin cap rather than a turban, so it is
possible that the term “turban” was adopted loosely, to point towards
the exotic effect of Wilde’s aesthetic ensemble. Importantly, the link
between Wilde and Byron signals that Wilde was another intellectual
figure; a poet who channelled his creativity into his personal
presentation. Wilde was clearly using fashion to distinguish himself as a
personality who demanded to be noticed, while also showing the public
an alternative, individualized style of men’s dress.
It is well known that Wilde created a media sensation by wear-
ing knee-breeches and silk stockings in public, however, the portraits
by Sarony reveal that some of Wilde’s outfits included dark trousers
(Fig. 5). The New York World report (quoted above) does not mention
this detail, so it is likely that Wilde was wearing trousers when he
greeted the press for the first time. But the report does mention
that Wilde
Fig. 5 Portrait of Oscar Wilde, “number 22,” 1882 (Photograph by Napoleon

Sarony, Library of Congress, Washington)
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added a nautical touch to his outfit with his “sailor style” cravat. 62 Wilde
might have chosen this evocative accessory to introduce an element of
youthfulness to his attire, as the vogue for boys’ sailor suits developed
between 1865 and 1870 and was well established by 1882.63 Wilde was
a tall man with a large frame, so we can imagine that he would have
stood out as an imposing masculine figure, despite his homage to the
Victorian sailor suit. Nonetheless, the thoughtful blend of boyish and
manly fashion, combined with historical and contemporary elements,
elevated Wilde as a designer who used his clothing as another avenue of
artistic expression.
As we can see in the New York World account of Wilde’s arrival in
America, his dress sense intensified the public’s desire to look at him. In
this respect, Wilde’s peculiar sartorial innovations were vital to ensur-
ing the commercial success of his lecture tour. Newspaper accounts of
Wilde’s appearance enticed Americans to see him in person—the lec-
ture hall was the only place where fans were guaranteed to be in his
presence for up to two hours. An audience survey published in the San
Francisco Daily Report (20 March 1882) suggests that many of the peo-
ple who attended Wilde’s lectures were drawn in by the media hype. It
was reported that only one percent of the audience genuinely admired
Wilde and ten percent were open-minded towards his ideas. For the
most part, the majority (thirty percent) were there because they “wanted
to experience his ‘bunk’ first hand.”64 Meanwhile, thirteen percent of
those surveyed admitted that their wives forced them to attend the lec-
ture; indeed, Wilde’s audience predominantly comprised of middle-class
women.65 A further ten percent attended for other reasons, and nine
percent were there to see and hear what all of the fuss was about.66
2 THEORIES IN PRACTICE
The visual impact of Wilde’s aesthetic costume complemented the polit-
ical themes that arise in his lectures. As Wilde formed his own ideas
about the practical application of aesthetic design, he began to speak
about consumption, not as a commercial transaction, but as an act that
had powerful political implications. This section investigates the intel-
lectual exchange between Ruskin and Wilde, as expressed in anecdotes
that Wilde recalled about his time at Oxford. Some of Wilde’s lecture
notes were published in Miscellanies under the heading, “Art and the
Handicraftsman.”67 From this source, we learn that Wilde proudly spoke
of his involvement in Ruskin’s project to build a road between two
local villages, Upper and Lower Hinksey. In his lecture, Wilde describes
Ruskin as a humble and charismatic teacher who toiled alongside his
group of student volunteers:
And when we came back in winter he [Ruskin] asked us [the Oxford

students] to help him to make a road across this morass for these village
people to use. So out we went, day after day, and learned how to lay levels
and to break stones, and to wheel barrows along a plank—a very difficult
thing to do. And Ruskin worked with us in the mist and rain and mud of
an Oxford winter, and our friends and our enemies came out and mocked
us from the bank. We did not mind it much then, and we did not mind it
afterwards at all, but worked away for two months at our road. And what
became of the road? Well, like a bad lecture it ended abruptly—in the
middle of the swamp.68
The roadworks ground to a halt after Ruskin left England to spend his
sabbatical in Venice. Wilde’s experience of performing dirty, physically
strenuous labour with Ruskin can be understood as his apprenticeship
in aestheticism. This story implies that Wilde was not just a theorist: he
too had endeavoured to build something with his own hands. That said,
some scholars believe that Wilde did not contribute to the roadworks at
all, while others concede that he may have provided a minimal amount of
assistance.69 Either way, the road-building anecdote serves an important
rhetorical purpose, as it signals that Ruskin’s teachings helped to
prepare Wilde for his lecture tour.
It is quite telling that Wilde ended the road-building story with
a punchy quip that highlights the failure of Ruskin’s intervention to
improve conditions for the local village workers. Wilde was clear in stat-
ing that Ruskin’s road languished in the middle of the swamp, as if to
suggest that the new generation of aesthetic theorists (i.e. Wilde’s gener-
ation) needed to improve on the work that Ruskin had started. The nar-
rative of Ruskin’s road develops into a self-aggrandizing fiction in which
Wilde credits himself for establishing the Aesthetic Movement:
And I felt that if there was enough spirit amongst the young men to go
out to such work as road-making for the sake of a noble ideal of life,
I could from them create an artistic movement that might change, as it has
changed, the face of England. So I sought them out—leader they would
call me—but there was no leader: we were all searchers only and we were
bound to each other by noble friendship and by noble art.70
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In this instance, Wilde’s profile is elevated through his identification

with the cultural milieu of Victorian Oxford. Wilde is no longer the dis-
ciple or the theorist who is beholden to Ruskin’s aestheticism. Instead,
he outstrips the “master” by establishing his own brotherhood of poets
and craftsmen. But anyone with a prior knowledge of the Decorative
Arts and Aesthetic Movements would have known that these cultural
formations predated Wilde’s time at Oxford. The Pre-Raphaelites pop-
ularized neo-Gothic aesthetics in their paintings in the 1850s and came
to be associated with the Aesthetic Movement later in the nineteenth
century. By 1859, the Pre-Raphaelite artists, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and
Edward Burne-Jones, were already collaborating with William Morris
to design and furnish a Gothic-inspired family home. 71 By the time that
Wilde entered the public spotlight in 1881, aestheticism was no longer a
grass-roots movement, but a popular fashion sensation on both sides of
the Atlantic. Nonetheless, Wilde exaggerated his involvement with the
Aesthetic Movement in order to be perceived as an Oxford intellectual—
although it was very bold to presume that he had done more for the
movement than Ruskin himself.
Of course, Wilde’s effort to promote aestheticism was executed on a
much larger scale. He was able to address thousands of people through
the American lecture circuit and the wide circulation of newspapers
that frequently published his conversations with journalists. Wilde was
a celebrity who embraced the communicative power of the market-
place, whereas Ruskin, by contrast, was very concerned about the neg-
ative impact of modern innovations. Ruskin felt that working conditions
determined the quality of an individual’s creative output and saw the
rise of industrialization as a threat to the culture of craftsmanship in
England. Again, if we turn to “The Relation of Art to Use,” we find that
Ruskin’s definition of art hinges on the “evidence of human skill, and the
formation of an actually beautiful thing by it.”72 In this lecture, he
laments the rise of technological forms of reproduction which
diminished the appreciation of work that was traditionally performed by
skilled artisans and craftsmen:
For instance, almost the whole system and hope of modern life are
founded on the notion that you may substitute mechanism for skill,
photograph for picture, cast-iron for sculpture. That is your main nine-
teenth-century faith, or infidelity. You think you can get everything by
grinding—music, literature, and painting. You will find it grievously not
so; you can get nothing but dust by mere grinding … But essentially, we
have lost our delight in Skill; in that majesty of it … The entire sense of
that, we have lost, because we ourselves do not take pains enough to do
right, and have no conception of what the right costs; so that all the joy
and reverence we ought to feel in looking at a strong man’s work have
ceased in us.73
In this passage, Ruskin frames his rejection of industrialization as a

series of losses which affect society as a whole, as well as individual art
lovers. As Ruskin stresses, the skill and dedication of an artist could not
be transferred to a system of grinding machinery, although the culture of
mass production generated a greater demand for substitutes that were
inherently inhuman. The consequence of settling for machine-made
equivalents of art is that consumers diminished their exposure to unique
objects that were slowly and carefully crafted through traditional pro-
cesses. Moreover, the preference for machine-made goods limited the
opportunity for consumers to feel the “delight,” “joy,” and “reverence”
that can be elicited from a “good piece of art.” 74 As in his earlier dis-
cussion on clothing reform, Ruskin’s comments on the cost of machine
manufacturing remind us of the moral cost of failing to “do right” by
the poor, since the industrial marketplace devalued skilled labour, to the
extent that the “strong man’s work” would go unnoticed, or be edged
out of the marketplace altogether.
Ruskin’s arguments on the loss of craft skills informed Wilde’s lecture
on “The English Renaissance of Art.” In this presentation, Wilde argued
that artistic integrity was a result of human skill and physical effort, and
he used the example of medieval craftsmanship to illustrate this point:
[T] he artist of that time, handicraftsman himself in stone or glass, found

the best motives for his art, always ready for his hand and always
beautiful, in the daily work of the artificers he saw around him—as in
those lovely windows of Chartres—where the dyer dips in the vat and
the potter sits at the wheel, and the weaver stands at the loom: real
manufacturers these, workers with the hand, and entirely delightful to
look at, not like the smug and vapid shopman of our time, who knows
nothing of the web or vase he sells, except that he is charging you double
its value and thinking you a fool for buying it.75
Wilde added a new dimension to Ruskin’s theory through his appreci-

ation of the physical beauty of the workers who carried out traditional
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types of manufacturing. The medieval craftsmen are not only gifted

with the ability to make beautiful things with their hands; when these
artisans perform their work, they too become living artworks. As they
turn their hands to their craft, they are “always beautiful” and “delight-
ful” to the eye, and they will continue to be admired as subjects who
are immortalized in the stained-glass windows at Chartres Cathedral. 76
In Wilde’s discourse, the aestheticization of the male body extends to
all forms of manual labourer. For instance, Wilde’s encounters with the
mining community in Denver prompted a similar response. He referred
to the miners as “great, strong, well-formed men, of graceful attitude
and free motion. Poems every one of them.” 77 This comment anticipates
the premise of The Picture of Dorian Gray, which I discuss in Chapter 5.
In this novel, Wilde confuses the boundaries between art and life, using
the language of aestheticism to render the body of Dorian Gray as an art
object that is privately viewed by male spectators.
In addition to Ruskin, Wilde also expanded on the ideas of William
Morris in his lectures, although Wilde identified with the consumer’s
experience of using arts and crafts objects, rather than the production
process. Morris was a major designer, craftsman, and businessman asso-
ciated with the Arts and Crafts Movement. He understood that the
production of handmade items required more labour, time, skill, and
expense. The market for decorative arts objects was largely dependent
on wealthy consumers who had the means to commission original
pieces. In their introduction to The Arts and Craft Movement, Elizabeth
Cumming and Wendy Kaplan state that “[t]he anti-industrial ideal—that
of a single person conceiving and making an object from start to finish—
was rarely achieved and frequently viewed as an elitist activity.”78
Morris aimed to democratize art by providing consumers with a range of
affordable, finely crafted homewares. To achieve this objective, his
company began to produce homewares that combined machine
manufacturing with handmade details and finishes. For example, the
popular “Sussex” range of chairs, designed by Dante Gabriel Rossetti,
were made from plain and ebonized wood (which was commonly used in
commercial furniture production), and also featured hand-woven rush
fibre seats.79 Like Ruskin, Morris championed the rights of workers and
also believed that working conditions affected the standard of design and
manufacturing. In the late 1870s, he lectured on the social benefits of
fostering a democratic culture of art in England. He campaigned for “an
Art made by the people and for the people, a joy to the maker and the
user.”80 In his own terms,
Wilde restated Morris’s call in order to garner support for a socially

conscious approach to aesthetic theory and practice.
In “The English Renaissance of Art,” consumption is
conceptualized as an act that can engender positive social outcomes.
When offering advice on home decoration, Wilde asked his audience
to consider the well-being of the workers who produced household
furniture and decorative objects: “For what is decoration but the
worker’s expression of joy in his work? And not joy merely … but that
opportunity of expressing his own individuality which, as it is the
essence of all life, is the source of all art.”81 In order to experience the
home as a site of aesthetic pleasure, consumers needed to ensure
that they purchased furnishings that were produced under ethical
conditions: “I think it would be impossible to overrate the gain that
might follow if we had about us only what gave pleasure to the maker
of it and gives pleasure to its user, that being the simplest of all rules
about decoration.”82 There is a strong similarity between Morris’s
political language and the expression that Wilde adopts in his
conclusion: “let it be for you to create an art that is made by the hands
of the people for the joy of the people, to please the hearts of the
people, too; an art that will be your expression of your delight in
life.”83 The same democratic language is employed—“by the (hands of
the) people” and “for the (joy of the) people”—but Wilde makes no
distinction between the maker and the user of craft objects. To some
extent, Wilde’s statement is more democratic in its sentiment because
his phrasing affirms that those who purchased and enjoyed handicrafts
were just as important as the craftsmen who acquired the skills to make
beautiful objects. In Wilde’s aesthetics, the success of the Aesthetic
Movement is redirected from the hands of the craftsmen to the hands of
the consumer public—that is, the people with the resources to
purchase well-made homewares.
A month into the tour, Wilde abandoned “The English Renaissance
of Art” lecture. O’Brien concludes that this lecture was not a success
because Wilde bored the audience with his intellectual pretensions:
“Insecure as a lecturer, unsure of his material, Wilde wanted to sound
profound and learned. As a result, the lecture is heavy with quotation
and name-dropping … It may have been high seriousness and intellec-
tual eclecticism, but it was also elaborately dull.” 84 There is no doubt
that Wilde was relying on the theories of established figures like Ruskin
and Morris, but we should acknowledge that he added a personal touch
to this discourse by exploring the implications of aestheticism for an
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audience of consumers. It was also difficult for Wilde to develop a cohe-

sive and entertaining lecture, considering the sheer diversity of this cul-
tural formation. Gregory Castle suspects that Wilde revised his lecture
material to accommodate the audience’s interest in the principles of
aesthetic design. He argues that it was “not because it [“The English
Renaissance”] was too dense or too dull, nor because it was beyond his
listeners’ comprehension, but because it did not deal fully enough with
the aesthetics of everyday life.”85 Castle’s explanation is helpful because
it points to Wilde’s flexibility as an intellectual and a public speaker.
He sensed that his academic persona was not winning over the public,
so he swiftly changed his tactics and directed his attention towards aes-
thetic interior decoration. When Wilde revised his material, he produced
the two shorter lectures on “The Decorative Arts” and “The House
Beautiful,” both of which provided audiences with practical advice relat-
ing to home decoration and fashion.
For the remainder of the tour, Wilde emphasized the long-term ben-
efits of adopting aesthetic interior design. In “The House Beautiful,”
Wilde commented on the costs associated with aesthetic design to affirm
that aesthetic consumption was affordable and accessible to all:
In asking you to build and decorate your houses more beautifully, I do not
ask you to spend large sums, as art does not depend in the slightest degree
upon extravagance or luxury, but rather the procuring of articles which,
however cheaply purchased and unpretending, are beautiful and fitted to
impart pleasure to the observer as they did to the maker. 86
From a design perspective, cheap items are not necessarily bad, as long
as they are not cheap imitations masquerading as luxury goods. It is
possible that Wilde had “Morris & Co.” in mind when he asked
consumers to opt for “cheaply purchased and unpretending” household
objects. This company had shown that arts and crafts principles could be
adapted for commercial purposes; the key was to improve the standard
of machine- made goods, not to abandon machinery altogether. Wilde,
however, equated machine-made manufacturing with inferior quality
without acknowledging that objects crafted by a single person were far
more expensive than mass-produced reproductions. To support his
objection to “machine-made ornaments,” Wilde reflected on the timeless
value of a humble Grecian urn:
Why, the most valuable curio in an art museum is, perhaps, a little urn out
of which a Greek girl drew water from a well over two thousand years ago
and made of the clay on which we walk, yet more artistic than all dreadful
silver centre-pieces of modern times, with their distorted camels and elec-
troplated palm-trees.87
Here, Wilde describes the beauty and simplicity of this Classical artefact
to highlight that it was once an everyday household object. By contrast,
the mass-produced centrepiece stands out as an absolute aesthetic
failure. This contemporary piece of exotica was forged through shoddy
mechan- ical processes that cannot match the quality of a piece that was
fashioned by a skilled silversmith. Effectively, Wilde called on the
cultural authority of the Ancient Greeks to encourage modern consumers
to acquire items that are worth treasuring, items that could be displayed
with pride in the home, or museums, so that future generations could
admire the superior workmanship of these art objects.
We have seen that Wilde’s advice on home decoration occupies
a middle ground that mediates between the politics of Ruskin and
Morris. Arguably, Ruskin’s position was much more radical, as his solu-
tion to the aesthetic crisis of the modern age was to return to an agrar-
ian economy: “Agriculture by the hand, then, and absolute refusal or
banishment of unnecessary igneous force, are the first conditions of
a school of art in any country.”88 Interestingly, Ruskin’s call to aban-
don machinery was based on the premise that new technology was not
being used in an ethically responsible manner. His criticism is most
damning when he considers the immorality of the capitalist enter-
prise: “though England is deafened with spinning wheels, her people
have not clothes—though she is black with digging of fuel, they die of
cold—and though she has sold her soul for gain, they die of hunger.” 89
Indeed, Ruskin framed his lecture as a “protest against the misdirection
of national energy” which perpetuated the exploitation of the poor. 90
Wilde would engage with this argument later in his career, when writ-
ing on the ugliness of poverty in The Soul of Man. Overall, Wilde was
much more cautious when he spoke about aesthetic reform in America
and tended to avoid the issue of poverty. The broader politics of the
movement were scaled back, as Wilde chose to focus on changes that
could be achieved by individuals through a style of conscientious
consumerism.
104 L.
3 AESTHETICISM AND PRACTICAL EDUCATION

The pedagogical purpose of Wilde’s lecture tour is most pronounced in
the interviews and lectures where he addresses the need to involve chil-
dren in the Aesthetic Movement. This section introduces the home as
a site where children learn to appreciate aesthetic beauty through their
exposure to high-quality furniture and homewares. Home decoration
is increasingly important, particularly in “The Decorative Arts,” where
Wilde establishes that the moral development of children is formed in
response to their everyday surroundings:
How can you expect them [children], then, to tell the truth if everything
about them is telling lies, like the paper in the hall declaring itself marble?
… we want children to grow up in England in the simple atmosphere of all
fair things so that they will love what is beautiful and good, and hate what
is evil and ugly, long before they know the reason why … but if everything
is dainty and delicate, you teach them practically what beauty is, and gen-
tleness and refinement of manner are unconsciously acquired.91
This passage reveals that the consumer choices of American families

would be instrumental in shaping the moral make-up of the next gen-
eration. According to Wilde, interior decoration was not simply an indi-
cation of taste, cultural refinement, or economic status. The desire for a
beautiful home was a moral imperative, as well as a powerful pedagog-
ical tool that could influence a child’s receptivity towards honesty and
integrity. Where in “The English Renaissance” Wilde established that the
moral implications of Aesthetic Movement related to the producers and
consumers of arts and crafts goods, in “The Decorative Arts” his moral
discourse is directed towards families, and parents, in particular.
Wilde’s rudimentary notion of aesthetic education originated
from Plato’s philosophy of education, as expressed in Book 3 of The
Republic.92 In this section of the dialogue, Socrates argues that young
men must be shielded from any images or household objects that are
“evil in character, unrestrained, mean and ugly.” 93 Socrates warns that it
is impossible for young people to cultivate a love of goodness and beauty
if they are always exposed to adverse influences in their environment:
“day by day and little by little [they] gather many impressions from all
that surrounds them, taking them all in until at last a great mass of evil
gathers in their inmost souls, and they know it not.” 94 Wilde expanded
on Plato’s theory when he boldly asserted that children who were raised
in ugly homes were more likely to be drawn towards sin and crime:
“Why, I have seen wallpaper which must lead a boy brought up under
its influence to a career of crime; you should not have such incentives to
sin lying about your drawing-rooms.” 95 According to Wilde, the com-
mitment to subscribe to the philosophies of the Aesthetic Movement
encompassed the parental duty to surround children with material
examples of goodness and beauty so they may become well adjusted,
morally principled adults. By implication, the failure to create a beautiful
home would allow evil and ugliness to contaminate the child’s mind and
soul.
As well as facilitating aesthetic education in the home, Wilde saw an
opportunity for Americans to re-evaluate the way that children were
being educated in schools. In “Art and the Handicraftsman,” Wilde
envisioned a future programme of education that included art and craft
lessons:
Your school of design here will teach your girls and your boys, your
handicraftsmen of the future (for all of your schools of art should be
local schools, the schools of particular cities) … So do not mind what art
Philadelphia or New York is having, but make by the hands of your own
citizens beautiful art for the joy of your own citizens, for you have here the
primary elements of a great artistic movement.96
It is helpful to note that Wilde’s model of aesthetic education extended

to girls and boys alike. He was confident that the new generation of
craftsmen and women would enrich their community as they developed
their own regional style of craft. Although Wilde’s interest was fixed on
the pleasures associated with creative production, this type of educa-
tion reform also promised young people the chance to pursue their craft
in a professional capacity. As Mary Warner Blanchard reminds us: “the
aesthetic quest pointed out by Oscar Wilde offered women a way out of
the dead ends of conventional domestic life” by creating new economic
opportunities for those who were skilled in traditional craft
techniques.97 By contrast, in “The Decorative Arts” lecture, Wilde’s
opinions on school reform were specifically targeted towards
institutions for boys: “In every school I would have a workshop, and I
would have an hour a day set apart when boys could learn something
practically of art.”98 Again, Plato’s philosophy informs Wilde’s view that
schools should replace dull, theory-based forms of moral instruction
with practical lessons in art and craft. He proposed that children could
intuitively learn all they need to
106 L.
know about morality via the creative process: “This [craft lessons] would
be a golden hour to the children, and they would enjoy that hour most,
learn more of the lessons of life and of the morality of art than in years of
book study.”99 Although Wilde became known for voicing his concerns
about society’s tendency to impose moral values on artists and their art,
we should remember that his early aesthetic theory explored the compli-
mentary relationship between art and morality, in the hope that parents
and educators would allow children to engage with art on a regular basis.
As Wilde began to express his ideas on education reform, he began
to consider the faults in the existing education system. By following the
trajectory of Plato’s aestheticism, Wilde questioned whether students
should be exposed to violent images and information as part of their his-
tory curriculum:
In the false education of our present system, minds too young to grapple
with the subjects in the right sense are burdened with those bloody
slaugh- ters and barbarous brawls of the French and English wars and that
calendar of infamy, European history. How much better would it be in
these early years to teach children in the useful branches of art, to use
their hands in the rational service of mankind. Bring a boy up in the
atmosphere of art, give him a mind before trying to teach him, develop his
soul before trying to save it.100
Wilde’s critique indicates that the conventional style of education dis-

torts a child’s sense of morality. He also criticizes the education system
on the grounds that it is impractical, but as we will see in Chapter 4,
Wilde did not maintain this stance in his later critical writing. Yet, we
begin to glimpse the utopian aesthetics of “The Critic as Artist” and The
Soul of Man in the “Decorative Arts,” as Wilde pictures a world where
children are taught to “use their hands in rational service of mankind.”
If we can imagine a school that does not teach its students about war,
we may go a step further by imagining a world without war. We might
even suppose that the child-aesthetes of the future will use their talents
to engage in the symbolic war against ugliness, instead of serving in con-
ventional military campaigns.
The opportunity to promote aestheticism in America and Canada
compelled Wilde to think of the ways in which art could be used to fos-
ter more equality in society. While in Canada, Wilde spoke of the dif-
ferences between the English and American university systems during
an interview for the Montreal Star (15 May 1882). He concluded that
American universities were more progressive because these institutions
were more socially inclusive:
[I]t is better for the country to have a good general standard of education
than to have, as we have in England, a few desperately overeducated and
the remainder ignorant. One of the things which delighted me most in
America was that the universities reached a class that we, in Oxford, have
never been able to touch, the sons of the farmers and people of moderate
means. These are the people to whose wants the university should adapt
its curriculum and expenses so that it should be able to reach them. 101
This is a rare instance where Wilde openly commented on the elitist,

exclusive culture of Oxford. Wilde praised the American university sys-
tem because he believed it was more democratic than English universi-
ties like Oxford, which was historically associated with the aristocracy.
Although much had been done to modernize the Classical curriculum at
Oxford (a matter discussed in Chapter 4), Wilde sensed that the process
of university reform would remain incomplete until working-class stu-
dents were able to receive a university education.
When Wilde spoke of university education in “The Decorative Arts,”
he was far more critical and suggested that both the American and
English systems were equally flawed. He claimed that both nations were
clinging to archaic models of education which served no practical pur-
pose outside of the university:
[There] may be found the great army of useless idlers whose costly
education tends only to cultivate their memories for a time and is now, in
the broad sea of practical life, nearly, if not quite completely, useless to
them. For instance, I have seen an example of the uselessness of modern
education among well-educated young men in Colorado, among others
that of Eton students, men of fine physique and high mental cultivation,
but whose knowledge of the names of all the kings of the Saxon Heptarchy,
and all the incidents of the second Punic War, was of no use to them in
Leadville and Denver.
How much better it would have been if those young men had been
taught to use their hands, to make furniture and other things useful to
those miners.102
Wilde regrets that American gentlemen were taught to memorize

historical information that was unrelated to modern life and modern
108 L.
forms of industry. He suggested that the students from Colorado would

have been better equipped for life in industrial communities if they had
learned a craft. Surprisingly, Wilde did not use this opportunity to reflect
on the aesthetic culture of Oxford. Instead, he invited his audience to
view craft as a productive, creative outlet that was appropriate for cul-
tured men. The repetition of the term “useless” reinforces the idea
that the current education system was not benefiting individuals or the
wider community because too much emphasis was placed on intellectual
study.103 In drawing attention to the uselessness of modern education,
Wilde expressed a desire to erode existing social barriers. Yet, the brief
reference to the miners reminds us that the pleasure of using and living
with well-made objects was beyond the reach of the working poor. One
way to ameliorate this economic disadvantage would be to saturate the
marketplace with useful, beautiful things made by the educated elites. As
Wilde suggests, this sort of widespread social and cultural change could
only arise if universities and schools instituted curricular reforms that
would increase the number of skilled furniture makers and craftsmen in
America.
4 IMPRESSIONS OF AMERICA
Wilde departed from New York City on the 27 December 1882 and
returned again in August to oversee the production of his play, Vera;
or, The Nihilists, on 11 August 1883.104 He also enlisted the help of
Colonel Morse to arrange a second lecture tour which enabled him
to lecture about aesthetic design and interior decoration in Britain.
When Wilde was back in Britain, he travelled to regional towns across
England and to major cities including Edinburgh and Dublin, drawing
on the material he had developed for American audiences. The North
American tour enabled Wilde to perfect his style of lecturing, and it also
provided him with enough anecdotal material to develop a new lecture
on his “Impressions of America.” When “Impressions of America” was
reviewed, one London journalist praised Wilde for his outstanding deliv-
ery: “He spoke with great fluency, in a voice now and then singularly
musical, and only once or twice made a scarcely perceptible reference
to notes.”105 After ten months of touring the USA and Canada, Wilde
had transformed into a seasoned performer and was finally accepted as
an authoritative spokesperson for the Aesthetic Movement. He could not
be accused of boring the audience, as he gained the confidence to
speak
publicly without needing to rely on a complex script. On this occasion,

Wilde charmed the audience with his melodic voice, much like the dandy
aesthetes who would feature in his aesthetic fiction and criticism.
The surviving material from “Impressions of America” reveals that
Wilde found beauty in unexpected places. It was not in American archi-
tecture or the tumultuous cities, where “everybody seems in a hurry to
catch a train.”106 Wilde was not impressed with the landscape either;
he thought that Niagara Falls was more of a disappointment than a nat-
ural wonder, and was unsettled by the “inordinate size of everything” in
America.107 Castle warns us not to take these criticisms at face value, as
it is likely that Wilde was playing up to the expectations of his audience.
Castle, therefore, describes the lecture as “a well-forged and witty mis-
recognition that is less concerned with aesthetics, decorative or other-
wise, than on Wilde’s description of America and Americans. It was also
disparaging and disingenuous. For these reasons, it gave English audi-
ences just what they wanted.” 108 In an unexpected twist, Wilde admitted
that he left America with a new-found admiration for machinery:
There is no country in the world, where machinery is so lovely as in

America. I have always wished to believe that the line of strength and
the line of beauty are one. That wish was realised when I contemplated
American machinery. It was not until I had seen the waterworks at
Chicago that I realised the wonders of machinery; the rise and fall of the
steel rods, the symmetrical motion of the great wheels is the most beauti-
fully rhythmic thing I have ever seen.109
Through his travels, Wilde realized that the appreciation of aesthetic

beauty was most profound when it was manifested in an ordinary con-
text. The skilled aesthete did not have to confine himself to a craftsman’s
workshop, an art studio, a gallery, or even a beautiful home; he could
be moved by the sublime effect of art, even in an industrial setting. The
engineers who designed and built the Chicago waterworks produced a
magnificent machine that served a functional purpose and also created
a marvellous spectacle. Wilde could admire this perfectly proportioned
machine and delighted in the hypnotic sounds and motions of its moving
components. Although most of his lectures validated the production and
consumption of hand-crafted objects, in “Impressions of America” Wilde
acknowledged that industrial structures also facilitated aesthetic
contemplation. In his earliest American interviews, he affirmed that
“[beauty] is
110 L.
nearer to most of us than we are aware. The material is all around us, but
we want a systematic way of bringing it out.”110 Moreover, aestheticism
constituted an ongoing search for beauty: “Some people might search
and not find anything. But the search, if carried on according to right
laws, would constitute aestheticism.”111 This comment reveals that the
pursuit of beauty is exciting because it is so elusive; it may manifest at
any time or place, if at all. When the aesthete is struck by the presence of
beauty, it is a profoundly touching moment, as seen in Wilde’s encounter
with the beautiful machine. In order to acquire this heightened sensitiv-
ity, the search for beauty must begin in the home, ideally in childhood.
By engaging with Wilde’s interviews and lectures, we can begin
to appreciate some of the difficulties and triumphs of the 1882 North
American lecture tour. Although Wilde could not control how he was
represented by the press, he made himself available for over one
hundred interviews so that fans and critics could learn more about him
and the content of his lectures. The 1882 lecture tour was an important
professional stepping stone for Wilde because it taught him how to
become a commercially savvy celebrity who could generate a substantial
income from his interest in art, culture, and design. Wilde’s aesthetic
costume positioned him as a salesman who was peddling Carte’s
production of Patience, and, at the same time, it expressed that he was a
flamboyant, artistic personality who understood the mysteries of
aesthetic beauty. As he called on the influence of Ruskin, Morris, and
reflected on his time at Oxford, Wilde reminded the American public that
aestheticism was a cultural phenomenon that emerged from the
academy. In each of his three lectures, Wilde started to forge his
signature style of aesthetic consumption and asserted that education
would play a vital role in ensuring the future of the Aesthetic Movement.
As Wilde discussed ways of democratizing the arts and crafts—in
American homes, schools, and workshops— he laid the foundations for
the radical aesthetic utopia that he envisioned in The Soul of Man.
NOTES
1. According to Regenia Gagnier, Wilde “Registered His Profession as
Professor of Aesthetics” when he completed his studies at Oxford, in
1878: Regenia Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace: Oscar Wilde and the
Victorian Public (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1986), 11.
2. Gilbert and Sullivan encountered Wilde through his friendship with
George Grossmith, who was an actor in the opera company. Grossmith
was later cast to perform the role of Bunthorne in the London

production of Patience. See H. Montgomery Hyde, Oscar Wilde, A
Biography (New York: Da Capo Press, 1981 [c. 1975]), 46–47.
For a discussion on George Du Maurier’s caricatures of Wilde (for
Punch) and his role in popularizing aestheticism, see Michèle
Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2018), 51–55. In Mendelssohn’s opinion, “Du Maurier not only gave
Wilde a prominence he didn’t have before, but he co-created Wilde’s
public persona”: Making Oscar Wilde, 53.
3. O’Brien’s reconstructed lectures are based on contemporary newspaper
reports from every city that Wilde visited during his tour. O’Brien
uncovered Wilde’s phrasing by cross-referencing individual sentences
from these reports. See Kevin O’Brien, Oscar Wilde in Canada: An Apostle
for the Arts (Toronto: Personal Library, 1982), 149. This source will be
super- seded by a forthcoming edition of Wilde’s miscellaneous works
(including his epigrams, lectures, unpublished essays, reviews, and
unpublished plays), edited by Joseph Bristow, Yvonne Ivory, and
Rebecca N. Mitchell.
4. Robert Ross was the general editor of the first collection of Wilde’s lit-
erary works, which was published by Methuen in 1908. The lectures,
however, were edited by Christopher Sclater Millard (who published
under the name Stuart Mason), but Millard is not credited in the publi-
cation. Wilde’s lectures were also reproduced in the Methuen edition of
Wilde’s Essays and Lectures (1908). I am grateful to Joseph Bristow for
alerting me to Millard’s editorial work on the lectures.
5. See Oscar Wilde in America: The Interviews, eds. Matthew Hofer and
Gary Scharnhorst (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010).
6. This biographical focus is demonstrated in publications by Roy Morris
Jr., Declaring His Genius: Oscar Wilde in North America (Cambridge,
MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2013); David M.
Friedman, Wilde in America: Oscar Wilde and the Invention of Modern
Celebrity (New York: W. W. Norton, 2014); and Michéle Mendelssohn,
Making Oscar Wilde (2018). Mendelssohn’s account of the lecture tour
is noteworthy because it explains how popular representations of Wilde
reflected racial stereotypes and evolutionary theories about the Irish
and African Americans.
7. According to Mendelssohn, American critics perceived Wilde as a fraud
because he was an Irishman who tried to pass himself off as English. See
Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde, 94–95, 106–7.
8. ‘The Science of the Beautiful’, New York World, 8 January 1882, 2, in
Oscar Wilde in America, 22.
9. Merlin Holland, ‘Introduction to Essays, Selected Journalism, Lectures
and Letters’, in Collins Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 5th ed.
(Glasgow: HarperCollins, 2003), 908.
112 L.
10. Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988 [c.
1984]), 157. Hyde mentions that a “swarm” of reporters
accompanied the team of medical officers who boarded the ship to
carry out quarantine checks: Hyde, A Biography, 51.
11. Hofer and Scharnhorst have included a news report on the arrival of the
Arizona. See ‘Oscar Wilde’s Arrival’, New York World, 3 January 1882,
1, in Oscar Wilde in America, 13–15.
12. ‘Oscar Wilde’s Arrival’, New York World, 3 January 1882, 1, in Oscar
Wilde in America, 15.
13. For a detailed account of the American Arts and Crafts Movement, see
Elizabeth Cumming and Wendy Kaplan, The Arts and Crafts Movement
(New York: Thames and Hudson, 1991), 143–78.
14. Paul Greenhalgh, Ephemeral Vistas: The Expositions Universelles, Great
Exhibitions and World’s Fairs, 1851–1939 (Manchester and New York,
NY: Manchester University Press and St. Martin’s Press, 1988), 13.
15. Michèle Mendelssohn, Henry James, Oscar Wilde and Aesthetic Culture
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007), 5.
16. According to Frank Norton’s Illustrated Historical Register of the
Centennial Exposition, there were few examples of British machinery on
display in the Main Exhibition Building. See Frank Norton, Illustrated
Historical Register of the Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia, 1876
and of the Exposition Universelle, Paris, 1878 (New York: American
News Company and J. J. Little, 1879), 220.
17. Charlotte Gere, The House Beautiful: Oscar Wilde and the Aesthetic
Interior [with an essay by Lesley Hoskins] (London: Lund Humphries,
2000), 88.
18. Norton, Illustrated Historical Register, 220. For a description of the
items on display in the British exhibit, see J. S. Ingram, The Centennial
Exposition, Described and Illustrated (Philadelphia: Hubbard Bros,
1876), 410–12.
19. Freidman, Wilde in America, 134–35.
20. O’ Brien, Wilde in Canada, 27.
21. O’ Brien, Wilde in Canada, 28.
22. Lisa K. Hamilton, ‘The Importance of Recognizing Oscar: The Dandy
and the Culture of Celebrity’, Center & Clark Newsletter 33 (1999): 4.
23. Mendelssohn, Aesthetic Culture, 1–3. See also Mendelssohn, Making
Oscar Wilde, 84–85.
24. In “The English Renaissance of Art,” Wilde demonstrates his alle-
giance to “art-for-art’s-sake” when he states: “one should never talk of
a moral or an immoral poem—poems are either well written or badly
written, that is all. And, indeed, any element of morals or implied ref-
erence to a standard of good or evil in art is often a sign of a certain
incompleteness of vision … for all good work aims at a purely artistic

effect”: Oscar Wilde, ‘The English Renaissance of Art’, in Miscellanies
(London: Methuen, 1908), 267. Wilde includes a variation on this
statement in his ‘Preface’ to The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891):
“There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well
written, or badly written. That is all”: The Picture of Dorian Gray
[1891], in The Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890 and 1891 Texts, ed.
Joseph Bristow, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 3: 167.
25. The article was entitled “The Grosvenor Gallery” and was published
in July 1877. “The Grosvenor Gallery” was the first example of art
criticism that Wilde produced. Ruskin also failed to see the artistic
merit in Whistler’s artwork and was astounded by Whistler’s audacity.
He wrote: “I have seen, and heard, much of Cockney impudence
before now; but never expected to hear a coxcomb ask two hundred
guineas for fling- ing a pot of paint in the public’s face”: John
Ruskin, ‘Letter 79: Life Guards of New Life’, in Fors Clavigera, July
1877, 7; as quoted by Anne Bruder, ‘Constructing Artist and Critic
Between J. M. Whistler and Oscar Wilde: “In the Best Days of Art
There Were No Art-critics”’, English Literature in Transition, 1880–
1920 47, no. 2 (2004): 163. Whistler responded by suing Ruskin for
libel; the case was heard on 25 November 1878. Although Whistler
won the case, it led to his bankruptcy because he was awarded the
nominal sum of one farthing. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 131.
26. Oscar Wilde, ‘The Grosvenor Gallery’, Dublin University Magazine,
July 1877, in Miscellanies (London: Methuen, 1908), 18. Years later,
Wilde alluded to the title of Whistler’s “The Falling Rocket” in his short
story, “The Remarkable Rocket” (1888), which presents a caricature of
Whistler’s egotistical personality. See Anne Bruder, ‘Constructing Artist
and Critic’, 161–62.
27. In this article, Wilde praises three of Whistler’s works: “The Golden
Girl,” “The Little Forge,” and “Harmony in Green and Gold.” He
notes that Whistler’s “wonderful and eccentric genius is better appreci-
ated in France than in England”: Oscar Wilde, ‘The Grosvenor Gallery’,
Saunders’ Irish Daily News, 5 May 1879, in Miscellanies (London:
Methuen, 1908), 77.
29. Bruder, ‘Constructing Artist and Critic’, 165.
30. Whistler began to view Wilde as a potential threat following Wilde’s
‘Lecture to Art Students,’ which he presented in June 1883. See
Bruder, ‘Constructing Artist and Critic’, 165–66.
114 L.
31. Whistler presented his “Ten O’ Clock” lecture in London (20 February,
1885), Cambridge (24 March), and Oxford (30 April). It was known
as the “Ten O’Clock” lecture because Whistler delivered it at the unu-
sual time of ten o’clock at night. Wilde attended the lecture and openly
denounced Whistler’s aestheticism in two reviews for the Pall Mall
Gazette: “Mr. Whistler’s Ten O’Clock” (21 February 1885) and “The
Relation of Dress to Art: A Note in Black and White on Mr. Whistler’s
Lecture” (28 February 1885). See Mendelssohn, Aesthetic Culture, 96–
97, 106. Wilde and Whistler began to publish their communications in
1883; their witty telegrams were reproduced (with their permission) in
the 14 November 1883 issue of the World. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde,
271. Whistler’s open letters became increasingly hostile towards Wilde
as time went by, but Wilde tended to respond in good humour. The
relationship reached its breaking point following the periodical publi-
cation of ‘The Decay of Lying’ (1889). Wilde’s critical dialogue pro-
voked more vitriolic accusations of plagiarism from Whistler, which he
expressed in a letter that was published in Truth. Wilde responded with
a letter of his own and publicly denounced Whistler as “an ill-bred and
ignorant person”: Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 325.
32. Mendelssohn notes that Morse arranged for Wilde to be photographed
by Sarony to generate publicity for Wilde’s lectures. See Mendelssohn,
Making Oscar Wilde, 67–68.
33. Wilde had the foresight to bring his first collection of poetry to Sarony’s
studio so it could be used as a prop. See Friedman, Wilde in America,
95. The complete set of Sarony’s portraits of Wilde have been published
by Merlin Holland. See Merlin Holland, The Wilde Album (London:
Fourth Estate, 1997).
34. W. S. Gilbert, Patience, in Plays and Poems (New York, 1932), 199–
200; as quoted by O’Brien, Wilde in Canada, 25.
35. For an example of Wilde’s discourse on flowers, see ‘A Talk with Wilde’,
Philadelphia Press, 17 January 1882, 2, in Oscar Wilde in America, 27.
36. In 1861, Morris began a collective enterprise with his wife and
friends, known as “Morris, Marshal, Faulkner & Co.,” but Morris
renamed the company “Morris & Co.” in 1875, when he became the
sole proprietor. See Cumming and Kaplan, The Arts and Crafts
Movement, 15–18.
37. This point is raised towards the end of the lecture, after Wilde mentions
Morris: “I remember William Morris saying to me once, ‘I have tried
to make each of my workers an artist, and when I say an artist I mean
a man’”: Wilde, ‘The English Renaissance’, 275. Wilde met Morris on
one occasion, but there is no evidence to suggest they were friends. See
Mendelssohn, Making Oscar Wilde, 72.
38. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 45. For a description of Wilde’s blue-and-white

china collection, see Christopher Armitage, ‘Blue China and Blue
Moods: Oscar Fashioning Himself at Oxford’, in Oscar Wilde: The Man,
His Writings, and His World, ed. Robert N. Keane (New York: AMS,
2003), 17–18; Anne Anderson, ‘At Home with Oscar: Constructing
the House Beautiful’, The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies
24 (2004): 28–29. In an interview with The New York Tribune, Wilde
boasted about the clerical backlash that stirred in response to this aph-
orism: “the preacher opened his sermon in something this way: ‘When
a young man says, not in polished banter but in sober earnestness,
that he finds it difficult to live up to the level of his blue china, there
has crept into these cloistered shades a form of heathenism which it is
our bounden duty to fight against and crush out, if possible’”: ‘The
Theories of a Poet’, New York Tribune, 8 January 1882, 7, in Oscar
39. Whistler was hired by Frederick R. Leyland to design and decorate a
room that would complement his collection of oriental pottery. The
project was carried out between 1876 and 1877. The walls of “The
Peacock Room” were decorated with gilded paintings of peacocks,
and Whistler also produced an original artwork of a woman wearing a
kimono to create a focal point for the room. In “The House Beautiful,”
Wilde praises Whistler’s “Peacock Room” as “the finest thing in colour
and art decoration that the world has known since Correggio painted
that wonderful room in Italy where the little children are dancing on
the walls”: Oscar Wilde, ‘The House Beautiful’, in Oscar Wilde in
Canada: An Apostle for the Arts, ed. Kevin O’Brien (Toronto: Personal
Library, 1982), 169.
40. Archibald Forbes (a Scottish war correspondent who was also lecturing
in America) wrote to Wilde on the 26 January, condemning the “utterly
mercenary aim of [his] visit to America”: Archibald Forbes, ‘To Oscar
Wilde’, 29 January 1882, in The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde, eds.
Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis (London: Fourth Estate, 2000),
133, n. 23.
41. Friedman, Wilde in America, 81.
42. Richard Carte had numerous business interests. He was a prominent
talent agent, an owner of luxury hotels, and a theatre impresario who
facilitated the creative partnership between W. S. Gilbert and Arthur
Sullivan. Carte was involved in financing Gilbert and Sullivan’s produc-
tions. Following the success of H. M. S. Pinafore (which opened 25 May
1878), Carte formed the “D’Oyly Carte Opera Company” and opened
the Savoy Theatre (in 1881) to house the company.
43. Friedman, Wilde in America, 51.
116 L.
44. In his account of the American lecture tour, Roy Morris states that
D’Oyly Carte “Was Nicknamed ‘Oily’ for His Slippery Business Sense”:
Declaring His Genius, 18.
45. ‘Our New York Letter’, Philadelphia Inquirer, 4 January 1882, 7, in
46. Wilde, ‘The English Renaissance’, 262.
47. ‘Oscar Wilde’, New York Evening Post, 4 January 1882, 4, in Wilde in
America, 16.
48. Wilde began his studies at Magdalen in 1874. Please refer to the
Introduction of this book for an overview of Wilde’s academic history.
49. ‘The Science of the Beautiful’, New York World, 8 January 1882, 2, in
50. Richard Carte; as quoted by Hyde, A Biography, 47.
51. Richard Carte; as quoted by Hyde, A Biography, 47.
52. Hyde does not suggest that Wilde is implicated in Carte’s description
of Patience. Hyde clarifies this point by stating Carte described Wilde
as follows: “Wilde is slightly sensitive although I don’t think appallingly
so”: Hyde, A Bibliography, 47.
53. Richard Carte; as quoted by Hyde, A Bibliography, 46–47.
54. John Ruskin, ‘The Relation of Art to Use’, in Lectures on Art: Delivered
Before the University of Oxford in Hilary Term, 1870, 3rd ed. (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1880), 111.
55. Ruskin, ‘The Relation of Art to Use’, 107.
56. Talia Schaffer, ‘Fashioning Aestheticism by Aestheticizing Fashion:
Wilde, Beerbohm, and the Male Aesthetes’ Sartorial Codes’, Victorian
Literature and Culture 28, no. 1 (2000): 39.
57. Schaffer, ‘Fashioning Aestheticism’, 44.
58. Schaffer, ‘Fashioning Aestheticism’, 44.
59. Charlotte Gere, The House Beautiful: Oscar Wilde and the Aesthetic
Interior (London: Lund Humphries, 2000), 88; Oscar Wilde, ‘To
Colonel W. F. Morse’, 26 February 1882, in Complete Letters, 141.
Photographs reveal that Wilde had two fur coats. One of these coats
has a rounded fur lapel and fur cuffs, as seen in the portrait photo-
graphed by Elliot & Fry, which was taken before Wilde departed for
America. This image is reproduced in Merlin Holland, The Wilde Album
(London: Fourth Estate, 1997), 57; also Eva Thienpont, ‘Visibly
Wild(e): A Re-evaluation of Oscar Wilde’s Homosexual Image’, Irish
Studies Review 13, no. 3 (2005): 6. The second coat appears to be
much heavier, with fur lining protruding at the seam and a different
style of lapel. This features in a number of the portraits by Sarony. See
Holland, Wilde Album, 65–73, 84–87.
60. ‘Oscar Wilde’, The Salt Lake Herald, 12 April 1882, in Oscar Wilde in
America, 129.
61. ‘Oscar Wilde’s Arrival’, New York Tribune, 3 January 1882, 1, in Oscar
62. Schaffer also mentions this point in her analysis of Wilde’s aesthetic
costume. See Schaffer, ‘Fashioning Aestheticism’, 45.
63. Clare Rose, ‘The Meanings of the Late Victorian Sailor-Suit’, Journal for
Maritime Research (June 2009): 32.
64. Nick Frigo, ‘Posing and Posters: Oscar Wilde in America—1882’, The
Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 30 (2007): 82.
65. Frigo, ‘Posing and Posters’, 82; Mary Warner Blanchard, Oscar Wilde in
America, 1882: Aestheticism, Women, and Modernism’, in Oscar
Wilde: The Man, His Writing and His World, ed. Robert N. Keane (New
York: AMS Press), 36.
66. Frigo, ‘Posing and Posters’, 82.
67. This lecture is prefaced with a note advising readers that “[i]t is not
certain that all [of the lecture notes] belong to the same lecture, nor
that all were written at the same period”: Oscar Wilde, ‘Art and the
Handicraftsman’, in Miscellanies, 307. Anne Anderson suggests that
this material is likely to have derived from an early version of “The
Decorative Arts” lecture. See Anderson, ‘At Home with Oscar’, 43.
68. Wilde, ‘Art and the Handicraftsman’, 307.
69. Bernard Richards, ‘Oscar Wilde and Ruskin’s Road’, The Wildean: A
Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 40 (2012): 74.
71. This house was located in Kent and became known as “The Red
House.”’ See Cumming and Kaplan, Arts and Crafts, 5–16.
74. Ruskin, ‘The Relation of Art to Use’, 94–95.
76. The Cathedral of Our Lady of Chartres (commonly known as Chartres
Cathedral) was constructed between 1194 and 1220. As Wilde indi-
cates, Chartres Cathedral is famous because it retains many of the
original stained-glass windows. Local tradesmen and labourers are rep-
resented on some of the lower windows of the cathedral; these images
date from the thirteenth century.
77. ‘The Apostle of Beauty in Nova Scotia’, Halifax Morning Herald, 10
October 1882, 2, in Oscar Wilde in America, 169.
78. Cumming and Kaplan, Arts and Crafts, 7.
118 L.
79. Cumming and Kaplan, Arts and Crafts, 17–18. Ebonizing is a chemical
process that turns wood black and replicates the look of ebony.
80. This quote is taken from Morris’s lecture, “The Beauty of Life,” which
was delivered at the Birmingham Society of Arts and School of Design
on 19 February 1880; as quoted by Gillian Naylor, The Arts and Crafts
Movement: A Study of Its Sources, Ideals and Influence on Design Theory
(London: Studio Vista, 1971), 108.
83. Wilde, ‘The English Renaissance’, 276. Wilde attributes this quote to
Ruskin, however, I believe it is a paraphrase of Morris (see note 74).
84. O’Brien, Wilde in Canada, 35.
85. Gregory Castle, ‘Misrecognising Wilde: Media and Performance on
the American Tour of 1882’, in Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories,
Archives, ed. Joseph Bristow (Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
2013), 97.
86. Oscar Wilde, ‘The House Beautiful’, in Oscar Wilde in Canada: An
Apostle for the Arts, ed. Kevin O’Brien (Toronto: Personal Library,
1982), 165.
87. Wilde, ‘The House Beautiful’, 165–66.
88. Ruskin, ‘Relation of Art’, 114.
91. Wilde, ‘The Decorative Arts’, 162.
92. Wilde directly attributes his ideas to Plato in “The English Renaissance
of Art.” He quotes The Republic 3. 401c then remarks, “[t]hat is what
Plato thought decorative art could do for a nation, feeling that the
secret not of philosophy merely but of all gracious existence might
be externally hidden from any one whose youth had been passed in
uncomely and vulgar surroundings, and that the beauty of form and col-
our even … will find its way into the inmost places of the soul and
lead the boy naturally look for that divine harmony of spiritual life of
which art was to him the material symbol and warrant”: Wilde, ‘The
English Renaissance’, 271.
93. Plato, The Republic, ed. Terence Irwin and trans. A. D. Lindsay
(London: Everyman Library, 1992), 3. 401b.
94. Plato, The Republic, trans. A. D. Lindsay, 3. 401b–c. For further dis-
cussion on this subject, see Leanne Grech, ‘Imagining Utopia: Oxford
Hellenism and the Aesthetic Alternative’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical
Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard and Iarla
Manny (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 170–73.

97. Mary Warner Blanchard, Oscar Wilde’s America: Counterculture Gilded
Age (New Haven: Yale University Press), xiii. In this book, Blanchard
argues that “the visionaries of American aestheticism were women.” Her
study acknowledges the women who were at the forefront of aesthetic
design culture in America, although their contribution was overshad-
owed by successful male designers, such as Louis Comfort Tiffany and
John Lafarge: see Blanchard, Oscar Wilde’s America, xiii.
100. ‘Oscar Wilde: The Arch-Aesthete on Aestheticism’, Montreal Star,
15 May 1882, 3, in Oscar Wilde in America, 153. When Wilde lec-
tured in Britain, in 1883, he presented a similar idea in his new lecture,
“Impressions of America”: “We base the education of children
entirely on books, but we must give a child a mind before we can
instruct the mind … handicraft should be the basis of education. Boys
and girls should be taught to use their hands to make something, and
they would be less apt to destroy and be mischievous”: ‘Impressions of
America’, in Oscar Wilde in America, 181.
101. ‘Oscar Wilde: The Arch-Aesthete on Aestheticism’, Montreal Star, 15
May 1882, 3, in Oscar Wilde in America, 153.
102. Wilde, ‘The Decorative Arts’, 163–64.
103. Wilde did not maintain this line of thinking, as his later aesthetic litera-
ture reflected on the role that art played in the intellectual lives of aes-
thetes. For example, Wilde’s ‘Preface’ to the 1891 edition of The Picture
of Dorian Gray ends with the epigram, “All art is quite useless”: Dorian
Gray, 168.
104. Vera; or, The Nihilists ran for eight days (from 20 to 28 August 1883) in
New York. See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 241–43, regarding the reception
of the play.
105. Stuart Mason [Christopher Sclater Millard], ‘Introduction’, in
Impressions of America, ed. Stuart Mason (Sunderland: Keystone
Press, 1906), 17. The reviewer was responding to Wilde’s lecture at
Wandsworth Town Hall, which took place on 24 September 1883.
106. Wilde, ‘Impressions of America’, 177.
108. Castle, ‘Misrecognising Wilde’, 108.
110. ‘Oscar Wilde’, New York Evening Post, 4 January 1882, 4, in Oscar
111. ‘Oscar Wilde’, New York Evening Post, 4 January 1882, 4, in Oscar
120 L.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anderson, Anne. ‘At Home with Oscar: Constructing the House Beautiful’. The
Armitage, Christopher. ‘Blue China and Blue Moods: Oscar Fashioning Himself
at Oxford’. In Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings, and His World. Edited by
Robert N. Keane, 17–18. New York: AMS Press, 2003.
Blanchard, Mary Warner. Oscar Wilde’s America: Counterculture Gilded Age.
New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.
Blanchard, Mary Warner. ‘Oscar Wilde in America, 1882: Aestheticism, Women,
and Modernism’. In Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writing and His World.
Edited by Robert N. Keane. New York: AMS Press, 2003.
Bruder, Anne. ‘Constructing Artist and Critic Between J. M. Whistler and
Oscar Wilde: “In the Best Days of Art There Were No Art-Critics”’. English
Literature in Transition, 1880–1920 47, no. 2 (2004): 161–80.
Castle, Gregory. ‘Misrecognising Wilde: Media and Performance on the
American Tour of 1882’. In Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories, Archives.
Edited by Joseph Bristow, 85–117. Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
2013.
Cover Illustration. ‘Aestheticism as Oscar Wilde Understands It’. In Daily
Graphic, 11 January 1882, 1. New-York Historical Society. Image Number
47832.
Cumming, Elizabeth, and Wendy Kaplan. The Arts and Crafts Movement. New
York: Thames and Hudson, 1991.
Friedman, David M. Wilde in America: Oscar Wilde and the Invention of Modern
Celebrity. New York: W. W. Norton, 2014.
Frigo, Nick. ‘Posing and Posters: Oscar Wilde in America—1882’. The Wildean:
A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 30 (2007): 73–85.
Gagnier, Regenia. Idylls of the Marketplace: Oscar Wilde and the Victorian Public.
Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1986.
Gambier, Marc. ‘J. H. Ryley in the Role of Bunthorne from a Production of
Patience’. 1881. Photograph. University of Washington Libraries. Collection
of studio portraits of entertainers, actors and actresses who performed on
the American and British stage in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Negative
Number UW 36077.
Gere, Charlotte. The House Beautiful: Oscar Wilde and the Aesthetic Interior
[with an essay by Lesley Hoskins]. London: Lund Humphries, 2000.
Gilbert, W. S. Plays and Poems. New York: Random House, 1932.
Grech, Leanne. ‘Imagining Utopia: Oxford Hellenism and the Aesthetic
Alternative’. In Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity. Edited by Kathleen
Riley, et al., 161–74. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Greenhalgh, Paul. Ephemeral Vistas: The Expositions Universelles, Great

Exhibitions and World’s Fairs, 1851–1939. Manchester and New York, NY:
Manchester University Press and St. Martin’s Press, 1988.
Hamilton, Lisa K. ‘The Importance of Recognizing Oscar: The Dandy and the
Culture of Celebrity’. Center & Clark Newsletter 33 (1999): 3–5.
Holland, Merlin. ‘Introduction to Essays, Selected Journalism, Lectures
and Letters’. In Collins Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. 5th ed. Glasgow:
HarperCollins, 2003.
Holland, Merlin. The Wilde Album. London: Fourth Estate, 1997.
Hofer, Matthew, and Gary Scharnhorst, eds. Oscar Wilde in America: The
Interviews. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010.
Hyde, Montgomery H. Oscar Wilde: A Biography. New York: Da Capo Press,
1981 [c. 1975].
Ingram, J. S. The Centennial Exposition, Described and Illustrated. Philadelphia:
Hubbard Bros, 1876.
Mason, Stuart [Millard, Christopher Sclater]. ‘Introduction’. In Impressions
of America. Edited with an Introduction by Stuart Mason. Sunderland:
Keystone Press, 1906.
Mendelssohn, Michèle. Henry James, Oscar Wilde and Aesthetic Culture.
Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007.
2018.
Morris, Roy, Jr. Declaring His Genius: Oscar Wilde in North America.
Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2013.
Naylor, Gillian. The Arts and Crafts Movement: A Study of Its Sources, Ideals and
Influence on Design Theory. London: Studio Vista, 1971.
Norton, Frank. Illustrated Historical Register of the Centennial Exposition,
Philadelphia, 1876 and of the Exposition Universelle, Paris, 1878. New York:
American News Company and J. J. Little & Co., 1879.
O’Brien, Kevin. Oscar Wilde in Canada: An Apostle for the Arts. Toronto:
Personal Library, 1982.
Plato. The Republic. Edited by Terence Irwin. Translated by A. D. Lindsay.
London: Everyman Library, 1992.
Richards, Bernard. ‘Oscar Wilde and Ruskin’s Road’. The Wildean: A Journal of
Oscar Wilde Studies 40 (2012): 74–88.
Rose, Clare. ‘The Meanings of the Late Victorian Sailor-Suit’. Journal for
Maritime Research (June 2009): 24–50.
Ruskin, John. ‘The Relation of Art to Use’. In Lectures on Art: Delivered Before
the University of Oxford in Hilary Term, 1870. 3rd ed. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1880.
122 L.
Sarony, Napoleon. ‘Number 16’. 1882. Photograph. Library of Congress.

https://www.loc.gov/item/98519705/. Accessed 11 November 2017.
Sarony, Napoleon. ‘Number 22’. 1882. Photograph. Library of Congress.
https://www.loc.gov/item/98519699/. Accessed 11 November 2017.
Schaffer, Talia. ‘Fashioning Aestheticism by Aestheticizing Fashion: Wilde,
Beerbohm, and the Male Aesthetes’ Sartorial Codes’. Victorian Literature
and Culture 28, no. 1 (2000): 39–54.
Thienpont, Eva. ‘Visibly Wild(e): A Re-evaluation of Oscar Wilde’s Homosexual
Image’. Irish Studies Review 13, no. 3 (2005): 291–301.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Impressions of America’. In Oscar Wilde in America: The
Interviews. Edited by Matthew Hofer and Gary Scharnhorst, 177–81.
Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010.
Wilde, Oscar. Miscellanies. London: Methuen, 1908.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘The Decorative Arts’. In Oscar Wilde in Canada: An Apostle for
the Arts. Edited by Kevin O’Brien, 151–65. Toronto: Personal Library, 1982.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘The House Beautiful’. In Oscar Wilde in Canada: An Apostle for
the Arts. Edited by Kevin O’Brien, 165–81. Toronto: Personal Library, 1982.
Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray [1891]. In The Picture of Dorian Gray:
The 1890 and 1891 Texts. Edited by Joseph Bristow. Vol. 3. The Complete
CHAPTER 4
Civilizing England: Oxford, Empire,

and Aesthetic Education
The years following Oscar Wilde’s 1882 North American lecture tour led
to a defining period of professional and personal change: the whirlwind
tour was followed by two British lecture tours, marriage, fatherhood, and
a new career in journalism. 1 Between the mid- to late 1880s, Wilde also
juggled his professional role as an anonymous reviewer with his
ambition to be recognized as a critical author. He became a regular
unsigned contributor for the Pall Mall Gazette in the early months of
1885 and continued writing for the paper until 1890. 2 The Pall Mall
Gazette adopted an American style of journalism known as New
Journalism, which included sensational investigative pieces, interviews,
and short feature articles like the reviews that Wilde wrote.3 Wilde’s
reviews touched on a range of popular subjects, such as fashion,
celebrities, theatrical perfor- mances, lectures, exhibitions, and new
books. In addition to writing for the Pall Mall Gazette, Wilde occasionally
published signed pieces for the Court and Society Review and the
Dramatic Review.4 He also produced a regular column called “Literary
and Other Notes” in the Woman’s World magazine, which he edited
between 1887 and 1889.5
While Wilde was earning a living as a journalistic writer, he began
to publish longer signed critical essays and dialogues in serious liter-
ary periodicals. The earliest example is Wilde’s essay, “Shakespeare and
Stage Scenery,” which featured in the May 1885 issue of the Nineteenth
Century; this essay was later revised and renamed “The Truth of
Masks.”6 But Wilde’s reputation as a critic started to gain momentum
© The Author(s) 2019

123
124 L.
in January 1889, when he succeeded in publishing three signed critical

essays: “The Decay of Lying” featured in the Nineteenth Century; this
was followed by “Pen, Pencil and Poison” in the Fortnightly Review;
and “London Models” in the English Illustrated Magazine.7 “The
True Function and Value of Criticism” (which would become “The
Critic as Artist”) was published in two parts, in the July and September
1890 issues of the Nineteenth Century. With the exception of “London
Models,” all of the aforementioned essays were revised and included
in Wilde’s Intentions collection, which was published by Osgood,
McIlvaine, in 1891.8
The other significant critical work that Wilde produced in this period
was “The Soul of Man under Socialism.” This essay was published in
the Fortnightly Review in February 1891, but in February of the pre-
vious year, Frank Harris (who was Wilde’s friend and the editor of the
Fortnightly Review) asked if Wilde would be interested in writing “an
Article on Literature or any Social Subject as paradoxical as you please”
for the journal.9 Wilde must have declined the initial offer from Harris
because he was still working on the Lippincott’s edition of The Picture
of Dorian Gray. He eventually produced an essay that reflected the
contemporary debate between left-wing socialist writers and the oppos-
ing camp of individualists, who favoured a conservative, liberal approach
to economics and individual property rights. Wilde’s essay was re-
released as a book, entitled The Soul of Man and was privately published
on 30 May 1895 by Arthur Lee Humphreys, who was friend to both
Oscar and his wife Constance. It is unlikely that Wilde was involved with
the preparation of The Soul of Man because he would have been preoc-
cupied with legal matters and was already in prison by the time the book
was published.10 The revisions included minor typographical and gram-
matical changes that were probably made by the publisher. 11 Only fifty
copies of The Soul of Man were made, and unlike all of Wilde’s other
books, it was released in cheap, light brown paper-wrappers and lacked
the usual designer features that Wilde adopted in his other book publica-
tions.12 For this reason, Josephine M. Guy suspects that The Soul of Man
was not intended to make a profit, but as “a gesture of good faith to
someone in trouble—an attempt to remind an increasingly hostile public
of an earlier, more successful Wilde.”13
Guy also points out that “it was the publication of Intentions, rather
than the cumulative effect of all [Wilde’s] various periodical contribu-
tions up till 1981 … which was crucial in the attempt to present himself
4 CIVILIZING ENGLAND: OXFORD, EMPIRE, AND AESTHETIC EDUCATION
as a critic.”14 Although Wilde often incorporated material from his

reviews in his signed works, he was reluctant to identify himself as a
journalist.15 In a letter that roughly dates between 1886 and 1887,
Wilde listed the prominent journals and newspapers he had contributed
to over the years, and he hastened to add that he was more of a
literary writer than a journalist: “As for journalism I have written for
the Pall Mall Gazette, the Saturday Review, the Athenaeum, the World
etc [sic.] – also for the Fortnightly Review, the XIXth Century,
Macmillan’s Magazine, etc. etc. – I write only on questions of
literature and art – am hardly a journalist.” 16 Once again, in 1890, he
reaffirmed his position as a literary critic in the following tersely
worded statement: “I have no claim to be regarded as a journalist, as
all my work is literary criticism – I notice books, not events.”17
According to Laurel Brake, “[t]he terms ‘critic’ and ‘criticism’ func-
tioned as our terms, ‘reviewer’ and ‘review,’ with no special association
with what we have since defined as ‘literature.’” 18 This usage explains
why Wilde was so eager to emphasize his particular interest in literature.
The other reason why Wilde sought to distance himself from journalism
was because some English critics, like Matthew Arnold, were uncomfort-
able with the fusion of journalism and criticism that was typical of New
Journalism.19 As Paul L. Fortunato reminds us, Arnold used his writing
to voice his “alarm at a crisis of authority, a fear that uncultured, uncrit-
ical writers were making statements about culture and society in a way
formerly reserved to authoritative ‘sages’ like himself.” 20 Wilde adopted
a similar attitude to Arnold when he reflected on the culture of journal-
ism that he encountered during his 1882 lecture tour of North America.
When writing to the American poet, Joaquin Miller, Wilde expressed his
contempt for journalists: “Who are these scribes who, passing with pur-
poseless alacrity from the police news to the Parthenon, and from crime
to criticism, sway with such serene incapacity the office which they so
lately swept?”21 With this cutting remark, Wilde placed himself above
his critics, as he suggested that most journalists were unintelligent hacks
who were paid to express their opinions on anything and everything. At
that point, however, Wilde did not know that he would become the type
of commercial writer that he abhorred.
This chapter considers the politics embedded in “The Critic as Artist”
(revised 1891) and The Soul of Man (1891, re-released 1895); these
two works are representative of Wilde’s late aesthetic criticism and are
concurrent texts.22 Through an analysis of “The Critic as Artist” and
126 L.
The Soul of Man, I examine Wilde’s efforts to promote aestheticism as

an alternative form of education. I argue that the tension between
Wilde’s aestheticism and the politics associated with the Oxford style
of Classical education combines to create a conflicting image of Oxford
University. In Wilde’s aesthetic criticism, Oxford is portrayed as a place
that facilitates aesthetic contemplation and intellectual play. At Oxford,
students have the time to admire the natural and architectural features
of the colleges, and this activity contributes to an instinctive apprecia-
tion of beauty. Yet, the Oxford culture of aestheticism is somewhat com-
promised by the presence of scholars who experience the academy as a
workplace and represent the institution’s role in supporting
professionalization and imperialism.
In order to shed light upon the type of Classical education that
Wilde received at Oxford, I will begin this study by discussing the
mid-century reforms to the Greats examination, which facilitated the
Platonic revival at Oxford. Both Thomas Arnold (father of Matthew)
and Benjamin Jowett introduced significant curricular reforms to ensure
that the study of ancient history and philosophy would have currency
outside of the university. In particular, Jowett succeeded in establish-
ing a professional pathway between Oxford and the Indian Civil Service
(ICS). This history informs the anti-imperialist rhetoric that surfaces
in “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of Man: in both of these works,
Wilde questions the very meaning of the term “civilized.” Rather than
reinforcing the imperialist construction of England as a progressive
world power, Wilde maintains that England is uncivilized. By extension,
Wilde also critiques the imperial model of leadership that was perpet-
uated via the Greats curriculum. Moreover, Wilde asserts that Plato’s
philosophy of education accords with his own concept of aesthetic
appreciation.
Although Wilde worked as a journalistic reviewer in the 1880s, he
condemned journalism in his critical writing because it lacked the sub-
stance to stimulate the imaginations of readers and writers. “The Critic
as Artist” and The Soul of Man offer a solution to this problem, as Wilde
draws on his Classical knowledge and memories of Oxford while inviting
his readers to contemplate and actively appreciate art. Wilde continues
to promote the consumption of arts and crafts objects, but his late
aesthetic criticism is more interested in the intellectual process of
interpreting aesthetic literature.
1 THE FORMATION OF GREATS

To contextualize the politics of “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of
Man, we must first consider the political implications of the Classical
curriculum that Wilde experienced as a student of Greats or Literæ
Humaniores. As a number of scholars have established, Benjamin Jowett
is a significant figure in the history of Oxford University because he
introduced major changes which transformed the content and culture
of Oxford Classics in the latter half of the nineteenth century.23 He is
also known for his English translations of Plato’s dialogues, which will
be discussed in Chapter 5. Jowett was the Master of Balliol College and
became involved in university reform because he supported Thomas
Arnold’s efforts to promote the study of ancient history at Oxford.
Arnold is chiefly remembered for his role as the headmaster of Rugby
(1828–1842), but towards the end of his life he also served as the Regius
Professor in Modern History at Oxford (1841–1842). As a public school
headmaster, Arnold was particularly interested in the social implications
of Classical education. As Heather Ellis has pointed out, Arnold believed
that students of Classics should be taught the “importance of activity,
work and one’s duty to contemporary society.”24
Arnold’s education philosophy influenced the Greats curriculum
in two ways. First, he campaigned for ancient history to be included in
the Greats examination, which was accomplished when the examination
Statute was reformed in 1830. Second, he endeavoured to see Aristotle’s
Politics and Plato’s Republic added to the curriculum. Arnold’s under-
standing of history was informed by Giambattista Vico’s theory of life
cycles. Vico suggested that nations underwent the same stages of devel-
opment as individuals, progressing from youth to maturity and decline.25
In accordance with Vico’s theory, Arnold believed that England had
entered a cycle of growth and expansion similar to that of fifth-century
Athens and Imperial Rome. When commenting on Arnold’s impact on
the Oxford Classical curriculum, Ellis notes that Arnold “considered
the study of ancient history to be of crucial importance in the educa-
tion of Britain’s future statesmen.”26 Arnold’s plans regarding Plato and
Aristotle did not eventuate in his lifetime, but he used his appointment
Regius Professor to give a series of lectures on Aristotle’s Politics. As
A. P. Stanley (Arnold’s biographer) acknowledges, Arnold was particu-
larly interested in exploring how Aristotle’s ideas could be used to
understand “the problems of modern times and countries.”27
128 L.
After Arnold’s death (on 12 June 1842), Jowett continued the

campaign to see Plato included in the Greats curriculum, and in the
late 1840s, he began to present lectures on Plato’s Republic at Balliol
College.28 As I mentioned in Chapter 2, Jowett revived the Tractarian
style of teaching which encouraged personal interaction between tutors
and students. Jowett’s approach differed to that of the Tractarians
because he fostered a culture of teacher–student intimacy to recreate
the dialectic, question answer-based style of discussion that is recorded
in Plato’s philosophical texts. As a result of Jowett’s innovative teach-
ing practice, Plato was officially included in the Classical curriculum in
1853, after new reforms to the examination system came into effect. In
the 1850s, the Greats exam was modified (as James Bowen notes) to
concentrate on the “poets and orators, drawn from the Greek histori-
cal and philosophical context.”29 The new emphasis on Greek content,
especially philosophical content, was another of Jowett’s innovations.
The approach to reading Classical literature was radically changed, as
the curriculum shifted from a “narrowly grammatical” philological study
of ancient texts towards what Linda Dowling describes as “a powerfully
engaged mode of reading which insisted on the vivid contemporaneity
and philosophical depths of these works.”30
Jowett was not only responsible for instituting major curricular
reforms at Oxford, but also for shaping the first competitive recruit-
ment examination for the ICS. Dowling rightly identifies Jowett as an
individual who “contributed, perhaps more than anyone else at Oxford,
to that larger intellectual movement within Victorian Hellenism … by
which Greek studies became a vehicle for channelling modern progres-
sive thought into the Victorian civic elite.” 31 This statement alludes to
the broader political implications of Jowett’s involvement with the ICS,
but if we focus only on the gains that Jowett secured for his students, we
miss the underlying politics of exclusion that shaped his agenda for the
ICS. That is, Jowett helped to create a bias in the ICS examination that
significantly marginalized Indian candidates and ensured that most of
the governing power remained in the hands of classically trained English
gentlemen.
Together with Thomas Macaulay, Jowett served on a committee that
presented the ICS Board of Control with recommendations for the con-
tent and assessment of the ICS entrance examination. In November
1854, Jowett and his fellow committee members produced a report
that encouraged the ICS Board to develop a Classics examination that
matched the level of the Oxford and Cambridge exams. 32 The com-
mittee also advised that a higher margin of points should be allotted to
Greek and Latin; therefore, the first exam papers from 1855 reflected a
bias towards Classical studies. Greek and Latin were awarded a total of
750 points each, and English followed with 500 points, whereas mod-
ern languages (French, German, and Italian) and Oriental Classical lan-
guages (Sanskrit and Arabic) ranked considerably lower, totalling only
375 points each.33 The committee’s report was the first step towards
establishing a connection between Oxford and the ICS. As Phiroze
Vasunia expresses it, the combined efforts of Jowett and Macaulay
“moved the elite British universities to the centre of training for ICS
recruits, specifically by giving Greek and Latin a large weight in the com-
petitive examinations.”34 Essentially, Jowett’s involvement with the ICS
made it possible for classically educated Oxford men to gain powerful
governing roles within the British Empire.
Over the decades, adjustments were made to the ICS scoring system,
but Classical studies maintained its elevated status as one of the high-
est-ranking subjects on the ICS examination.35 The new examination
immediately increased the number of ICS recruits who were educated
at Oxford and Cambridge. Within five years, sixty percent of success-
ful applicants were Oxbridge men, although this trend had reversed by
the time Wilde was completing his degree in the late 1870s. 36 The age
limit of ICS candidates had been lowered from twenty-three to nine-
teen in the 1860s, and, for a time, this change discouraged students
who wished to complete a university degree. The policy was reversed
in 1892 in order to allow candidates to sit the exam at the age of twen-
ty-three as in the past.37 This change led to a sudden rise in the number
of classically educated recruits in the early 1890s. At this point, the ICS
examination was again modified to reflect the content of the Classical
examinations at the English universities. The original Classical compo-
nent of the ICS examination was bolstered with additional sections on
Greek and Roman history, along with ancient and modern philosophy. 38
These additional subjects advantaged those who had passed through the
Greats curriculum, to such an extent that Oxford graduates continued
to dominate the ICS recruitment system from the 1890s until the out-
break of the First World War.39
As Vasunia has argued, the ICS recruitment process raised sev-
eral difficulties for Indian applicants. The age restrictions (before the
1892 reform) prevented Indian candidates “from gaining the necessary
130 L.
education in India and England to stand a realistic chance in the open

competition.”40 Until 1922, the ICS examination was only held in
London; this tradition forced Indian candidates to spend more time
and money on travel than their British rivals. 41 The content of the ICS
examination presented yet another obstacle, as the higher ranking of the
Classical languages did not accord with the types of languages that were
traditionally studied in India.
The Indian education system was divided between institutions
devoted the study of Indian classical languages (Persian, Arabic, and
Sanskrit), and British government and missionary schools that taught
English language and literature. While it was not typical for Indian
students to learn Greek and Latin, the government institutions taught
English in much same way that the Classical languages were taught in
schools across Britain. English literature was used as the basis of gram-
mar lessons, which involved parsing, memorizing, and reciting passages
from the texts.42 Indian students also studied Classical authors in English
translations and learned about Ancient Greek history through the works
of English historians.
In Britain, Classical education was commonly directed towards boys
and young men with elite social backgrounds (which included mem-
bers of the aristocracy and upper-middle-class families); this was also
true of the English style of education that was adopted in India.43 But,
as Gauri Viswanathan has acknowledged, the British and colonial Indian
approaches to Classical education served entirely different ideological
purposes. Viswanathan suggests that reformers like Arnold and Jowett
looked to Classical history and philosophy to address the British
Empire’s “need for better-trained and better-informed administrators”
and was, therefore, “suited to the vocation of ruling.” 44 By contrast, those
who received a Western-style education in India were—in
Viswanathan’s words—“reading texts that taught them to be
independent thinkers and leaders, but they neither had the
independence nor the opportunity to lead.”45 Ultimately, the education
system in India reinforced England’s colonial rule by instilling Indian
subjects with a respect for English culture and promising the prospect
of a government career, when in reality, their advantages were quite
limited. Until the latter half of the nineteenth century, Indian men were
only recruited for low-level subordinate roles in the British
administration.46 When it was possible for them to gain higher
government positions, the ICS established an examination which system-
atically favoured men who were educated in England.
Oscar Wilde was in a different position to most Oxford students,

not only because of his Irish background but also because he had com-
menced a second university degree and was older than most of his peers.
This was surely an advantage for Wilde, as he was more academically
advanced than most of the younger students who competed against
him for a scholarship (which was known as a demyship) to Magdalen
in 1874. We can only speculate as to what he wrote about when he sat
the Greats exam in 1878, but his letters reveal that he was concentrating
on Aristotle’s Ethics and Plato’s Republic when he was revising for the
exam.47 Due to his rustication (see Chapter 2), Wilde had the disadvan-
tage of preparing for the exam alone in Ireland, so he reached out to his
friend William Ward:
But of Greats work I have done nothing. After all there are more profit-
able studies, I suppose, than the Greats course: still I would like a good
Class awfully and want you to lend me your notes on Philosophy: I
know your style, and really it would be a very great advantage for me to
have them – Ethics, Politics (Republic) and general Philosophy. … And
also give me advice – a thing I can’t stand from my elders because it’s
like preaching, but I think I would like some from you “who have
passed through the fire.”48
Wilde did not simply pass with “a good Class”; he achieved a rare
Double First in Moderations and Greats. When writing about his success
to Ward, he colourfully described this triumph as a “display of fireworks
at the end of my career.”49 Unfortunately, these proverbial fireworks
were not enough to secure him an academic appointment at Magdalen
College.
The option of joining the Indian Civil Service was not available to
Wilde, given the age restrictions. Financial pressures were a constant
concern, so the prospect of joining the British Civil Service became
more appealing after Wilde left university. On two separate occasions,
he applied to become an Inspector of Schools and sought references
from influential contacts to obtain the position. On his first attempt, he
requested a testimonial from Oscar Browning, who was a Cambridge
don and former housemaster at Eton. The letter to Browning, which
dates from February 1880, reveals that income was foremost on Wilde’s
mind. It also demonstrates a genuine interest in the travel opportunities
that were available to government officials: “I want to get a position with
an assured income, and any Education work would be very congenial to
132 L.
me, and I have here good opportunity of studying the systems of France
and Germany.”50 The prospect of balancing a literary career with the
duties of public office was surely another aspect that attracted Wilde.
Matthew Arnold had proved that it was possible to produce literature
while earning a living as a school inspector, despite the meagre income.51
In the end, Wilde’s application was unsuccessful, possibly because
Browning had been surrounded by allegations of sexual misconduct,
which led to his dismissal from Eton.52
In July 1885, Wilde made his second attempt to join the education
system. At this point, he had a family to support and was writing for the
Pall Mall Gazette. On this occasion, he called on the assistance of the
Conservative politician, George Curzon, who Wilde knew from Oxford.
Curzon was one of Jowett’s outstanding pupils; he later served as the
Viceroy of India between 1899 and 1905. In his letter to Curzon, Wilde
asked for help to gain the support of Edward Stanhope, who was a fellow
Conservative:
Dear Curzon, I want to be one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors of Schools!

This is ambition – however, I want it, and want it very much, and I hope
you will help me. Edward Stanhope has the giving away and, as a contem-
porary of mine at Oxford, you could give me great help by writing him a
letter to say (if you think it) that I am a man of some brains.53
Stanhope had the power to determine whether this second application

would result in success or another failure. It is pertinent that Wilde
wanted his prospective employer to perceive him as “a man of some
brains,” which could be a modest allusion to his Double First. In the
light of the connection between Greats and government recruit-
ment, Wilde’s reference to Oxford serves as a reminder that he had
the same academic training as Curzon, and that this training qualified
him for a government position. Five years earlier, Wilde learnt that his
academic reputation was not enough to guarantee his admission into
the Civil Service. Quite tellingly, the final part of his message empha-
sizes the necessity to reach Stanhope through a personal contact in the
Conservative Party: “I don’t know Stanhope personally and am afraid
he may take the popular idea of me as a real idler. Would you tell him
it is not so?”54 It is ironic that Wilde needed to reassure Stanhope (via
Curzon) that he had the intellect and the diligence to serve the state.
If he lacked a work ethic, he would not have made himself available for
numerous interviews, public appearances, and lecture commitments

across America and Canada, all of which increased his fame as an idle
aesthete.
For Wilde, the Oxford Classical curriculum did not provide the pro-
fessional advantages that he had reason to expect from his
outstanding academic success. Contrary to his plans, Wilde found no
direct path into the academic profession and his Oxford affiliation
made no difference when he set out to establish a career in the Civil
Service. Although Curzon did write to Stanhope, as requested, Wilde’s
application was overlooked yet again.55 As Guy and Ian Small have
pointed out, “the life of a writer-civil servant … was less than ideal”
because junior offices in the Civil Service involved “hard work and
[were] not particularly well paid.”56 The question remains, if Wilde
was employed in a government role, would he have risked his career by
criticizing this institution and the education system, which were
integral to the machinery of the British Empire? Journalism was not
Wilde’s first choice of employment, but it did allow him the freedom
to produce critical works such as “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of
Man. In both of these major essays, Wilde begins to question the
value of practical knowledge.
2 THE TYRANNY OF WORK

Overall, when Wilde mentioned Oxford in his letters and literature, it
was with a sense of fondness. As William F. Shuter has observed: “Wilde
was, in fact, deeply attached to Oxford, leaving it with regret, returning
often to visit it, and always remembering it with affection.” 57 While it is
true that Wilde did not directly criticize the Oxford Classical curriculum
in his correspondence or in his literature, we may turn to “The Critic as
Artist” and The Soul of Man in order to gauge his thoughts on the impe-
rialist objectives that shaped the pedagogical culture of Victorian Oxford.
During his 1882 lecture tour of North America, Wilde extolled the
moral virtues of art and craft lessons and argued for a model of
education that reflected the principles of the Aesthetic Movement (see
Chapter 3). By the 1890s, however, Wilde abandoned the view that
education and art should combine to serve a didactic function. His late
aesthetic criticism therefore calls for a self-directed style of education
that is enacted through aesthetic consumption.
“The Critic as Artist” unfolds as a private dialogue between the
London aesthete, Gilbert, and another young friend named Ernest.
134 L.
The conversation between Gilbert and Ernest replicates Plato’s dialectic

structure, which is staged as a series of questions and answers posed by
Socrates to his interlocutors. When commenting on the dialogue struc-
ture of “The Critic as Artist,” Stefano Evangelista credits Wilde for fash-
ioning “an updated version of Platonic dialektiké that would effectively
fuse art and philosophy in the context of modern literary culture.” 58
Regenia Gagnier arrives at a similar conclusion; however, her analysis
draws attention to the seductive quality of Wilde’s aesthetic prose. 59 For
Gagnier, “The Critic as Artist” depicts the verbal play between an elder
and a younger man, and this suggests that the ideal audience Wilde had
in mind for this work was an audience of young men. 60 I would add that
Wilde’s aesthetic dialogue is equally indebted to the culture of Greats, as
the interaction between Gilbert and Ernest reflects the way that Oxford
students were trained to approach Greek philosophy with the modern
world in mind.
In “The Critic as Artist,” Gilbert wages an attack on Victorian prac-
ticality, although his criticism can be interpreted as a comment on the
practical rationale of the reformers who modernized the Greats cur-
riculum. By the time that Wilde had reissued “The Critic as Artist” in
Intentions, the tie between the ICS and the Oxford curriculum was
firmly established and would be strengthened even further with the
1892 reforms. In Part II of the dialogue, Gilbert proposes that a career-
ori- ented approach to knowledge is not conducive to intellectual
progress. Rather, he associates professional practice with intellectual
degeneration:
There is no country in the world so much in need of unpractical people as

this country of ours. With us, Thought is degraded by its constant asso-
ciation with practice. … Each of the professions means a prejudice. The
necessity for a career forces every one to take sides. We live in the age of
the overworked, and the under-educated; the age in which people are so
industrious that they become absolutely stupid.61
Gilbert’s statement reflects the sort of education that Oxford provided in

the latter half of the nineteenth century. The Oxford pedagogy exposed
students to Classical thought and assessed their ability to manipulate
Classical texts in order to address topics that were specific to Victorian
politics and culture. As Shuter explains, candidates who read for Greats
“were regularly expected to notice analogies or parallels between the
ancient and modern worlds and to examine their validity.”62 Given that
the study of Classical and contemporary philosophy unofficially assisted

in training students for government service, the reproach—namely,
that “Thought is degraded by its constant association with practice”—
extends to the intellectual culture of Oxford. If we accept Gilbert’s view
of England as an industrialized intellectual wasteland, the implication is
that Greats was accommodating the shift towards professionalization
and was partially responsible for the surplus of practical people. What
Wilde’s speaker alludes to, but does not make explicit here, is his sense
that middle-class professional culture had infiltrated the “cloistered
Utopia” of Oxford.63 Based on Gilbert’s cultural commentary, we can
surmise that Oxford was producing fewer intellectuals because the
reforms to Greats reflected a growing need to prepare students for
professional life beyond the university.64
“The Critic as Artist” also undermines the imperialist assumption
that England was civilized, and that the British had the right to control
the colonies, which they deemed to be uncivilized. Again, Oxford is not
directly mentioned, but Gilbert adopts a parodic use of colonial lan-
guage, and this evokes the imperialist model of leadership that was facili-
tated through the Oxford Classical curriculum:
England will never be civilized till she has added Utopia to her domin-
ions. There is more than one of her colonies that she might with advantage
surrender for so fair a land. What we want are unpractical people who see
beyond the moment, and think beyond the day. Those who try to lead the
people can only do so by following the mob.65
Far from being a civilizing force, Gilbert declares that England is not
and “will never be civilized” while the Empire remains intact: England
must surrender its colonies in exchange for the fair land of Utopia. When
reflecting on Wilde’s utopian discourse, Matthew Beaumont argues that
Wilde “parodies the discourse of imperialism in order to propose an
expansion of the empire of the political imagination.” 66 Indeed, Gilbert
anticipates that those who are in power cannot possibly sustain their
position in the long term because they are not visionary thinkers who
can imagine a world without empire: they try to lead by following the
mob. The term “mob” is used in a counterintuitive sense; it does not
refer to the exploited workers who may take to rioting in the streets;
rather, the “mob” includes the politicians and businessmen who steered
society to prioritize economic growth over intellectual development.67
136 L.
We might ask, how does this viewpoint relate to Oxford? The history
between Oxford and the ICS meant that students of Greats were consid-
ered to be the next generation of leaders. Gilbert’s speech alerts us to the
likelihood that the minds of intelligent young men would be employed
to reinforce the present system of colonial occupation, not to invent
ways to improve or abolish that system. In order to break the devastat-
ing cycle of subjugation and exploitation, leadership must be strongly
aligned with progressive thinking, that is, the ability to “think beyond
the day.”
By comparison, in The Soul of Man, the civilizing discourse takes
a darker turn as images of starvation and slavery are used to introduce
Wilde’s vision of an aesthetic Utopia. In this essay, which is in Wilde’s
own voice, he concedes that “civilization requires slaves. The Greeks
were quite right there. Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible,
uninteresting work, culture and contemplation become almost impossi-
ble.”68 Of course, Wilde’s justification of slavery is ironic, as his vision of
Utopia raises the possibility of eliminating the economic and social divi-
sions that prevented so many people from cultivating an intellectual life.
As Wilde reminds us, a large proportion of the English population were
so occupied with the basic struggle for survival that they had no oppor-
tunity to acquire a basic education, let alone a taste for culture:
[T] here are a great many people who, having no private property of their
own, and being always on the brink of sheer starvation, are compelled to
do the work of beasts of burden, to do work that is quite uncongenial
to them, and to which they are forced by the peremptory, unreasonable,
degrading Tyranny of want. These are the poor, and amongst them there
is no grace of manner, or charm of speech, or civilization, or culture, or
refinement in pleasures, or joy of life. From their collective force Humanity
gains much in material prosperity. But it is only the material result that it
gains, and the man who is poor is in himself absolutely of no importance.69
Paul A. Cantor suggests that Wilde’s argument for socialism is motivated

by aesthetic concerns, rather than a humanitarian sympathy for work-
ing-class people. Cantor notices a tone of “aristocratic disdain” in The
Soul of Man, and he contends that Wilde “ridicules the poor more openly
here than elsewhere in his writings.” 70 Certainly, the working poor are
characterized as ignorant and barbaric; they lack manners, eloquence,
and sophistication and do not seem to possess any redeeming qualities.
Perhaps it is more appropriate to say that the language Wilde employs

in the passage above is more detached than disdainful. Although Wilde
accepts that the poor were enduring constant degradation, there is no
attempt to sentimentalize their plight. Instead, he rationally observes
that the instinct for self-preservation has made the poor compliant; they
allowed themselves to become slaves or beasts of burden in order to
stave off starvation. On the one hand, the poor of England are necessarily
lacking in culture and refinement because education, especially Classical
education, reinforced class divisions. On the other hand, Wilde’s atti-
tude towards the working poor also highlights the ideological function
of education. “Charm,” “grace,” “civilization,” “culture,” and a taste for
refined pleasures are all qualities that are acquired through education.
These are also attributes that we associate with the Oxford gentleman
who is socially connected, highly educated, politically empowered, and
economically advantaged.
Wilde’s representation of the poor in The Soul of Man deviates from
his earlier tendency to praise the simple tastes of impoverished
workmen. As I established in Chapter 3, the poor tend to be excluded
from Wilde’s early aesthetic discourse, however, this is not the case in
his “Impressions of America” lecture (1883). In this presentation, Wilde
recalled the beauty of the Chinese railroad workers that he encountered
in San Francisco:
The people—strange, melancholy Orientals, whom many people would call

common—and they are certainly very poor, have determined that they will
have nothing about them that is not beautiful. In the Chinese restaurant,
where these navvies meet to have supper in the evening, I found them
drinking tea out of china cups, as delicate as the petals of a rose-leaf. …
When the Chinese bill was presented, it was made out on rice paper, the
account being done in Indian ink as fantastically as if an artist had been
etching little birds on a fan.71
Despite their impoverished living conditions, these Chinese work-

ers practice aestheticism, as they enjoy the use of beautiful objects on a
regular basis. Although the navvies were employed in dirty, physically
strenuous, and dangerous work, Wilde avoids these details. He chooses
instead to linger on the scene of the labourers enjoying a leisurely cup
of tea together and handling delicate petal-like cups. If the Chinese nav-
vies command admiration and colour Wilde’s memories of America, the
138 L.
working poor in The Soul of Man do not. In this latter work, the poor are
seen to be a blight on the landscape and are a reminder of the “hideous
poverty” that accompanied England’s economic boom.72
The uncomfortable juxtaposition between slavery and starvation
resurfaces in The Soul of Man, as Wilde prioritizes the intellectual and
creative freedom of artists above the rights of consumers. This would
become a defining feature of the aesthetic philosophy that is explored
at length in The Picture of Dorian Gray (see Chapter 5) and Wilde’s
prison letter to Lord Alfred Douglas (see Chapter 6). In his essay, Wilde
claims that artists are within their rights to limit the agency of consum-
ers because they are working to bring an end to the supply of hideous
homewares. Alarmingly, starvation is seen to be an integral part of aes-
thetic reform, which is also conceptualized as a civilizing process:
People have been to a very great extent civilized. It is only fair to state,
however, that the extraordinary success of the revolution in house-deco-
ration and furniture and the like has not really been due to the majority of
the public developing a very fine taste in such matters. It has been chiefly
due to the fact that the craftsmen of things so appreciated the pleasure of
making what was beautiful, and woke to such a vivid consciousness of the
hideousness and vulgarity of what the public had previously wanted, that
they simply starved the public out.73
Where the Oxford Hellenists failed in their civilizing enterprise, the

community of craftsmen have already civilized England by imposing
their “official” standard of beauty on the entire population: “However
they may object to it, people must nowadays have something charming
in their surroundings.”74 In this case, the reference to starvation frames
aesthetic reform as a gentler form of tyranny. 75 Despite Wilde’s confi-
dent tone, readers of The Soul of Man (in both 1891 and 1895) would
have known that the popularity of the Aesthetic Movement did not
produce any grand-scale cultural or social changes. More to the point,
the so-called revolution in house-decoration and furniture had already
reached its peak in the early 1880s and was fading into outmoded fash-
ion trend by the 1890s.76 Wilde’s work as a promoter of aestheticism
certainly would have been easier if it were possible to force aestheti-
cism on the public. Of course, this was far from the case, as the future
of aestheticism truly depended on the public’s willingness to acquire
beautifully crafted objects for their homes. The state that produced the
“Tyranny of Want” could not be trusted to insulate its citizens from ugli-
ness, and so, Wilde’s mission as an aesthetic critic was to encourage his
audience to assume this responsibility for themselves.
3 OXFORD AND AESTHETIC CONSUMPTION

While the search for a professional career and public recognition
situated Wilde further away from the academy, Oxford continued to
feature in his writing long after he had graduated. In October 1885,
Wilde admitted his nostalgia for Oxford in a letter to the newly
appointed President of Magdalen College, Herbert Warren: “I often
think with some regret of my Oxford days and wish I had not left
Parnassus for Piccadilly.”77 Mount Parnassus is traditionally associated
with Apollo and the Muses; in Wilde’s letter, Parnassus stands for the
intellectually robust college setting where he studied Greek literature
and produced much of his early poetry.
When reviewing Walter Pater’s Appreciations in 1890, Wilde also
reflected on his undergraduate years, particularly his preoccupation with
poetic experimentation. Within this anonymous review, Wilde recalled a
time when he did not have to balance his love of literature with profes-
sional writing commitments:
It was during my undergraduate days at Oxford [that I first met Pater];

days of lyrical ardours and of studious sonnet-writing; days when one
loved the exquisite intricacy and musical repetitions of the ballade, and
the vil- lanelle with its linked long-drawn echoes and its curious
completeness; days when one solemnly sought to discover the proper
temper in which a triolet should be written; delightful days, in which, I am
glad to say, there was far more rhyme than reason.78
In describing his serious attempt to become an accomplished poet, Wilde

adopted a poetic prose style that exemplified the “lyrical ardour” he felt
as a student. For Wilde, the memory of Oxford was bound to his mem-
ory of falling in love with poetry and discovering the subtle musicality of
each verse form. The construction of Oxford as a lost Parnassus may be a
recognition of his failure to become a respected English poet. At Oxford,
Wilde’s poetry was deemed worthy of the Newdigate Prize, but—as we
saw in Chapter 2—in the context of the English literary marketplace,
his first collection of poems received mixed reviews and poor sales.79
140 L.
By identifying himself as a regretful denizen of Piccadilly, Wilde sig-

nalled that the road to literary success had not been easy for him. When
advising another aspiring young writer, he urged him to “remember that
London is full of young men working for literary success, and that you
must carve your way to fame. Laurels don’t come for the asking.”80
Almost a decade later, when writing The Soul of Man, Wilde sym-
pathetically referred to journalists as slaves of the culture industry. He
pitied the “men of education and cultivation” who did not enjoy writ-
ing ugly and scandalous content for the press, but did so because their
occupation “oblige[d] them to supply the public with what the pub-
lic wants.”81 Speaking from experience, Wilde remarked: “It is a very
degrading position for any body of educated men to be placed in, and
I have no doubt that most of them feel it acutely.”82 So, it is possible
that Wilde’s antipathy towards journalism arose from his sense that this
profession was far removed from the Parnassian world of Oxford. The
following analysis will explore how Wilde used his aesthetic criticism to
rekindle a connection to the student life that he surrendered upon enter-
ing the workforce as a professional writer.
Although “The Critic as Artist” and The Soul of Man raise questions
about the politics underlying the Greats curriculum, these texts are also
inspired by the historic buildings, natural scenery, and the intellectual
culture associated with Oxford. In his discussion with Ernest, Gilbert
expresses Wilde’s long-held view that beautiful surroundings facilitate
aesthetic appreciation:
You remember that lovely passage in which Plato describes how a young
Greek should be educated, and with what insistence he dwells upon the
importance of surroundings, telling us how the lad is to be brought up in
the midst of fair sights and sounds, so that the beauty of material things
may prepare his soul for the reception of the beauty that is spiritual.
Insensibly, and without knowing the reason why, he is to develop that real
love of beauty which, as Plato is never weary of reminding us, is the true
aim of education.83
In this lyrical paraphrase of The Republic (401b–402a), Gilbert interprets

Plato’s philosophy as a precursor to the nineteenth-century Aesthetic
Movement; this idea can be traced to Wilde’s lectures on “The English
Renaissance of Art” and “The Decorative Arts.” 84 While Plato’s aesthet-
ics (as expressed in The Republic) relates to the artist’s role in providing
the community with influential models of behaviour, Wilde’s aesthet-

icism emphasizes the personal pleasure that arises from the repeated
exposure to art objects. Therefore, when Gilbert speaks of “rejecting
what is vulgar” and cultivating an “instinctive taste,” he means that aes-
thetic education is a matter of learning how to recognize beauty in a
marketplace that is saturated with shoddy, mass-produced goods.85 With
regard to Oxford, it is implied that aesthetic theory and practice offers
a more authentic version of Platonism because it serves the personal,
spiritual need to be in the presence of beauty, and this view departs from
the increasingly professional thrust of Greats.
Wilde’s representation of Oxford in “The Critic as Artist” allows us
to consider the different ways that students and scholars experience the
university. Oxford provides the perfect atmosphere in which to culti-
vate the aesthetic temperament, meanwhile, the university educators
fail to instruct their students on the all-important principles of aesthetic
philosophy. Shortly after citing Plato, Gilbert moves into an elaborate
description of the college structures and grounds, implying that the
environmental features of the university instil students with an aesthetic
sensibility:
Yet, even for us, there is left some loveliness of environment, and the dull-
ness of tutors and professors matters very little when one can loiter in
the grey cloisters at Magdalen, and listen to some flute-like voice singing
in Waynfleete’s chapel, or lie in the green meadow, among the strange
snake-spotted fritillaries, and watch the sunburnt noon smite to a finer
gold the tower’s gilded vanes, or wander up the Christ Church staircase
beneath the vaulted ceiling’s shadowy fans, or pass through the sculptured
gateway of Laud’s building in the College of St. John.86
At Oxford, students become accustomed to aesthetic beauty through

the habitual exposure to architectural features such as the gothic clois-
ters, the vaulted ceilings, and sculptured masonry. The medieval archi-
tecture also exemplifies the traditional, labour-intensive style of design
that was promoted through the Arts and Crafts Movement. Oxford is
idealized as a rural paradise where students have the time to laze in the
grass, admire the appearance of flowers and sunbeams—that is, to con-
template and appreciate the natural elements that complement the man-
made structures. At the same time, we are reminded that this institution
is not immune to professionalization. The “dullness” of the professional
142 L.
scholars is at odds with the decorative scenery. These men experience

Oxford as a workplace, which means that they have academic duties to
attend to and cannot spend their days lounging, listening, or laying in
the meadows. Consequently, the scholars overlook the beautiful scenery
that is more apparent to a young, aesthetically inclined student. Gilbert,
however, understands that art is powerful because it “can lead us away
from surroundings whose beauty is dimmed to us by the mist of famil-
iarity.”87 He unfairly dismisses the Oxford scholars as inconsequential
figures (“they matter very little”), possibly because they are a reminder
of the professional life that awaited many students. Though briefly men-
tioned, the scholars carry the taint of industry, and their presence under-
mines the notion that Oxford University is the ideal setting to practice
aesthetic appreciation.
Wilde’s construct of Utopia is strongly linked to a pastoral, leisurely
lifestyle. In “The Critic as Artist,” neither Gilbert nor Ernest explains
how England is to arrive at Utopia, but in The Soul of Man, Wilde argues
that one course of action is to create machinery that will eliminate “[a]ll
unintellectual labour, all monotonous, dull labour, all labour that deals
with dreadful things, and involves unpleasant conditions.”88 This may
be a reincarnation of the beautiful machine that was mentioned in
“Impressions of America” (see Chapter 3). The problem, as Wilde sees
it, is that the majority of the population is enslaved or burdened by the
need to work, compared to the wealthy members of society, who have
time to devote themselves to artistic and intellectual pursuits. At the
heart of Wilde’s mechanized Utopia is the desire to extend the liber-
ties that were traditionally reserved for the aristocracy to all members of
society:
There is no doubt at all that this is the future of machinery, and just as
trees grow while the country gentleman is asleep, so while Humanity will
be amusing itself, or enjoying cultivated leisure—which, and not labour, is
the aim of man—or making beautiful things, or reading beautiful things,
or simply contemplating the world with admiration and delight, machinery
will be doing all the necessary and unpleasant work.89
As he looks ahead towards the future of aestheticism, Wilde resurrects

the Old World figure of the aristocrat: the country gentleman who
effortlessly accumulates wealth from his agricultural estate. The sleeping
lord is an icon of rest and ease, and unlike the working poor, he is spared
of the pressure to work as a matter of survival. Significantly, the utopian

life of amusement and cultivated leisure recalls the aspects of student life
that are evoked in “The Critic as Artist.” The connection with nature is
restored as all of humanity acquires the same economic and social sta-
tus as the country gentleman. The citizens of Utopia inhabit an environ-
ment where “trees grow,” but nobody is charged with the responsibility
of tending the garden. People are free to sit and observe their surround-
ings, much like the student-aesthete who marvels at the sights and
sounds of the Oxford colleges. Wilde even improves on the Oxonian
environment, as there are no professionals to detract from the beauty
of the landscape. The utopian lifestyle is defined by three distinct activ-
ities: making beautiful objects; reading beautiful works of literature; and
the contemplation of beautiful surroundings. Although Wilde classifies
these activities as amusements or forms of cultivated leisure, they each
reflect the various ways in which he promoted aestheticism throughout
his career: first, as a lecturer, who encouraged his audiences to learn a
craft and suggested that school curriculums should include subjects in
art and craft, and then, as a reviewer, who assisted readers to discrimi-
nate between aesthetically beautiful texts and those that he believed
were lacking in style. As much as Wilde’s aesthetic criticism glorifies
inaction, we cannot overlook the fact that his professional history is
neatly written into his vision of an aesthetic Utopia.
Wilde’s image of Utopia may sound familiar because it hinges on the
premise of democratizing an aristocratic lifestyle. Yet, we should ques-
tion whether this lifestyle actually existed outside of the academy. When
Jeff Nunokawa reflects upon the resistance towards labour in The Soul of
Man, he reminds us that the aristocracy performed social activities that
are not in accordance with Wilde’s ideal of work that is “‘congenial,’
‘pleasurable,’ and ‘quite freely chosen.’” 90 To illustrate the routinized
working week of an aristocratic gentleman, Nunokawa cites an example
from Wilde’s society comedy, An Ideal Husband (1895): “he rides in
the Row at ten o’clock in the morning, goes to the Opera three times
a week, changes his clothes at least five times a day, and dines out every
night of the season.”91 Similarly, for Gilbert, the experience of viewing
art at a society event is more of an ordeal than a pleasant diversion:
The beautiful sterile emotions that art excites in us, are hateful in its [soci-
ety’s] eyes, and so completely are people dominated by the tyranny of this
dreadful social ideal that they are always coming shamelessly up to one at
144 L.
Private Views and other places that are open to the general public, and
saying in a loud stentorian voice, ‘What are you doing?’ whereas ‘What are
you thinking?’ is the only question that any single civilized being should
ever be allowed to whisper to another.92
Gilbert’s impression of “Private Views” suggests that Oxford aesthet-

icism does not easily transfer to London society. Far from being an
intellectual gathering ground, “Private Views” attract gossiping social-
ites who are more interested in the individuals who attend the exclusive
event than the artworks on exhibit. They distract the art lover with their
prattle and they limit his opportunity for intellectual conversation. While
Gilbert appreciates that society has conditioned its citizens to be prac-
tical workers and thinkers, he is unlike his contemporaries because he
longs for inaction and silence. In his conversation with Ernest, Gilbert
expresses the desire to be among people who would take an interest
in his thoughts, or at least allow him the space to think. When Gilbert
views art in society, he is assailed by “loud stentorian voices,” and in
giving his attention to his social peers, Gilbert is denied the pleasura-
ble aesthetic sensation that he seeks at the art gallery. Under these cir-
cumstances, it is impossible to access the “beautiful sterile emotions that
art excites in us,” and so Gilbert’s complaint against society highlights
his detachment from the joyous aesthetic life that he associates with his
time at Oxford. In other words, Gilbert is another figure who longs for
Parnassus while remaining stuck in Piccadilly.
Gilbert’s predicament implies that high society life does not accom-
modate the pursuit of aesthetic pleasure. The Aesthetic Movement
addresses this problem by inviting consumers to replicate the historical
aesthetic of Oxford in the relative privacy of their own homes. In “The
Critic as Artist,” Gilbert celebrates the fact that traditional English crafts-
manship was no longer confined to the English universities:
Nor is it merely at Oxford, or Cambridge, that the sense of beauty can be

formed and trained and perfected. All over England there is a Renaissance
of the decorative Arts. Ugliness has had its day. Even in the houses of the
rich there is taste, and the houses of those who are not rich have been
made gracious and comely and sweet to live in.93
This statement assumes that aesthetic reform had already taken place
(“Ugliness has had its day”) and that it was possible for individuals to
cultivate a love of beauty by introducing handcrafted or historically

inspired objects into their homes, without attending an elite university.
In practical terms, the expression “those who are not rich” only extends
to those who have the disposable income to redecorate their homes in
the aesthetic style. The fashion for aesthetic interior design promised to
supply consumers with the materials they needed to form a “sense of
beauty,” but the ambiguous language leaves us wondering if the working
poor would ever share in this advantage. In the passage above, Gilbert
sidesteps this issue by adopting the phrase “those who are not rich” to
avoid using the word “poor.” Wilde’s speaker maintains that the aes-
thetic temperament can be “trained” and “perfected” without any direct
contact with Oxford or Cambridge, but he does not propose that the
aesthetic temperament can be formed in total isolation from these insti-
tutions. After all, Wilde openly publicized his connection with Oxford
when he lectured about the Aesthetic Movement in 1882. In his critical
writing, however, we see Wilde drawing on his memories of Oxford in
order to inspire others to practice the aesthetic lifestyle.
In “The Critic as Artist,” the combined factors of Wilde’s Irish her-
itage and his authorial identity signal his investment in assisting the
English public to take up the practice of aesthetic contemplation:
Although the mission of the aesthetic movement is to lure people to con-

template, not to lead them to create, yet, as the creative instinct is strong
in the Celt, and it is the Celt who leads in art, there is no reason why in
future years this strange Renaissance should not become almost as mighty
in its way as was that new birth of Art that woke many centuries ago in the
cities of Italy.94
This statement gains more significance if we remember that it featured

in Intentions, which was a volume that preceded the book publica-
tion of The Picture of Dorian Gray and A House of Pomegranates (also
released in 1891). All three of these books facilitated aesthetic consump-
tion in so far as they provided readers with many detailed descriptions
of decorative homewares and artistic collectables. In these works, the
boundaries between art and life are further complicated by Wilde’s ten-
dency to present his principle characters as living art objects.95
In The Soul of Man, Wilde looks to the example of the great Victorian
tragic actor, Henry Irving, in order to express his ambition to create
popular art that demanded a higher level of critical attention. He praises
146 L.
Irving’s “extraordinary power, not over mere mimicry but over imagi-
native and intellectual creation.”96 Wilde also credits Irving, who both
managed and took leading roles in productions at the Lyceum Theatre,
for improving the taste of average playgoers through his commercially
successful style of drama: “At first he appealed to the few: now he has
educated the many. He has created in the public both taste and tempera-
ment.”97 Like Irving, Wilde also believed that he had an opportunity to
“educate the many” by producing literature that was widely available
and intellectually challenging. We should, however, bear in mind that
Wilde did not endeavour to educate by explaining the meaning of
artworks to the public; he was more interested in guiding his readers to
enjoy and be conscious of the interpretive, creative possibilities that his
literature could inspire.
The title of Wilde’s essay collection, Intentions, reminds us that the
scope for critical interpretation is unlimited precisely because we can
never be sure of an artist’s intentions.98 Again, if we return to “The
Critic as Artist,” we find that analysis and exposition are relegated to
the “lower sphere” of criticism, but the highest form of criticism (i.e.
aesthetic criticism) delights in the “mist of wonder” that surrounds art-
ists and their work.99 To illustrate this point, Gilbert draws on the myth
of Oedipus and the Sphinx to shed light upon the role of the aesthetic
critic:
The critic will certainly be an interpreter, but he will not treat Art as a
riddling Sphinx, whose shallow secret may be guessed and revealed by one
whose feet are wounded and who knows not his name. Rather, he will
look upon Art as a goddess whose mystery it is his province to intensify,
and whose majesty his privilege to make more marvellous in the eyes of
men.100
Here, Gilbert introduces his readers to the textual nuances of

Sophocles’s tragedy, Oedipus Tyrannus. He cryptically evokes the dif-
ferent meanings associated with the name Oedipus, instead of directly
naming this mythical character. If we were to read the text superficially
(to guess at the “shallow secret”), we might dismiss this allusion as a
literary embellishment. Looking beyond the surface, we can appreciate
that Gilbert is in fact demonstrating his Classical training in a subtle and
thought-provoking way. Simon Goldhill has described Oedipus as “the
solver of riddles and questions, the reader of signs and messages” who
lacks the capacity to “read the different, ambiguous signs of his ambig-
uous identity that are set in play by his name.”101 Wilde plays with
this ambiguity and amplifies Oedipus’s position as an ignorant reader
when he refers to Oedipus as “one whose feet are wounded and who
knows not his name.” As Wilde suggests, the name Oedipus translates
as “swollen foot,” which refers to the circumstance of his exposure in
infancy. Wilde’s second phrase gestures towards the ironic puns that
repeatedly surface throughout the play and undermine Oedipus’s fame
as a solver of riddles: οἶδα (oida) translates as “I know,” which signi-
fies Oedipus’s confidence in his knowledge; οἶδα ποῦ (oida pou), “know
where,” reminds us that he is unaware of his true origin; and οἶσθά που
(oistha pou), “perhaps you know,” suggests an uncertainty of knowl-
edge.102 In Wilde’s essay, Oedipus emerges as an uncritical reader who
fails to discern the layers of meaning that point to his past and antici-
pate his tragic future.103 It is also pertinent to recall that Oedipus blinds
himself in Sophocles’s play, which means that he is unable to “look
upon Art”—that is, to perceive the variety of colours, shapes, and words
that excite an aesthete who is devoted to beauty. The physical and intel-
lectual blindness of Oedipus therefore reflects the experience of those
who consume art briefly and superficially, much like the audience at the
“Private Views.” Through his own critical dialogue, Wilde warns his
readers not to limit themselves to a singular interpretation when engag-
ing with art. To do so is to overlook the marvellous complexities and
ambiguities that are open to those who approach art with a critical eye.
Wilde is more direct when he considers the prevalence of superficial
literary consumption in The Soul of Man. In this work, he suggests that
the lack of critical reading is due to the low standard of popular art:
The popular standard is of such a character that no artist can get to it.
It is at once too easy and too difficult to be a popular novelist. It is too
easy, because the requirements of the public as far as plot, style, psychol-
ogy, treatment of life, and treatment of literature are concerned are within
the reach of the very meanest capacity and the most uncultivated mind. It
is too difficult, because to meet such requirements the artist would have
to do violence to his temperament, would have to write not for the artis-
tic joy of writing, but for the amusement of half-educated people, and so
would have to suppress his individualism, forget his culture, annihilate his
style, and surrender everything that is valuable in him.104
148 L.
According to Wilde, most novels lack the depth to generate multiple

interpretations. At this point, he blames the consumer public for the
inferior standard of popular literature, but earlier in the essay, Wilde
concedes: “It is not quite their fault. The public has always, and in
every age, been badly brought up.” 105 In other words, the public has
been “brought up” to view popular novels as banal entertainment
commodities that are designed to be consumed once and discarded.
Again, Wilde refers to another mythical monster to imply that popular
novels are akin to mind-numbing opiates. Wilde alludes to the
drugging of Cerberus in Virgil’s Aeneid (6. 417–25) when he writes:
“[the true artist] has no poppied or honeyed cakes through which to give
the monster sleep or sustenance. He leaves that to the popular
novelist.”106 In Wilde’s recast- ing of this mythological episode, the
reading public is sedated by the novelists who satisfy their desire for
low-brow stories. By contrast, the enigmatic Sphinx symbolizes the sort
of popular art that Wilde endorsed: art that is “suggestive,”
“interpretive,” and “symbolic.”107 Unlike Oedipus, the aesthetic critic
does not wish to solve the Sphinx’s riddle, as this would mean destroying
the ambiguity that excites critical discussion. Ideally, the critical reader is
an aesthete who derives aesthetic pleasure by returning to the text,
adapting his/her interpretation with each reading. Of course, it is up to
individuals decide whether they will become the sort of reader who can
rise to the challenge of decoding Wilde’s riddling aesthetic prose.
Both The Soul of Man and “The Critic as Artist” are works that
encapsulate Wilde’s literary stance against professionalization and
British imperialism, which was inextricably linked to the institution of
Oxford Hellenism. Jowett’s curricular reforms transformed Oxford into
a training ground for Civil Service recruits and the ICS entrance exam
orchestrated a demand for classically trained government officials. In
this sense, the Greats curriculum reinforced the culture of “the over-
worked” and “under-educated,” but Wilde’s aesthetic criticism also sug-
gests that Oxford was a part of the solution to England’s intellectual
malaise. Although Wilde’s representation of educators is often unflat-
tering, he appreciates the fact that Oxford students learn the most val-
uable lessons when they stop to admire the historical, architectural, and
natural scenery that is so characteristic of the Oxford environment. For
Wilde, the love of beauty (or aesthetic appreciation) is the truest expres-
sion of Plato’s philosophy. The pursuit of beauty is also a political mat-
ter because aestheticism supports the type of thinking and leadership
that is needed to overturn the dominant, exceptionally flawed notion

of “civilization.” As Wilde reminds us, the aesthetic lifestyle is open to
anybody who wants to experience the pleasure of living with beautiful,
well-crafted objects and literary works. Wilde’s paradoxical response to
the issues of starvation, subjugation, and censorship indicates that this
type of aesthetic practice is unlikely to result in an immediate process of
social and political reform. Rather, Wilde invites us to view aestheticism
as a path towards progress. Moreover, the progress towards Utopia must
begin with small-scale, personal choices, such as the decision to adopt
aesthetic interior decoration, or the willingness to contemplate and
reconsider Wilde’s critical literature.
NOTES
1. This chapter contains material that is reproduced by permission of
Oxford University Press. See Leanne Grech, ‘Imagining Utopia:
Oxford Hellenism and the Aesthetic Alternative’, in Oscar Wilde and
Classical Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and
Iarla Manny (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 161–74.
2. Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988 [c.
1984]), 263; Paul L. Fortunato, Modernist Aesthetics and Consumer
Culture in the Writings of Oscar Wilde (New York: Routledge, 2007),
21.
3. Fortunato, Modernist Aesthetics, 15. Wilde produced a total of 90 pieces
for the Pall Mall Gazette under the editorship of William T. Stead.
During his time at the Pall Mall Gazette, Stead promoted investigative
and politically activist journalism. He is best known for publishing a
controversial series of articles in 1885 (“The Maiden Tribute of Modern
Babylon”) that exposed the issue of child prostitution. Stead successfully
campaigned to see the legal age of consent raised from 13 to 16; how-
ever, he received a three-month prison sentence for procuring a child
while investigating the prostitution industry. See Fortunato, Modernist
Aesthetics, 21–22.
4. Josephine M. Guy, ‘Introduction’, in Criticism: Historical Criticism,
Intentions, the Soul of Man, ed. Josephine M. Guy, in The Complete
2000–continuing), 4: xxviii.
5. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: xxvii.
6. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: xxviii–xxix. A shorter, earlier version of this essay
(entitled “Shakespeare on Scenery”) appeared in the 14 March 1885
issue of the Dramatic Review. See Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: xxix.
7. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: xxix.
150 L.
8. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: lxiii. According to Guy, most of the revisions

involved improving sentences, paragraphs, and the argument of the
individual essays and dialogues. These changes suggest that Wilde was
not concerned with improving the structure of the entire book. See Guy,
‘Introduction’, 4: lvii–lx.
9. ‘Frank Harris to Wilde’, 10 February 1890; as quoted by Guy,
‘Introduction’, 4: lxviii.
10. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: lxxviii–lxxix. Please refer to the introduction to
Chapter 6 of this book for a discussion of the events that led to Wilde’s
imprisonment.
11. Guy, ‘Introduction’, lxxvii–lxxviii: Guy notes that “there are small
changes in spelling, punctuation, and capitalization of abstract nouns,
and the use of italics to emphasize phrases and sentences is omitted”:
‘Introduction’, 4: lxviii.
12. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: lxxvi.
13. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: lxxviii.
14. Guy, ‘Introduction’, 4: xiii–xiv.
15. See Guy’s Commentary to Intentions and The Soul of Man for examples
of instances where Wilde re-uses older material from his reviews in his
longer essays and dialogues: ‘Commentary’, in Criticism: Historical
Criticism, Intentions, the Soul of Man, ed. Josephine M. Guy, in
The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000–continuing), 4: 360–551, 551–84.
16. Oscar Wilde, ‘To an Unknown Correspondent’, 1886–1887, in The
Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-
Davis (London: Fourth Estate, 2000), 293. In this particular letter,
Wilde was responding to a request for biographical information about
himself.
17. Oscar Wilde, ‘To an Unknown Correspondent’, 1890, in Complete
Letters, 457.
18. Laurel Brake, Subjugated Knowledges: Journalism, Gender and Literature
in the Nineteenth Century (London: Macmillan, 1994), 2. Josephine M.
Guy and Ian Small also note that literary reviewers “provide[d] a service
for the reader in the sense that the reviewer’s personal taste was much
less important than the ability to judge on behalf of his readers by antic-
ipating their tastes”: Oscar Wilde’s Profession: Writing and the Culture
Industry in the Late Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000), 43.
19. Fortunato, Modernist Aesthetics, 23–25.
20. Fortunato, Modernist Aesthetics, 23.
21. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Joaquin Miller’, 28 February 1882, in Complete Letters,
143.
22. Throughout this chapter, I will reference Guy’s edition of Intentions and
The Soul of Man. Both of these works are included in the collection of
Criticism in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde (2007). Given that the
content of The Soul of Man was not revised by Wilde after its initial pub-
lication in 1891, I will refer to the earlier publication date when discuss-
ing this literary work.
23. See Linda Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press), 62–80; Daniel Orrells, Classical
Culture and Modern Masculinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2011), 97–145); and Frank M. Turner, The Greek Heritage in Victorian
Britain (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981), 414–46.
24. Heather Ellis, ‘Newman and Arnold: Classics, Christianity and Manliness
in Tractarian Oxford’, in Oxford Classics: Teaching and Learning, 1800–
2000, ed. Christopher Stray (London: Duckworth, 2007), 50.
25. Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) was an Italian Enlightenment phi-
losopher, historian, and scholar of law. His theory of historical cycles
appeared in his 1725 philosophical treatise, New Science, which was
originally published in Italian, as Scienza Nuova. This publication was
Vico’s most influential work because it established the foundation for
modern scholarly disciplines, such as anthropology, social sciences, and
the philosophy of history. See Leon Pompa, A Study of the ‘New Science’,
2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990 [c. 1975]),
1–2.
26. Ellis, ‘Newman and Arnold’, 53.
27. Ellis, ‘Newman and Arnold’, 51. Ellis is quoting Thomas Arnold in A.
P. Stanley, The Life and Correspondence of Thomas Arnold DD
(London: Dellowes, 1846), 590.
29. James Bowen, ‘Education, Ideology, and the Ruling Class:
Hellenism and English Public Schools in the Nineteenth Century’,
in Rediscovering Hellenism: The Hellenic Inheritance and the
English Imagination, eds. G. W. Clarke with J. C. Eade (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press), 175.
32. Phiroze Vasunia, ‘Greek, Latin and the Indian Civil Service’, Cambridge
Classical Journal 51 (2005): 45. These data are also reproduced in The
Classics and Colonial India (2013); see pp. 193–235. I am referring to
Vasunia’s 2005 article, ‘Greek, Latin and the Indian Civil Service’.
33. Vasunia, ‘Indian Civil Service’, 46.
152 L.
35. Mathematics outranked the Classical languages on the 1855 examina-

tion. Pure and mixed mathematics were allotted 1000 points, which
was double the value of Greek and Latin. In 1893, however, the mar-
gin between the subjects was reduced so that “pure and advanced
mathematics” were allotted 900 points, compared to Greek and Latin
language and literature, which received 750 points: Vasunia, ‘Indian
Civil Service’, 46–52.
37. Vasunia, ‘Indian Civil Service’, 47–51.
38. Vasunia, ‘Indian Civil Service’, 52–53.
39. Between 1892 and 1914, forty-nine percent of ICS recruits were from
Oxford University, thirty percent were from Cambridge and fourteen
percent from Irish and Scottish Universities. See Vasunia, ‘Indian Civil
Service’, 56.
41. Vasunia, ‘Indian Civil Service’, 50. For Hindu Indians, the journey to
London was out of the question because their religion prohibited sea
voyages.
42. Gauri Viswanathan, Masks of Conquest: Literary Study and British Rule in
India (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989), 46.
43. Viswanathan, Masks of Conquest, 116–17.
44. Viswanathan, Masks of Conquest, 56.
University Press, 2013), 38. For a discussion of the themes in Wilde’s
philosophy notebook, see Joseph Bristow, ‘Wilde’s Abstractions: Notes
on Literæ Humaniores, 1876–1878’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical
Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 69–88.
48. Oscar Wilde, ‘To William Ward’, August 1877, in Complete Letters, 60.
Original emphasis.
50. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Oscar Browning’, February 1880, in Complete
Letters, 87.
51. Guy and Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession, 24–25.
52. H. Montgomery Hyde suggests that Browning “had been dismissed
ostensibly for slackness in the running of his house but in reality for his
homosexual proclivities and undue familiarity with some of the boys in
his charge”: Oscar Wilde: A Biography (New York: De Capo Press, 1981
[c. 1975]), 42.
53. Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Hon. George Curzon’, 20 July 1885, in Complete
Letters, 264.
54. Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Hon. George Curzon’, 20 July 1885, in Complete
Letters, 264.
55. Hyde, A Biography, 105. After Wilde had written to Curzon, he
learned that Stanhope was succeeded by Sir Henry Holland.
Suspecting that this change would hinder his application, Wilde
asked Curzon to write another letter addressed to Holland. See Oscar
Wilde, ‘To the Hon. George Curzon’, 23 October 1885, in Complete
Letters, 266.
56. Guy and Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession, 25.
57. William F. Shuter, ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’,
English Literature in Transition 1880–1920 46, no. 3 (2003): 259.
58. Stefano Evangelista, British Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism,
Reception, Gods in Exile (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 149.
59. Regenia Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace: Oscar Wilde and the Victorian
Public (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1986), 19.
60. Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace, 46–47.
61. Oscar Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’, in Criticism: Historical Criticism,
2000–continuing), 4: 179–80.
62. Shuter, ‘Greats’, 254–55.
63. I am borrowing John Dougill’s expression here. See John Dougill,
Oxford in English Literature: The Making, and Undoing, of ‘The English
Athens’ (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press), 5–6.
64. Walter Pater was also critical of the standardized system of testing that was
adopted at Oxford. On one occasion, he is said to have remarked, “the
undergraduate is a child of nature: he grows up like a wild rose in a
country lane: you want to turn him into a turnip, rob him of all grace,
and plant him out in rows”: Pater, as quoted by William F. Shuter, ‘Pater
as Don’, Prose Studies: History, Theory, Criticism 11, no. 1 (1988): 52.
65. Oscar Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’, in Criticism, 4: 181.
66. Matthew Beaumont, ‘Reinterpreting Oscar Wilde’s Concept of Utopia:
‘The Soul of Man Under Socialism’, Utopian Studies 15, no. 1 (2004):
24. In this instance, Beaumont is responding to the description of
Utopia that is presented in “The Soul of Man under Socialism.” I have
found it helpful to draw on Beaumont’s interpretation to explore the
utopian theme in “The Critic as Artist.”
67. In The Soul of Man, the “mob” is more closely aligned with journalists
who reinforce the values of the bourgeois public when reviewing art
and literature, often at the expense of artists. For instance, Wilde
writes, “It was a fatal day when the public discovered that the pen is
mightier than the paving-stone … They at once sought for the journalist,
found him, developed him, and made him their industrious and well-
paid servant”: The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 254–55.
154 L.
68. Wilde, The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 247.

69. Wilde, The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 233–34.
70. Paul A. Cantor, ‘Oscar Wilde: The Man of Soul Under Socialism’, in
Beauty and the Critic: Aesthetics in the Age of Cultural Studies, ed. James
Soderholm (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1997), 77.
71. Stuart Mason [Christopher Sclater Millard], ed., ‘Impressions of
America’, in Oscar Wilde in America: The Interviews, eds. Matthew
Hofer and Gary Scharnhorst (Urbana: University of Illinois Press,
2010), 179. This anecdote is also reproduced in an interview that was
published in the Denver Rocky Mountain News. See ‘Oscar Wilde’,
Denver Rocky Mountain News, 13 April 1882, 8, in Oscar Wilde in
America, 133.
74. Wilde, The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 260. My emphasis.
75. Jarlath Killeen interprets the reference to starvation as an allusion to the
Irish famine. As Killeen explains: “The dissonance between starvation
and the laws of progress were hardly unfamiliar to Wilde as he came
from a country considered to be the very antithesis of progress and
evolution”: The Faiths of Oscar Wilde: Catholicism, Folklore and Ireland
(Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 133.
76. Lawrence Danson, Wilde’s Intentions: The Artist in His Criticism
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 23.
77. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Herbert Warren’, 18 October 1885, in Complete
Letters, 265. Wilde wrote to Warren to congratulate him on his new
appointment as President of Magdalen College.
78. Oscar Wilde, ‘Mr. Pater’s Last Volume’, Speaker, 22 March 1890, 319–
20, in Journalism, Part 2, eds. John Stokes and Mark W. Turner, The
Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000–continuing), 7: 243–44.
79. Guy and Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession, 30–37.
80. Oscar Wilde, ‘To an Unidentified Correspondent’, 1885, in Complete
Letters, 265.
84. For an analysis of Wilde’s misrepresentation of Plato and Aristotle in
“The Critic as Artist” and “The Decay of Lying,” see Kelly Comfort,
‘The Reuse and Abuse of Plato and Aristotle by Wilde’, The Wildean: A
Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 32 (2008): 57–70.
85. Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’, in Criticism, 4: 191.

90. Jeff Nunokawa, Tame Passions of Wilde: The Styles of Manageable Desire
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006), 96.
91. Nunokawa is quoting from An Ideal Husband; Act 1: l32–35. See
Nunokawa, Tame Passions, 96.
94. Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’, in Criticism, 4: 193. This is a politically
loaded statement, considering that the Irish were often represented as
a barbaric race in the English media. See Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde,
133–34.
95. The following chapter will explore the ways in which Dorian Gray is
objectified by Basil Hallward and Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of
Dorian Gray (1891).
98. On this point, Guy mentions that “the use of the plural form
[Intentions] may also have been designed to warn the reader against
expecting any single or ‘finished’ critical position”: Guy, ‘Introduction’,
4: lvi.
101. Simon Goldhill, Reading Greek Tragedy (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2006 [c. 1986]), 218. The Sphinx’s riddle is related
to the Library of Apollodorus as follows: “This was the riddle: What
is four-footed and two-footed and three-footed though it has but one
voice?”: Apollodorus, Library, in Apollodorus’ Library and Hyginus’
Fabulae: Two Handbooks of Greek Mythology, trans. R. Scott Smith and
Stephen M. Trzaskoma (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2007), 3, 5,
and 8. The answer to the riddle is a human being. Humans crawl in
infancy (four feet), walk upright in adulthood (two feet), and lean on a
cane in old age (three feet).
102. Goldhill, Greek Tragedy, 217. The context and placement of the Greek
words effect the English translation. For example, οἶδα ποῦ (oida
pou) can also mean “I know from where,” and οἶσθά που (oistha pou),
can mean “you know from where” if it is used in a statement, or “do
you know from where?” if it is used in a question. As Goldhill points
out, the puns associated with Oedipus’s name appear at different
points in the play. Οἶδα ποῦ (oida pou), “know where,” arises when
the messenger arrives at the palace and asks for Oedipus: “Might I
learn from
156 L.
you, sirs, where is the house of Oedipus? Or best of all, if you know,
where is the king himself?” (924–26). Οἶσθά που (oistha pou), “perhaps
you know,” is mentioned when the priest entreats Oedipus to find out
the cause of the plague that was afflicting Thebes: “Perhaps you know
something from a man …” (43). Οἶδα (oida) “I know,” is implied when
the messenger responds to Oedipus’s questions about his exposure: “I
don’t know but he who gave you to me, has more knowledge than I”
(1038). See Goldhill, Greek Tragedy, 216–17. I am grateful to James K.
O. Chong-Gossard for assisting me with this part of my analysis.
103. When Oedipus comes to realize the significance of his name, he is
reduced to a life in exile and walks blindly with the aid of a cane.
106. Wilde, The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 259. This allusion is noted in
Josephine Guy’s commentary. See Guy, ‘Commentary’, 4: 578–79.
107. Wilde, The Soul of Man, in Criticism, 4: 259. These are terms that Wilde
uses to describe the novels of George Meredith in The Soul of Man.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Apollodorus. Library. In Apollodorus’ Library and Hyginus’ Fabulae: Two
Handbooks of Greek Mythology. Translated with Introductions by R. Scott
Smith and Stephen M. Trzaskoma, 1–93. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing,
2007.
Beaumont, Matthew. ‘Reinterpreting Oscar Wilde’s Concept of Utopia: The Soul
of Man Under Socialism’. Utopian Studies 15, no. 1 (2004): 13–29.
Bowen, James. ‘Education, Ideology, and the Ruling Class: Hellenism and
English Public Schools in the Nineteenth Century’. In Rediscovering
Hellenism: The Hellenic Inheritance and the English Imagination. Edited by
G. W. Clarke with J. C. Eade. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
Brake, Laurel. Subjugated Knowledges: Journalism, Gender and Literature in the
Nineteenth Century. London: Macmillan, 1994.
Bristow, Joseph. ‘Wilde’s Abstractions: Notes on Literæ Humaniores, 1876–
1878’. In Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity. Edited by Kathleen Riley,
Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 69–88. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2017.
Cantor, Paul A. ‘Oscar Wilde: The Man of Soul Under Socialism’. In Beauty
and the Critic: Aesthetics in the Age of Cultural Studies. Edited by James
Soderholm, 74–95. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1997.
Comfort, Kelly. ‘The Reuse and Abuse of Plato and Aristotle by Wilde’. The
Danson, Lawrence. Wilde’s Intentions: The Artist in His Criticism. Oxford:

English Athens’. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1998.
Ellis, Heather. ‘Newman and Arnold: Classics, Christianity and Manliness in
Tractarian Oxford’. In Oxford Classics: Teaching and Learning, 1800–2000.
Edited by Christopher Stray, 46–63. London: Duckworth, 2007.
Fortunato, Paul L. Modernist Aesthetics and Consumer Culture in the Writings of
Oscar Wilde. New York: Routledge, 2007.
Goldhill, Simon. Reading Greek Tragedy. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2006 [c. 1986].
Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 161–74. Oxford: Oxford
Guy, Josephine M. ‘Commentary’. In Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions,
Guy, Josephine M. ‘Introduction’. In Criticism: Historical Criticism,
Intentions, the Soul of Man. Edited by Josephine M. Guy, xviv–lxxxvi. Vol.
4. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing.
Press, 2000.
Holland, Merlin, and Rupert Hart-Davis eds. The Complete Letters of Oscar
Hyde, H. Montgomery. Oscar Wilde: A Biography. New York: De Capo Press,
1981 [c. 1975].
Mason, Stuart [Millard, Christopher Sclater], ed. ‘Impressions of America’. In
Oscar Wilde in America: The Interviews. Edited by Matthew Hofer and Gary
Scharnhorst. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010.
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Nunokawa, Jeff. Tame Passions of Wilde: The Styles of Manageable Desire.

Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.
Pompa, Leon. A Study of the ‘New Science’. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1990 [c. 1975].
Press, 2013.
Shuter, William F. ‘Pater as Don’. Prose Studies: History, Theory, Criticism 11, no.
1 (1988): 41–58.
Shuter, William F. ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’. English
Stanley. A. P. The Life and Correspondence of Thomas Arnold DD. London:
Dellowes, 1846.
Turner, Frank M. The Greek Heritage in Victorian Britain. New Haven, CN: Yale
Vasunia, Phiroze. ‘Greek, Latin and the Indian Civil Service’. Cambridge
Classical Journal 51 (2005): 35–71.
Vasunia, Phiroze. The Classics and Colonial India. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2013.
Viswanathan, Gauri. Masks of Conquest: Literary Study and British Rule in India.
New York: Columbia University Press, 1989.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Mr. Pater’s Last Volume’. In Journalism. Part 2. Edited by John
Stokes and Mark W. Turner, 243–44. Vol. 7. The Complete Works of Oscar
Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘The Critic as Artist’. In Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions,
Wilde, Oscar. The Soul of Man. In Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions,
CHAPTER 5
Fervent Friendships: Oxford Platonism

and The Picture of Dorian Gray
Oscar Wilde consolidated his identity as an author of the aesthetic

school with the release, in 1891, of four consecutive publications. 1 The
first book to appear on the market was a revised and expanded edition
of Wilde’s aesthetic novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. This work was
first published in the July 1890 issue of Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine:
a popular literary magazine that circulated in the USA and was
co-published in Britain by Ward, Lock and Co. 2 When commenting on
the publication history of the 1890 and 1891 editions of The Picture of
Dorian Gray, Joseph Bristow alerts us to the fact that there are two ver-
sions of the novel, just as there are two versions of the character, Dorian
Gray.3 The periodical version of the novel includes thirteen chapters
and is around 50,000 words in length. 4 By comparison, the book ver-
sion (published by Ward, Lock and Co.) is nearer to 78,000 words and
includes a total of twenty chapters.5
The Picture of Dorian Gray is now recognized as a fine example of
nineteenth-century queer literature because Wilde explores the subject
of homosexual desire through a compelling narrative about male friend-
ship. Dorian’s character development is strongly influenced by the two
men in his life: Basil Hallward, the passionate, principled artist; and
Lord Henry Wotton, the witty, world-weary dandy. Both Basil and
Lord Henry are Oxford graduates, and their relationships with Dorian
are shaped by their differing approaches to aesthetic philosophy. On the
one hand, Basil gravitates towards Dorian because he is inspired by the
© The Author(s) 2019

159
160 L.
young man’s physical beauty and believes that he will be able to perfect
his style of painting by being in Dorian’s presence. On the other hand,
Lord Henry introduces Dorian to the “cult of aestheticism” and takes
pleasure in observing Dorian’s progress as he embraces a lifestyle that
centres on the pursuit of new sensations.6 The homosexual subtext of
The Picture of Dorian Gray is expressed via these male–male
relationships, which revolve around spectatorship and consequently
render Dorian as an aesthetic object.
My analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray concentrates on the dia-
logues between Basil Hallward and Dorian. The verbal exchanges that I
will be examining are present in both the 1890 and 1891 editions of the
novel. I will, however, refer to the 1891 text because it is more widely
available. The relationship dynamic between Basil and Dorian warrants
closer consideration because Basil often evokes the Platonic/Oxford
ideal of male love as a friendship that is intellectually and spiritually
productive when he describes his feelings for Dorian. Moreover, Basil’s
understanding of male friendship corresponds with the discourse on
Platonic love that emerged from Oxford and was popularized through
the writing of Benjamin Jowett and Walter Pater. This chapter there-
fore begins with a study of two influential works that Wilde had access
to as a student: Jowett’s revised translation of Plato’s Symposium in his
Dialogues of Plato (1875) and Pater’s biographical essay on the eight-
eenth-century art historian, Johann Joachim Winckelmann, which Wilde
knew from Pater’s Studies in the History of the Renaissance (1873).
Wilde owned a copy of Jowett’s 1875 edition of the Dialogues, and
he marked a number of passages from Jowett’s “Introduction” to the
Symposium.7 Jowett began to publish English translations and commen-
taries on Plato in the 1870s, while he was the Master of Balliol College.
His first edition of The Dialogues of Plato (in four volumes) appeared
in 1871 and was followed by a revised five-volume series, in 1875 and
1892, both of which included longer introductions and corrections to
the earlier translations.8 Pater’s “Winckelmann” essay was first
published in the left-leaning Westminster Review in 1867. Six years later,
Pater included it as the final chapter in his most famous work of
aesthetic criticism, Studies in the History of the Renaissance. Over the
course of his life, Pater continued to perfect this book; he renamed it
The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry and produced three revised
editions in 1877, 1888, and 1893.9 Wilde met Pater while he was a
student at Oxford, and it is widely acknowledged that he admired The
Renaissance so much that
5 FERVENT FRIENDSHIPS: OXFORD PLATONISM …
he mimicked Pater’s prose style in his own writing.10 Wilde even claimed
that Pater read a manuscript of The Picture of Dorian Gray and offered
some suggestions for revision, which Wilde incorporated into the 1891
text.11
It is helpful to refer to Jowett’s and Pater’s writing as these Oxford
scholars believed that it was beneficial to recreate the experience of
Platonic love in the modern age through intellectual friendships. Platonic
love, however, relates to non-sexual, intellectual relationships that can
evolve from paiderastia.12 Jowett and Pater saw great potential in Plato’s
model of education, but, at the same time, they recognized that the
idea of practising Plato’s philosophy could encourage illicit homosexual
attachments. This moral and intellectual dilemma informs the sexual aes-
thetic code that is sustained in Wilde’s revised edition of The Picture of
Dorian Gray.
In this chapter, I argue that Wilde provides a critical response to the
Platonic revival, given that his novel portrays a relationship in which the
lover and beloved, Basil and Dorian, struggle to communicate with each
other. The intimacy between these two characters is tied to an artistic
process that does not facilitate dialogue. Their intimacy therefore goes
against the intellectually productive, liberal construction of Platonic love
that we encounter in Jowett’s Symposium and Pater’s Renaissance. When
Dorian models for Basil, he is expected to remain still and silent while
Basil’s gaze shifts between Dorian’s physical form and the lifelike image
that he is replicating on canvas. Whenever Basil initiates conversations
with Dorian outside the art studio, he invariably provokes Dorian’s anger
by questioning his behaviour and repeatedly asking him to sit for
another portrait. In these instances, both speakers strive to dominate the
conversation, and ultimately, Basil and Dorian fall into a pattern of
silencing one another.
When the 1890 edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray was published,
it was well received in America, but British reviewers were quick to con-
demn the novel as immoral.13 Reviewers alluded to the homosexual sub-
text of Wilde’s story by evoking the rhetoric of sexual pathology. The
words “unmanly,” “effeminate,” “sickening,” “perverted,” and “unnat-
ural” are some of the negative terms that were used to describe the first
incarnation of the text.14 In particular, the review published in the 5 July
1890 number of the Scots Observer stands out above all others because
it alludes to the fact that homosexual intimacy was a criminal offence. 15
The Scots Observer was an imperialist newspaper that combined news
162 L.
and political coverage with literary content, such as essays, short stories,
poetry, and book reviews. Between 1889 and 1894, this publication was
edited by W. E. Henley, who was a prominent English poet, critic, and
editor. The Scots Observer review criticizes Wilde for providing a “false”
representation of art, morality, and human nature.16 The issue of sexual
deviance is broached by warning readers that The Picture of Dorian
Gray “deals with matters only fitted for the Criminal Investigation
Department or a hearing in camera.”17 Interestingly, the personal attack
on Wilde ends with a cutting remark about the intended audience of his
book: “if he [Mr. Wilde] can write for none but outlawed noblemen and
perverted telegraph-boys, the sooner he takes to tailoring (or some other
decent trade) the better for his own reputation and the public morals.” 18
As Bristow has revealed, the reviewer for the Scots Observer was link-
ing Wilde’s novel to a recent homosexual scandal which was known
as the Cleveland Street affair. On 14 September 1889, the Pall Mall
Gazette published an exposé piece about a male brothel that was operat-
ing from 19 Cleveland Street, in London’s West End.19 It was reported
that upper-class men were paying young male postal workers for sexual
favours. An equerry to the Prince of Wales’s household, Lord Arthur
Somerset, was implicated in the scandal, but he evaded criminal pros-
ecution by fleeing the country.20 One of the postal workers was found
guilty of committing homosexual acts and received a four-month prison
sentence with hard labour.21 As Bristow has pointed out, the pub-
licity surrounding the Cleveland Street case helps us to understand
why British reviewers suspected that the relationships in The Picture of
Dorian Gray crossed the line between Hellenism and criminal activity.
The British correspondent for the New York Times sensed that the back-
lash against Wilde’s novel reflected the increasing cultural anxiety about
male friendships in England at the time: “since last year’s exposure of
what are euphemistically styled the West End scandals Englishmen have
been abnormally sensitive to the faintest suggestion of pruriency in the
direction of friendships.”22
It is clear that Wilde was not deterred by the hostile response to his
novel because the theme of male friendship remains a prominent feature
of the 1891 text. The revised edition places more emphasis on Basil’s
role as an artist and extends the content relating to Lord Henry’s phil-
osophical theories. To some extent, Wilde felt it was necessary to dimin-
ish the homosexual connotations in his writing. For instance, he framed
Basil’s attraction to Dorian as an artistically motivated form of passion,
whereas the 1890 text included more revealing statements that betrayed
Basil’s romantic desire for Dorian.23 Another difference is that Wilde
reduced the number of affectionate gestures (e.g. touching and holding
hands) that are exchanged between the three male protagonists. 24 The
1891 edition also includes new chapters which explore Dorian’s double
life in greater depth. In Chapters 15–18, we see Dorian frequenting high
society gatherings with Lord Henry and venturing into the working-class
districts of London on his own, in search of drugs.25 These chapters
also feature a new plot-line involving James Vane, who is the brother of
Sybil Vane: the young Shakespearean actress who commits suicide after
Dorian abruptly ends their romantic relationship. When James returns
to England, eighteen years later, he tries to avenge his sister’s death
by stalking Dorian. James’s presence greatly distresses Dorian, but this
troublesome situation is soon resolved, as James is killed in a shooting
accident.
The preface to the 1891 version of The Picture of Dorian Gray is
another significant addition to the text in so far as it encapsulates Wilde’s
response to the critics who derided his work a year earlier. 26 The pref-
ace comprises of a series of aphorisms that assert Wilde’s position as an
author and an aesthete. Collectively, the aphorisms imply that the con-
tent of the novel does not reflect Wilde’s ethical values, and for this
reason, it should only be judged on its aesthetic merits. Wilde raises
this point in the opening lines of the preface: “The artist is the creator
of beautiful things. / To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim. /
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material
his impression of beautiful things.”27 Here, Wilde indicates that his pri-
mary aim as an author is to satisfy his own conception of beautiful liter-
ary expression. In other words, Wilde wanted the reading public to know
that he intended to please himself, first and foremost, rather than accom-
modating the tastes of the reviewers, who represented the interests of
the British middle class.
Wilde also retaliates against his critics by suggesting that their objec-
tions to the novel are merely a reflection of their own unhealthy fixa-
tions. At the beginning of the preface, Wilde states that “[t]hose who
find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charm-
ing,” and towards the end, he adds that “[i]t is the spectator, and not
life, that art really mirrors.”28 These phrases are a variation of the argu-
ment that Wilde expressed when he defended the 1890 edition of The
Picture of Dorian Gray in a letter to the editor of the St. James’s Gazette.
164 L.
The St. James’s Gazette was another staunchly conservative London

newspaper.29 At that point in time, Wilde was willing to outline the
moral premise of his story: “the moral is this: All excess, as well as all
renunciation, brings its own punishment.” 30 He suspected that many
reviewers had failed to recognize the moral of The Picture of Dorian Gray
because they were troubled by unhealthy sexual thoughts: “Yes; there is
a terrible moral in Dorian Gray – a moral which the prurient will not
be able to find in it, but which will be revealed to all whose minds are
healthy.”31 By contrast, the preface to the 1891 edition stresses that style
is paramount. Accordingly, the notion that The Picture of Dorian Gray
is an immoral book is dismissed as an irrelevant criticism, as it bears no
relation to the aesthetic form of the work: “There is no such thing as a
moral or an immoral book. Books are well-written or badly written. That
is all.”32 Although Wilde accepts that morality can be a fruitful subject
for artists to draw upon (“Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for
an art”), he is unapologetic in his refusal to moralize or even comment
on his personal “ethical sympathies,” for this would be “an unpardonable
mannerism of style.”33 This chapter, however, aims to show that Wilde’s
aestheticism was not formed in isolation. The remarkable fusion of
aestheticism and homosexual desire that we find in The Picture of Dorian
Gray is greatly shaped by the Pater’s and Jowett’s competing interpreta-
tions of Platonic eros.
1 EROS ACCORDING TO JOWETT AND PATER

As I mentioned in the previous chapter, Jowett worked tirelessly to
promote a secular approach to Classical education during the 1840s
and 1850s. He also helped to transform Oxford into a preparatory
ground for England’s future statesmen. As Jowett’s career progressed,
he came to be recognized (in Frank M. Turner’s words) as “the major
translator and interpreter of Plato for the late-Victorian generation.” 34
Jowett’s interest turned to Plato after the publication of his controver-
sial essay, “On the Interpretation of Scripture” (1860). 35 In this essay,
Jowett proposed that the Bible should be read like any other book and
suggested that the interpretation of scripture should be informed by an
understanding of the author’s historical context. 36 This argument signals
Jowett’s connection with German historicism: a field of scholarship that
promoted ethical detachment and challenged scholars to engage with
historical material without imposing contemporary moral judgements on
past cultures.37 Oxford was not operating as a religious institution when

Jowett published his essay, but the clerical community was so outraged
by his ideas that he was prosecuted for heresy. 38 From this point on,
Jowett began to raise theological concerns under the guise of Classical
scholarship and devoted himself to the study of Plato’s philosophical
works.
In several ways, Jowett’s study of Plato was influenced by his earlier
background as a New Testament scholar. As Turner has established,
Jowett’s editions of Plato adopted “the language and rhetoric of the
Authorised Version of the Bible” and included translations, analysis,
and interpretation in one volume, which was more typical of Biblical
commentaries.39 Tuner also reminds us that Jowett was determined to
help his students and the broader English public “find lessons for con-
temporary life in Plato.”40 To achieve this objective, it was necessary to
disguise the homoerotic content of Plato’s love dialogues in a manner
that was sensitive to Christian beliefs. In this regard, Jowett contradicted
the principles of German historicism.
When considering Jowett’s style of translation, Lesley Higgins
draws attention to his technique of obscuring the language of male
desire by manipulating the gender neutrality of the English language. 41
She argues that the distinction between friendship (philia) and sexual
desire (eros) is easier to discern in the Greek text because “[t]he sex-
ual activities of males are carefully defined and delimited with words
such as paiderasteo, to love boys; paiderastes, a lover of boys; and paid-
erastia, the love of boys.”42 According to Higgins, Jowett relied on
“innocuous, sentimentalized words such as ‘lover’ and ‘beloved’—to
mute the frank Greek discourse, to empty out all significance of male-
male erotic motives, consequences, and activities.” 43 We can observe
this technique in Jowett’s “Introduction” to the Symposium, especially
when he summarizes Phaedrus’s speech on the social benefits of male–
male relationships:
He descants first of all upon the antiquity of love, which is proved by the
authority of the poets, and then upon the benefits which love gives to
man. The greatest of these is the sense of honour and dishonour. The lover
is ashamed to be seen by the beloved doing or suffering any cowardly or
mean act. And a state or army which was made up only of lovers and their
loves would be invincible. For love will convert the veriest coward into an
inspired hero.44
166 L.
Phaedrus’s speech validates sexual intimacy between men and boys

because these relationships have the power to inspire virtue and
bravery, which are especially valuable qualities in political and military
contexts. Yet, the expression “the benefits love gives to man” can be
understood in a general sense, as being of benefit to humanity. At a later
point in the “Introduction,” Jowett clarifies that this is what he means
when he refers to the idea of love: “I must beg you not to suppose
that I am alluding to Pausanias and Agathon (cp. Protag[oras].315 E),
for my words refer to all mankind everywhere.”45 We can credit Jowett
because he does not undermine Phaedrus’s validation of male love,
although there is nothing in this passage to suggest that paiderastia
involves sex. Instead, Jowett elevates eros as a code of honour that unites
comrades on the battlefield and statesmen in the political arena.
Jowett has become notorious for including moralizing statements
about male-male desire, and this aspect is most noticeable when he com-
ments on Alcibiades’s speech. Alcibiades was an Athenian politician who
played a significant role as a general and political strategist during the
Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta. Towards the end of the
Symposium, Alcibiades stumbles in on the gathering in a drunken state.
By that point, Socrates and the other guests had already delivered their
speeches on love.46 When Alcibiades is asked to contribute to the dis-
cussion, he provides a very personal account of his failed attempts to
seduce Socrates.47 Jowett warns that Alcibiades’s affection for Socrates
will appear to be “unintelligible” and “perverted” to the modern
reader.48 Despite his condemnatory tone, there is a degree of ambiva-
lence in Jowett’s writing. While Alcibiades’s love for Socrates is said to
be a “most degrading passion,” it is somewhat pardonable because it is
intertwined with “the desire of virtue and improvement.” 49 To deflect
attention from Socrates’s erotic allure, Jowett likens him to a chaste
spiritual teacher. He declares that “Plato [does not] feel any repugnance
… at bringing his grand master and hero into connexion with nameless
crimes. He is contented with representing him as a saint, who has won
the ‘Olympian victory’ over the temptations of human nature.”50
For Jowett, Socrates commands respect and is desirable to others
because he has no interest in sexual relationships. This aligns with the
teachings of Diotima, the mysterious wise woman who is said to influ-
ence Socrates’s views on male love. In the Symposium, Socrates recalls
a previous discussion he had with Diotima and relates her view that the
lover-philosopher progresses from loving one individual, to being a lover
of all beautiful bodies, and will ultimately “regard the beauty of minds
as more valuable than that of the body.” 51 Like climbing a ladder or
staircase, he ascends towards “that form of learning which is of noth-
ing other than that beauty itself, so that he can complete the process of
learning what beauty really is.” 52 The paiderastic relationship therefore
is the starting point of a long process of intellectual discovery, one that
culminates in a deeper awareness of the truth and wisdom, which is
what Socrates speaks of and pursues in his life as a philosopher.
Linda Dowling is right in arguing that Jowett “repeatedly sought
to naturalize and make vitally relevant the unfamiliar or alien turns of
Platonic thought by presenting them in terms of Christian and English
parallels.”53 We see this naturalizing impulse when Jowett includes Plato
within the corpus of Christian literature (Wilde also marked this passage
in his edition):
As the Christian might speak of hungering and thirsting after righteous-

ness; or of divine loves under the figure of human (cp. Eph[esians]. v. 32:
‘This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church’);
as the mediæval saint might speak of the “fruitio Dei;” as Dante saw all
things contained in his love of Beatrice, so Plato would have us absorb all
other loves and desires in the love of knowledge.54
Platonic eros is seamlessly linked to these analogies of Christian fervour,

and we may interpret this connection as another sign of Jowett’s depar-
ture from the German historicism. The passage quoted above supports
Stefano Evangelista’s view that Jowett “struggled to reconcile what he
thought to be the highly sophisticated morality of Plato with the unal-
terable fact … that this was the product of a pagan worldview that
had been rendered obsolete by the triumph of Christ.” 55 Then again,
Jowett’s expression demonstrates a confidence in his ability to align
Plato with Christian philosophers. He communicates his theological
learning by inserting a parenthetical Biblical reference and mentions
Plato alongside Saint Paul, Augustine, and Dante. 56 By association with
these major Christian authors, Platonic eros is recast as a desire that
mirrors the relationship that devout Christians share with God.
At one point, Jowett is willing to recognize that eros involves an
element of “sensual desire,” but he ultimately calls on the example of
Socrates to reiterate that the higher love transcends physical attraction.
In the Symposium, Socrates mentions that all men are instilled with
168 L.
a desire to reproduce, but some men accomplish this by pursuing a

relationship with a young man. The products (or “children”) of these
partnerships are intellectual: they contribute to exemplary leadership
and inspire great works of poetry. 57 If the relationship is to be
productive, the lover must seek out a partner with a beautiful body and
“a mind that is beautiful, noble and naturally gifted.” 58 For Jowett, desire
should be succeeded by a “spiritualised form” of intimacy:
Plato seems also to be aware that there is a mystery of love in man as well
as in nature, extending beyond the mere immediate relation of the sexes. 59
He is conscious that the highest and noblest things in the world are not
easily severed from the sensual desires, or may even be regarded as a
spiritualised form of them. We may observe that Socrates himself is not
represented as originally unimpassioned, but as one who has overcome
his passions; the secret of his power over others partly lies in his
passionate but self-controlled nature.60
This passage accords with Jowett’s translation, which presents the lover
in spiritual terms, as a “creative soul” that “wanders about seeking
beauty that he may beget offspring … [with a beloved who possesses] a
fair and noble and well-nurtured soul.” 61 Jowett interprets the exchange
between the lover and beloved as a union of two souls, rather than a
physical attraction that can lead to intellectual procreancy. 62 Of course,
Jowett concedes that it is difficult for most people to “sever” their sexual
urges from the spiritual urge to achieve wisdom and virtue through love,
as Socrates does.
Despite his reservations, Jowett takes heart in the thought that “there
may be some few—perhaps one or two in a whole generation—in whom
the light of truth may not lack the warmth of desire. And if there be
such natures, no one will be disposed to deny that ‘from them flow most
of the benefits of individuals and states.’” 63 These words reflect Jowett’s
efforts as an educational reformer, as discussed in Chapter 4. The
Platonic revival at Oxford influenced government recruitment processes,
and, consequently, it was the responsibility of teachers to instil their stu-
dents with the knowledge to become outstanding leaders. At the same
time, Jowett understood that Platonic love was a fraught ideal because
many would fail to attain an equilibrium between philosophy and desire.
Ultimately, Jowett believed that most young men would benefit from
studying Plato, and this form of education outweighed the risk that they
might confuse paiderastia with homosexual desire. As Jowett expresses

it: “even from imperfect combinations of the two elements [truth and
desire] in teachers or in statesmen great good may often arise.”64
The educational culture at Oxford encouraged teacher–student inti-
macy and exposed students to explicit descriptions of male-male love
in Classical texts such as the Symposium, but this culture also created a
need to monitor and punish those who expressed homosexual inclina-
tions. Pater was a student of Jowett’s and had been examined in the new
curriculum before he was awarded a fellowship at Brasenose College
in 1864. Both Jowett and Pater taught at Oxford during a period—as
Dowling states—“of particularly intense male homosociality which flour-
ished between the first two waves of university reform,” which occurred
in 1854 and 1877.65 From Dowling’s chronology, we learn that Wilde
was among the last generation of students to experience Oxford as a
“wholly male residential society,” since the first of the women’s colleges,
Lady Margaret Hall and Somerville, were founded in 1878 and 1879,
respectively.66 Nevertheless, there were incidents where teachers and
students strayed from the ideal of intellectual friendship, and those who
were suspected of forming romantic attachments were internally disci-
plined for their transgressions.67
In 1874, Pater was implicated in a homosexual scandal involving a
nineteen-year-old Balliol student named William Money Hardinge. 68
There is no evidence to suggest that Pater and Hardinge were involved
in a sexual relationship, but Hardinge was known to have written son-
nets that overtly featured homosexual imagery, and some of his peers
nicknamed him the “Balliol bugger.”69 Suspicions were raised by Pater’s
letters to Harding, which ended with the intimate sign-off, “yours
lovingly.”70 When this was brought to Jowett’s attention, he defused
the scandal by sending Hardinge away and preventing Pater’s election as
Proctor at Brasenose College.71 The details surrounding the scandal are
far from concrete; it is, however, clear that Pater suffered continued
financial and professional losses after his alleged affair with Hardinge. 72
Pater was also overlooked for the Oxford Professorship in Poetry, which
was awarded in 1877, and by the 1880s, his career prospects were so
diminished that he voluntarily resigned from his tutorship.73 Stefano
Evangelista even suspects that “Pater’s resignation was the outcome of a
long process of alienation and bullying … produced by the conjoint
influences of religious intolerance, homophobia, and continued
ideological opposition.”74
170 L.
It is likely that the prejudices against Pater were compounded by

his reputation as the author of Studies in the History of the Renaissance.
Before Pater’s academic career was impeded by the Hardinge scandal, he
had already signalled his departure from Jowett’s Platonism in a semi-
biographical essay on Winckelmann. Johann Joachim Winckelmann was
an eighteenth-century German art historian who is credited for sparking
the Romantic Hellenic revival. In his most famous work, History and Art
among the Greeks (1764), Winckelmann provided the first detailed study
of Greek art objects, which he classified according to their historical
time periods. Winckelmann’s scholarship was also revolutionary because
his work combined evidence from literature, history, and visual arts, to
form an understanding of Ancient Greek culture as a whole. 75 When
Pater wrote about Winckelmann’s intellectual legacy, his essay empha-
sized Winckelmann’s identity as a homosexual historical figure. Pater’s
Winckelmann is celebrated as a lover-philosopher who succeeded in rec-
reating the experience of Platonic eros in his lifetime. Winckelmann is an
inspiring individual because he developed a passion for Ancient Greek
culture at a time when “[t]he condition of Greek learning in German
schools and universities had fallen.” 76 Although he was sent to school
and university to study theology, Winckelmann’s desire to study the
Classics proved to be much stronger. He developed a fascination with
Homer and Herodotus at an early age and taught himself to read and
translate Classical texts. At university, Winckelmann focused his atten-
tion on translating Herodotus. When he was later employed as a school
teacher, Winckelmann spent his nights immersing himself in “the liter-
ature of the arts.”77 Interestingly, the story of Winckelmann’s limited
Classical education leads Pater to observe that modern-day Classical
scholars must somehow come to terms with their cultural and histori-
cal estrangement from Ancient Greek culture: “To most of us, after all
our steps towards it, the antique world, in spite of its intense outlines, its
own perfect self-expression, still remains faint and remote.” 78 Likewise,
Winckelmann knew that he was situated within a cultural context that
did not accommodate the sexual-social practice of paiderastia and feared
that he may never overcome the cultural breach between Christianity
and Paganism. In 1755, when Winckelmann was finally able to travel to
Rome to pursue his studies, he was aware of the limits of his knowledge
and considered himself to be a late learner: “I am one of those whom
the Greeks call ὀψιμαθεῖς (opsimatheis) – I have come into the world
and into Italy too late.”79 But, as Pater reveals, Winckelmann overcame
the burden of his belatedness by turning away from the influences of

Christianity and choosing to “[make] himself a pagan for the purpose of
penetrating antiquity.”80
Pater’s essay first appeared before Jowett’s translations of Plato was
available to the public; however, he had the advantage of experiencing
Jowett’s teaching style first-hand and anticipated that his Platonic dis-
course would be heavily influenced by Christian theology. Accordingly,
Pater was concerned that students were being taught to conflate paider-
astia with religious devotion:
The modern student most often meets Plato on that side which seems
to pass beyond Plato into a world no longer pagan, and based upon the
conception of a spiritual life. But the element of affinity which he pre-
sents to Winckelmann is that which is wholly Greek, and alien from the
Christian world, represented by that group of brilliant youths in the Lysis,
still uninfected by any spiritual sickness, finding the end of all endeavour
in the aspects of the human form, the continual stir and motion of a
comely human life.81
Pater’s remarks indicate that paiderastia is entirely incompatible with

the Christian tradition and that we must stop thinking about paider-
astia in Christian terms in order to understand this aspect of Greek
culture. Added to this, Pater’s vocabulary betrays a defiantly anti-Chris-
tian stance; he boldly refers to Christianity as a contagion, a “spiritual
sickness” that stands in the way of the appreciation of male beauty.
Remarkably, Pater’s expression evokes common tropes that positioned
male love as an illness or a moral defect, as seen in the media backlash
that followed the publication of 1890 edition of The Picture of Dorian
Gray. Through his retelling of Winckelmann’s story, Pater shows that
aestheticism provided a way to explore the subject of Platonic eros with-
out having to sanitize or Christianize Plato’s philosophy.
Winckelmann was “a lover and philosopher at once” and, as Pater
stresses, his passion for Classical literature and art led him to seek out
the company of attractive young men. 82 In his essay, Pater defines these
male-male attachments as “fervent friendships”:
That his affinity with Hellenism was not merely intellectual, that the
subtler threads of temperament were inwoven in it, is proved by his
romantic, fervent friendships with young men. He has known, he says,
172 L.
many young men more beautiful than Guido’s archangel. These friend-
ships, bringing him into contact with the pride of human form, and stain-
ing the thoughts with its bloom, perfected his reconciliation to the spirit of
Greek sculpture.83
When contrasting Pater’s and Jowett’s respective interpretations of

Plato, Higgins finds that the distinguishing feature in Pater’s writing is
his “[refusal] to disengage the pleasures of the body from the pleasures
of the mind.”84 “At the heart of Pater’s enterprise,” Higgins also observes,
“is that which Jowett finds unspeakable: the body.” 85 Winckelmann’s
friendships enriched his appreciation of Greek sculpture. It is therefore
possible to assume that Winckelmann’s interest in these young men
was purely aesthetic and not sexually motivated. That said, there is
absolutely no denying that Pater’s expression is sexually charged. The
open-endedness of his prose allows us the space to view Winckelmann
as a desiring subject, although it is possible to reject the notion that
Winckelmann’s experience of Hellenism included homosexual love
affairs.86
The matter of Winckelmann’s homosexuality is especially prominent
in the passages where Pater reproduces the art historian’s love letters to
Fredrich Von Berg. When reflecting on this relationship, Winckelmann
was certain that Von Berg possessed the qualities a man should look for
in a beloved. Winckelmann was struck by Von Berg’s physical beauty and
his finer spiritual nature:
[T]he first time I saw you, the affinity of our spirits was revealed to me:
your culture proved that my hope was not groundless; and I found in a
beautiful body a soul created for nobleness, gifted with the sense of beauty.
My parting from you was therefore one of the most painful in my life …
for your separation from me leaves me no hope of seeing you again. Let
this essay be a memorial of our friendship, which, on my side, is free from
every selfish motive, and ever remains subject and dedicate to yourself
alone.87
For Evangelista, this letter elucidates Winckelmann’s “amorous intent”

towards Von Berg and is a clear indication that Pater’s “treatment of
Winckelmann’s homosexuality is intentional.”88 It should also be noted
that Winckelmann’s letter articulates the painful consequences of his fer-
vent friendships. In writing to Von Berg, he exposes his vulnerability as a
rejected lover. The pleasure of looking at Von Berg and interacting with
this beautiful youth was all too brief, and the sudden loss of this intimacy
was beyond Winckelmann’s control. As Pater reminds us, the pursuit of

beauty also brought suffering: “of that beauty of living form which reg-
ulated Winckelmann’s friendships, it could not be said that it gave no
pain.”89 In the next part of this chapter, we will see that The Picture of
Dorian Gray revives the theme of separation and loss as it charts the dis-
solution of Basil Hallward’s relationship with Dorian Gray.
2 ThE PICTUrE OF DOrIAN GrAY

AND THE AESTHETICS OF DESIRE
When Wilde defended The Picture of Dorian Gray in the press, he repeat-
edly asserted that his novel was a work of aesthetic literature. For many
scholars today, English aestheticism is understood as a cultural forma-
tion that expressed queer sexuality. Some of the most influential
research on The Picture of Dorian Gray and the Classics stems from the
broader movement of queer scholarship, which emerged in the 1990s. 90
Dowling’s 1994 study provided the first detailed analysis of Wilde’s
engagement with Classical culture. According to Dowling, Oxford was
influential for Wilde, both intellectually and personally, because he could
identify with the positive homosexual discourse that emerged from the
culture of Greats:
[B] oth in the specific program of Greek studies shaped by Jowett and
the Oxford reformers and in the diversity ideal more generally diffused
by Victorian Hellenism there lies a possibility undreamt of by Victorian
liberals: the legitimation of love between men. In this context such late-
Victorian writers as Pater, Symonds, and Wilde … will begin to glimpse in
Plato’s defense of transcendental, “Uranian” love a vocabulary adequate to
their own inmost hopes, and to see in “Greek Love” itself the promise of a
Hellenic individuality and diversity with the most positive implications for
Victorian civilization.91
For individuals like Wilde, the Oxford Classical curriculum was not just a
programme of study, it represented a way of life. Dowling supports this
argument by reflecting on Wilde’s efforts to live up to “the Socratic ideal
of mental intercourse between male friends.” 92 Consequently, much of
her analysis focuses on Wilde’s intimate relationship with Lord Alfred
Douglas, which is discussed in the following chapter. When Dowling’s
attention turns to The Picture of Dorian Gray, she contends that the
174 L.
decision to avoid naming homosexual desire was a deliberate aesthetic

choice by Wilde. Embedded in his suggestive aesthetic prose is “a double
allusion to Greek culture” that evokes Platonic eros as well as Oxford’s
culture of intimate friendship.93 My interpretation of The Picture of
Dorian Gray complicates Dowling’s argument, as it shows that Wilde
sets up the Platonic/Oxonian model of male friendship as an ideal that is
impossible to achieve and fraught with danger.
Evangelista’s research also confirms that Wilde’s aesthetic philoso-
phy is inextricably linked to his Oxford education. He discusses Wilde’s
position as homosexual writer and notes that the overlap between
aestheticism and Classical philosophy is evident in his undergraduate
notebooks and essays.94 From these sources, Evangelista discovers that
“Wilde read both Pater and Symonds very closely and transcribed quo-
tations from them in his notebooks side by side his notes on ancient
Greek sources.”95 This influence extends to Wilde’s fiction and criti-
cism, as Evangelista’s study exposes the intertextual dialogue with John
Addington Symonds’s Studies of the Greek Poets (1873 and 1876) and
Pater’s Renaissance.
According to Evangelista, Pater’s essay on Winckelmann is the most
influential source for The Picture of Dorian Gray because the novel revis-
its the notion of “[finding] emotional possibilities for the experience of
antiquity in the present.”96 The clash between aesthetic Hellenism and
Christian morality ultimately destroys Dorian Gray, and Evangelista sees
the novel’s conclusion as a comment on “the impossibility of living the
Greek life in nineteenth-century England.” 97 A further compelling fea-
ture of Evangelista’s study is that it alerts us to the objectification of
Dorian Gray’s body. When the narrator and other characters describe
Dorian’s beauty, they rely on sculptural metaphors which evoke Classical
art objects.98 The confusion between the male body and ancient art is
also embedded in Pater’s and Symonds’s types of aesthetic criticism, as
their writing was preoccupied with Classical sculpture and “the ancient
ideal of physical perfection.”99
Evangelista’s scholarship has influenced my understanding of The
Picture of Dorian Gray in two ways. First, his interpretation of the sculp-
tural metaphors in the novel has led me to focus on the theme of specta-
torship when considering Basil’s motives as a lover. Second,
Evangelista’s method of linking The Picture of Dorian Gray to aesthetic
criticism from the 1870s has prompted me to adopt a similar approach
with Jowett’s Symposium. Evangelista’s analysis clearly demonstrates
the transference
between Pater’s aestheticism and that of Wilde, but I am inclined to

think that Wilde’s novel problematizes the idealistic rhetoric that Jowett
adopts in his writing on Platonic love.
Nikolai Endres’s analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray is another
significant critical source because it acknowledges that the culture of
paiderastia is evoked as a “homoerotic code” for relationships that are
purely sexual.100 One of the ways that Wilde establishes this code is
through the names and personal histories of his main characters. As sev-
eral commentators have noted, Dorian is a Hellenic name which dou-
bles as a reference to the Dorian people of Sparta. 101 In addition to this,
Dorian’s family history reflects his position as an eromenos or beloved.
He is characterized as an orphan and gravitates towards Lord Henry as a
“surrogate father.”102 In turn, Lord Henry lacks a son and approximates
the role of an erastes (elder lover) by exposing Dorian to aesthetic teach-
ings that “give birth to [his] adulthood.”103
As Endres compares the idea of influence in Plato’s love dialogues
and The Picture of Dorian Gray, he realizes that this word gains an
exclusively sexual connotation in Wilde’s novel. 104 Although the inter-
action between Lord Henry and Dorian replicates archetypal images and
themes that are specific to paiderastic courtship scenes, this is where the
parallel ends.105 Lord Henry does not fulfil the erastes’s duty to improve
the mind and soul of his beloved; instead, he encourages and takes pleas-
ure in Dorian’s corruption.106 Endres establishes that Basil is another
problematic erastes because he submits to Dorian’s influence, and in
doing so, Basil assumes the role of the beloved.107 Basil repeatedly draws
on Platonic philosophy when he articulates the effect that Dorian has
had on his art, but Endres concludes that his allusions to “Platonic” love
are simply a euphemism for sex. 108 I hope to further Endres findings by
examining how Basil fails to establish a good dialogue with Dorian, as he
prioritizes his own artistic and sexual desires over Dorian’s need for inti-
macy and communication.
More recently, Marylu Hill has acknowledged the influence of
Jowett’s translations in her analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray. After
viewing Wilde’s personal copy of The Republic and considering the cen-
trality of this text in the Greats curriculum, Hill has determined that
Plato’s ideas on the soul and its susceptibility to corruption inform the
relationship dynamics in Wilde’s novel.109 In The Republic, Socrates
warns that the soul of a philosopher is more sensitive to evil influences
than that of an ordinary person. The premature exposure to philosophy
176 L.
or vice leads to the creation of “puppies”: individuals “who play at and

tear at knowledge without truly understanding it.” 110 Hill therefore
positions the character development of Dorian Gray and the narrative of
his soul’s decay as an example of puppydom.
Hill’s interpretation of the novel also positions Lord Henry’s aesthetic
philosophy in a new light. She refers to Lord Henry as an anti-philos-
opher, given that he is a man of superior intellect who uses his talents
to undermine the aims of philosophy.111 His role in the novel mirrors
that of a “drone,” which is a term that Socrates uses to describe some-
one who has a corrosive influence on young men because he drives
them to indulge their destructive appetites.112 In opposition to this type,
Basil’s love and Sibyl Vane’s love for Dorian serve as positive examples
of Socratic eros. Basil’s relationship with Dorian perfectly illustrates the
“ladder of love” analogy from the Symposium in so far as the beloved is
“expendable” to the lover-philosopher.113 Interestingly, Hill argues that
Basil’s desire to pursue the “Ideal of Beauty” is much stronger than his
love for Dorian, and, consequently, the relationship with Dorian ceases
to be useful after his portrait is completed. 114 By extension, Dorian’s
rejection of Sibyl Vane is also a rejection of Plato’s higher love. Although
Dorian is enthralled by Lord Henry from the outset of the novel, he
chooses to act upon his suggestion to live a hedonistic life after he learns
of Sibyl’s death.115 Hill has succeeded in constructing a unique and con-
vincing argument by linking The Picture of Dorian Gray with Jowett’s
translation of The Republic. My analysis will adopt a similar approach,
but I have chosen to focus on the Symposium and the subject of eros to
highlight the growing tension between Basil and Dorian.
When Walter Pater reviewed the 1891 edition of The Picture of
Dorian Gray, he praised Wilde’s mastery of the dialogue form. He had
reservations about the moral implications of the aestheticism that is
espoused by Lord Henry and embraced by Dorian, nevertheless, the
words that he used to describe Wilde’s conversational style (alive, fluid,
felicitous, enjoyable, critical) evoked the erotically charged form of
Plato’s dialogues:
There is always something of an excellent talker about the writing of

Mr. Oscar Wilde, and in his hands, as happens so rarely with those who
practise it, the form of dialogue is justified by its being really alive. His
genial, laughter-loving sense of life and its enjoyable intercourse, goes
far to obviate any crudity there may be in the paradox … Conversational
ease, the fluidity of life, felicitous expression, are qualities which have a
natural alliance to the successful writing of fiction; and side by side with
Mr. Wilde’s Intentions (so he entitles his critical efforts) comes a novel,
certainly original, and affording the reader a fair opportunity of compar-
ing his practice as a creative artist with many a precept he has enounced as
critic concerning it.116
In the Symposium, the exchange of ideas is the verbal equivalent to

sexual intercourse. According to Endres, the characters in the Symposium
“enact the erotic” through their speeches: “One speaker makes a point,
the other reacts against it; one gives, the other takes. This dialogical
structure creates the circulation of a certain (homo)social energy that
clearly charges the atmosphere.”117 Similarly, in The Picture of Dorian
Gray, Wilde’s male protagonists compete to direct the flow of
conversation. In Chapter 10, Wilde famously defines Basil Hallward’s
attachment to Dorian Gray as love, a love that “had nothing in it that
was not noble or intellectual.”118 But if we closely examine the dialogue
interaction between Dorian Gray and Basil Hallward, we learn that their
relationship is founded on silence rather than a reciprocal exchange of
ideas.
Pater’s comparison between The Picture of Dorian Gray and
Intentions is productive for another reason. As I have demonstrated
in Chapter 4, in “The Critic as Artist” we encounter the dilemma of
the Oxford gentlemen who leave the university—to enter either the
workforce or high society—and find themselves bored by the culture
of London. Wilde returns to this theme in The Picture of Dorian Gray;
in this work, Basil’s home art studio proves to be an excellent substi-
tute for the collegial community at Oxford. In the opening dialogue
between Lord Henry and Basil, we learn that the art studio is a place
where these two Oxford gentlemen go to engage in philosophical
discussions. In this context, aesthetic production and consumption
are acts which arouse homosexual desire, and it is for this reason that
Evangelista views the studio as “an aesthetic space” where “Eros and
philosophy mingle.”119 Before Dorian Gray physically enters this space
(in Chapter 2 of the novel), Lord Henry and Basil talk about the unfin-
ished portrait, which serves a decorative function as the main focal
point of the room.120 The portrait creates a tangible link between
the aesthetic décor of Basil Hallward’s art studio and that of Wilde’s
college rooms. Biographical accounts reveal that Wilde recreated
the feel of an artist’s studio by setting up an easel with an unfinished
178 L.
painting in his rooms at Magdalen.121 This item was placed amid an

arrangement of lilies, figurines, peacock feathers, imported rugs,
Catholic mementos, and Wilde’s legendary blue china. Similarly, the
opening passage of The Picture of Dorian Gray is crammed with sump-
tuous aesthetic details. The scent of flowers permeates the art stu-
dio as Lord Henry lounges on a “divan of Persian saddle-bags” and
observes the shadow play of birds passing across “long tussore-silk
curtains.”122
We can be certain that Basil Hallward is an Oxford gentleman
because of a distinctive mannerism that has lingered from his under-
graduate days. Lord Henry Wotton insists that he should exhibit his lat-
est artwork (the incomplete portrait of Dorian Gray) at the Grosvenor
Gallery, which was an exclusive London art gallery that promoted the
work of artists who were associated with the Aesthetic Movement.123
In response to Lord Henry’s suggestion, Basil “answered, tossing
his head back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at
him at Oxford.”124 The third-person omniscient narration reveals
that Basil and Lord Henry share a history that is tied their education
at Oxford.125 The idiosyncratic head-toss may be taken as an endear-
ing mannerism and a sign that Basil has not changed very much since
his undergraduate days. When he was a student, this “odd” quirk pro-
voked laughter, and it seems that Basil is accustomed to being laughed
at. From this little detail, we can sense that Basil has not quite mas-
tered the art of conversation, despite being exposed to the Oxford
Platonic revival, and the dialectical teaching style that was promoted by
Jowett. Basil naturally assumes that his companion will make light of
his decision to keep the portrait out of the public domain: “‘I know
you will laugh at me,’ he replied, ‘but I really can’t exhibit it. I have
put too much of myself in it.’”126 Sadly, Basil’s expectation is fulfilled,
as Lord Henry reacts by “stretch[ing] himself out on the divan and
laugh[ing].”127
Wilde’s characterization of Lord Henry creates an interesting coun-
terpoint to Basil’s identity as an Oxford aesthete. Wotton is later intro-
duced as an “old Oxford friend,” and his aestheticism undermines the
sanctity of intellectual friendship.128 He is confused by the notion that
Basil has put too much of himself in the portrait, so he is compelled to
compare the physical differences between Basil and his young model. At
this point, Lord Henry voices the opinion that intellect is not an attrac-
tive quality in a young man:
I really can’t see any resemblance between you, with your rugged strong
face and your coal-black hair, and this young Adonis, who looks as if he is
made of ivory and rose-leaves. Why my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you
– well, of course you have an intellectual expression, and all that. But
beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect
is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face.
The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead,
or something horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned
professions. How perfectly hideous they are! … He is some brainless,
beautiful creature, who should always be here in winter when we have
no flowers to look at, and always here in summer when we want
something to chill our intelligence.129
According to Lord Henry, intellect and beauty are skin-deep, and there
is enough evidence in the incomplete portrait to dismiss Dorian as a
brainless beauty. Dorian’s physique is stunning, and Lord Henry fancies
that it would be fun to display him around the house like a living art
installation. When Lord Henry and Basil tire of talking, they will fix their
attention on a body that shows no sign of intellectual strain: the lines
and wrinkles that make learned men so “perfectly hideous.” What are we
to make of Basil’s strong masculine features and his “intellectual expres-
sion”? Basil is an artist, yet he reminds Lord Henry of the scholars and
educators whom he classes as ugly professionals. That said, Lord Henry
does not exactly claim that Basil is a learned man, only that he has the
appearance of an intellectual. For Lord Henry, surface is everything, and,
most importantly, this dialogue foregrounds Basil’s account of his friend-
ship with Dorian. It follows that the emphasis on intellectual
appearances extends to Basil, as well as his relationship with Dorian
Gray.
When describing his first meeting with Dorian, Basil is eager to
convince Lord Henry that he is indifferent to Dorian’s physical beauty
and refrains from mentioning his appearance. This omission is conspic-
uous, given that so much emphasis is placed on Dorian’s beauty before
we learn any other details about his life. Instead, Basil insists that he was
drawn to Dorian’s fascinating personality:
I suddenly became conscious that someone was looking at me. I turned

half-way round, and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. When our eyes
met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation of terror came over
me. I knew that I had come face to face with some one whose mere per-
sonality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my
whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself.130
180 L.
There is a strong correlation between Wilde’s notion of the “fascinat-

ing personality” and Jowett’s translation of Alcibiades’s speech. 131
Alcibiades describes Socrates as a flute-playing satyr who can bewitch
men, women, and children with the incredible power of his words. 132
When he attempts to describe Socrates’s beauty, Alcibiades speaks in
strikingly similar terms: “But when I opened him, and looked within at
his serious purpose, I saw in him divine and golden images of such fas-
cinating beauty that I was ready to do in a moment whatever Socrates
commanded: they may have escaped the observation of others, but I saw
them.”133 Jowett’s translation suggests that Socrates’s inner beauty is so
irresistible that it borders on the supernatural―it is divine, golden, fasci-
nating, and visible to a select few. For Alcibiades, the prospect of being
dominated by this extraordinary philosopher is both exciting and ter-
rifying. Nonetheless, Alcibiades refuses to be consumed by this attrac-
tion and is unwilling to submit to Socrates’s influence: “For he makes
me confess that I ought not to live as I do, neglecting the wants of my
own soul … therefore I hold my ears and tear myself away from him.” 134
In Wilde’s novel, Dorian doubles as a Socratic figure. He has the same
effect on Basil, who is simultaneously distressed and intrigued upon
making eye contact with Dorian. Like Alcibiades, Basil is aware that he
could easily lose himself in an uncontrollable desire. There is one glaring
difference: the seduction between Basil and Dorian is enacted silently.
As Camille Paglia contends: “Basil somehow grasps Dorian’s ‘personality’
without a word being spoken. He only sees Dorian; he does not hear
him.”135 There is nothing to suggest that Dorian has a beautiful mind
or is capable of delivering a thoughtful speech. Basil and Dorian share an
erotic encounter that is entirely visual and wordless, yet it is no less
powerful than Socrates’s alluring speeches.
In Tame Passions of Wilde: Styles of Manageable Desire (2003), Jeff
Nunokawa identifies Basil as a homosexual who is anxious to avoid pub-
lic exposure.136 Basil “protect[s] his gaze from the glance of others by
casting his [eyes] not directly at Dorian Gray, but rather, like a figure in
a mirrored shield, at his image in the remote region of art.” 137 Before
Basil completes his lifelike portrait of Dorian, he is gripped by the com-
pulsion to sketch him as an archetypal youth from the Classical tradition:
“I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, and as Adonis with hunts-
man’s cloak and polished boar-spear. … you sat on the prow of Adrian’s
barge, gazing across the turbid Nile. You had leant over the still pool of
some Greek woodland, and seen in the water’s silent silver the marvel
of your own face.”138 In these sketches, the sense of remoteness is com-

pounded by the artist’s decision to locate his model in an amorphous,
mythical past. When he is alone with his art, Basil can safely enjoy the
pleasure of viewing these images, knowing that the subject of the art-
work cannot return his gaze.139
The fascinating personality is another stratagem that Basil uses to
disguise the pleasure he derives from looking at Dorian’s body. When
pressed to describe his relationship with Dorian, affection and aestheti-
cism converge:
“I couldn’t be happy if I didn’t see him every day. He is absolutely

necessary to me.”… “He is all my art to me now,” said the painter gravely.
“I sometimes think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance
in the world’s history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art,
and the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. What
the invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of Antinoü s was
to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will some day be to
me.”140
Again, the awareness of Dorian’s inspiring personality is dependent on

the act of seeing him in person. The attachment is strengthened by reg-
ular visits that provide Basil with the visual stimulus he needs to
produce art and satisfy his need—as Evangelista observes—to “consume
[Dorian] as an object of erotic desire.” 141 Early on in the discussion, Lord
Henry openly objectifies Dorian as a beautiful ornament, and Basil
repeats this thought process here. Instead of evoking the beauty of
Narcissus or Adonis, Basil likens the face of his boy-muse to that of
Antinoü s, the beloved of Emperor Hadrian.142 Basil is aspiring to
replicate a paiderastic relationship with Dorian, but the sculptural
parallel between Dorian and Antinoü s betrays a preoccupation with
the male form. His speech on personality drifts towards the image of
Dorian’s beautiful face, as if faces and personalities are interchangeable
concepts. As Basil voices his ambition to immortalize Dorian Gray’s
beauty, he inadvertently reduces him to little more than a handsome
face, just as Lord Henry did in the opening dialogue.
To obscure the signs of his sexual attraction, Basil retreats into an
abstract aesthetic vocabulary. At first, he claims that Dorian’s personality
has given him a new artistic perspective. Basil sees and thinks
differently: “I can now recreate life in a way that was hidden from me
before.”143
182 L.
But the cover of personality is blown when Basil discloses that his crea-
tivity is inspired by the “visible presence” of Dorian Gray: “The merely
visible presence of this lad – for he seems to me little more than a lad,
though he is really over twenty – his merely visible presence – ah!” 144
The excited repetition of the phrase, “merely visible presence,” reveals
that Basil is enraptured by the sight of Dorian’s body, but to pre-
vent Lord Henry from reaching this conclusion, he evokes the physi-
cal-spiritual phenomena of Platonic eros: “Unconsciously he defines for
me the lines of a fresh school, a school that is to have in it all the passion
of the romantic spirit, all the perfection of spirit that is Greek. The har-
mony of soul and body – how much that is!” 145 Basil does not suggest
that Dorian has miraculously achieved a “harmony of soul and body” of
his own accord; rather, he predicts that his interactions with Dorian will
generate an aesthetic product, a painting, that captures the Classical and
Romantic ideal of the beloved.
Ann Herndon Marshall argues that Basil “wishes to generalize his
attachment into a new aesthetic spirit for the age,” and in doing so, he
performs “a reenactment of Winckelmann’s discovery.” 146 In a way, Basil
generalizes Dorian out of existence. This feature is most evident
when he clarifies that “Dorian Gray is to me simply a motive in art …
He is never more present in my work than when no image is there. He
is a suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner.” 147 Again, Basil’s words
bear a resemblance to Jowett’s translation of Diotima’s speech on
intellectual procreation:
[A]t the touch of the beautiful which is ever present to his memory, even
when absent, he brings forth that which he had conceived long before, and
in company with him tends that which he brings forth; and they are mar-
ried by a far nearer tie and have a closer friendship than those who beget
mortal children, for the children who are their common offspring are fairer
and more immortal.148
In the Symposium, the birth of ideas extends to the art of poetry; Hesiod
and Homer are cited as examples of the immortal fame that is granted
to individuals who create exceptional works of art. 149 Basil’s speech
broadens the Platonic concept of “intellectual offspring” to apply to the
medium of painting. Earlier, Basil aestheticized Dorian as a boy with
a beautiful face; here, in a few words he displaces Dorian’s body alto-
gether. The genius of Basil’s rhetoric lies in his ability to redefine Dorian
as an abstract idea or a non-corporeal entity, whose presence is most

potent when absent. Dorian is not a model, not a body, not even the
subject of Basil’s art. Far from being a lover or a close friend, he becomes
“a suggestion,” “a motive” for a radically new aesthetic in visual art.
In Chapter 2, where we see Basil and Dorian interacting together in
the art studio, we find that their working partnership does not facilitate
any discussion. In the first chapter, Basil has already commented on his
private conversations with Dorian: “I find a strange pleasure in saying
things to him that I know I shall be sorry for having said. As a rule,
he is charming to me, and we sit in the studio and talk of a thousand
things.”150 By the time Lord Henry Wotton is permitted to join them
in the art studio, they barely communicate. Dorian protests against Lord
Henry’s departure because he is bored by the silence that pervades the
room: “‘Basil,’ cried Dorian Gray, ‘if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall
go too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is hor-
ribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant.’” 151 With
this ultimatum, Dorian shows that he wants to be involved in an inti-
mate conversation, but he is perpetually disappointed by Basil, who can-
not talk and paint at the same time. Basil concedes: “It is quite true,
I never talk when I am working, and never listen either, and it must be
dreadfully tedious for my unfortunate sitters.” 152 More to the point,
when Basil does speak, it is out of the necessity to instruct his model to
sit still or adjust his pose: “Dorian, get up on the platform, and don’t
move about too much … Just turn your head a little more to the right,
Dorian, like a good boy.”153 Lord Henry’s presence is a welcome dis-
traction because he arrives in time to restore the flow of conversation.
The pair soon retreat to the privacy of the garden, where Lord Henry
questions Dorian and concludes his “strange panegyric on youth.” 154
When they return indoors, the silence of this space is stressed once
more: “The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only
sound that broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward
stepped back to look at his work from a distance.” 155 The breakdown in
the dialogue between Dorian and Basil signals the end of their intimate
working relationship. From this point on, Basil will have to venture
outside the confines of the art studio in order to see Dorian.
Surprisingly, the first private dialogue between these two characters
arises late in the novel, in Chapter 9, following the death of Sibyl Vane.
Basil visits Dorian at his home and initiates a discussion, only to find that
Dorian is unwilling to talk about the recent death of his fiancée. Sibyl’s
184 L.
death falls into the general category of “horrid subjects” of conversation

that should be avoided.156 After conferring with Lord Henry, Dorian
decides that it is best to view her suicide as “a marvellous
experience” that has passed and will not be mentioned again.157 Basil’s
arrival threat- ens to undermine this plan, and so, Dorian is forced to
take charge of the dialogue: “Don’t talk about horrid subjects. If one
doesn’t talk about a thing, it has never happened.”158 Although Dorian
effectively instructs Basil to drop the subject, he will not be silenced.
He is determined to discuss the matter and implants the image of
Sibyl’s decaying corpse in Dorian’s mind: “there are horrors in store
for that little white body of hers!”159 At this point, the conversation
modulates into an argument. Seized by rage and frustration, Dorian
begins to shout and stands to make his point clear: “‘Stop Basil! I
won’t hear it!’ cried Dorian leap- ing to his feet, ‘You must not tell me
about things.’”160 Dorian adopts a similar tactic in his first dialogue
with Lord Henry in Chapter 2. Upon hearing Lord Henry’s aesthetic
preamble, Dorian entreats him to stop talking: “‘Stop!’ faltered Dorian
Gray, ‘stop! you bewilder me. I don’t know what to say. … Don’t speak.
Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think.” 161 In the episode
with Lord Henry, Dorian listens atten- tively and ends the
conversation to avoid formulating an opinion of his own. With Basil,
he is much more defensive and less receptive. Dorian is not lost for
words; he simply prefers not to listen to Basil’s provocations. By
contrast, Basil shows that he is not easily frightened and is unwilling to
acquiesce to the demand for silence.
During this heated discussion, Basil is unsettled by the contradiction
between Dorian’s physical beauty and his nasty speech. Dorian looks
like “the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come down
to my studio to sit for his picture,” but he is not the silent, compliant
model he once knew.162 When Basil gives his full attention to Dorian,
he is shocked by what he hears: “You were the most unspoilt creature in
the whole world. Now I don’t know what has come over you. You talk
as if you had no heart, no pity in you.”163 He senses a shift in Dorian’s
personality, but is not repelled by the hostile response that he receives
when he mentions Sibyl Vane. When Basil is ready to abandon this sen-
sitive topic of conversation, he unintentionally distresses Dorian again
by imploring him to model for another portrait: “But you must come
and sit to me yourself again. I can’t get on without you.” 164 By this point,
Dorian has already noticed a look of cruelty in the portrait and interprets
this change as a reminder of his cruelty towards Sibyl. Unlike Dorian,
Basil is a lover who struggles to cope with the absence of his beloved.
His brief, unornamented plea reveals that the intangible, philosophical
idea of Dorian’s beauty is no substitute for the pleasure of seeing him in
person, and often. Basil cannot shake the desire to recover what he has
lost, or as he expresses it: “I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint.”165
Dorian, who is clearly exasperated, has no reservations in telling him
that he is harbouring an impossible desire: “‘I can never sit to you again,
Basil. It is impossible!’ he exclaimed, starting back.” 166 The mysterious
alteration of the portrait establishes that there is no incentive for Dorian
to satisfy Basil’s desire. Posing for him is not only boring work—it is lit-
erally soul-destroying.
When speaking directly to the object of his desire, Basil is willing to
talk freely about the perilous pleasure of gazing at Dorian’s body. The
verbal dynamic between Basil and Dorian reverses after Basil insists on
seeing the portrait. This time, Dorian masters the conversation and com-
pels Basil to make another telling confession about his “artistic idolatry.”
Before he reveals all, Basil urges Dorian to stop talking:
Don’t speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. Dorian, from the
moment I met you, your personality had the most extraordinary influence
over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and power by you. You became to
me the visible incarnation of that unseen ideal whose memory haunts us
artists like an exquisite dream. I worshipped you. I grew jealous of every-
one who spoke to you. I wanted to have you all to myself. When you were
away from me you were still present in my art. … Of course I never let you
know anything about this. It would have been impossible. You would not
have understood it. I hardly understood it myself. I only knew I had seen
perfection face to face, and that the world had become wonderful to my
eyes – too wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, the
peril of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them. … 167
Here, we are confronted with the notion of an impossible desire which

is difficult to understand and equally difficult to express. Initially, Basil
duplicates the aesthetic terminology that he used in his discussion with
Lord Henry, but this lofty discourse unravels into a simpler register of
speech. Basil’s expression is littered with personal pronouns that com-
promise the security of his abstract, impersonal aesthetic discourse. It
is as if Basil loses his verbal composure and can no longer conceal his
desire to keep Dorian within view. The emphasis on seeing perfection
face-to-face reveals that Basil is not in love with Dorian as such; he is,
186 L.
instead, in love with looking at him. The phrase, “I worshipped you,”

suggests an over-zealous admiration that borders on fetishism. Basil also
reflects on his inadequacy as a lover when he professes: “I grew jeal-
ous of everyone who spoke to you.” Although Basil is able to carry out
thoughtful conversations with Lord Henry, he does not engage with
Dorian in this way and envies those who exchange words with him. Basil
has great difficulty accepting that he has lost exclusive access to Dorian’s
body and his confession seems like a last attempt to restore their level of
intimacy.
It is possible that Dorian is put off by Basil because his understand-
ing of intimacy is limited to the static and silent interaction between
an artist and his model. Basil ignores Dorian’s wishes and restates the
same impossible question: “You will sit to me again?” 168 When Dorian
refuses for the second time, he alludes to his secret fascination with
the supernatural portrait: “I can’t explain it to you, Basil, but I must
never sit to you again. There is something fatal about a portrait. It
has a life of its own.”169 This confession presents an opportunity for
Basil question Dorian on this point, but he is so dejected that he ends
the conversation without asking Dorian to explain how or why he has
reached such a strange conclusion. Just as Dorian begins to tease him
with hints about the supernatural portrait, Basil retreats from Dorian,
as if to suggest that he is unwilling to listen to anything more that he
has to say.
The final verbal interaction between Dorian and Basil also occurs in
Dorian’s home. Basil invites himself inside to address the rumours sur-
rounding Dorian’s involvement with the young men and women who
have been damaged by his “fatal” friendship.170 In answer to this ver-
bal onslaught, Dorian denies all culpability and goads Basil into viewing
the transformed portrait. When confronted with the image, Basil takes
pleasure in examining the traces of beauty that survive in the corrupted
artwork:
There was something in the expression that filled him with disgust and
loathing. Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray’s own face that he was look-
ing at! The horror, whatever it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that mar-
vellous beauty. There was still some gold in the thinning hair and some
scarlet on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes had kept something of the
loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not yet completely passed
away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat.171
As Basil inspects the mysterious alterations, he keeps his thoughts and

feelings to himself, but Wilde’s narration establishes that the immediate
reaction of “disgust and loathing” is a transitory response. Once the ini-
tial shock passes, Basil indulges in the familiar pleasure of looking and
internally re-enacts his first meeting Dorian Gray. In their first face-to-
face encounter, Basil experienced a “curious sensation of terror” which
heightened the excitement of seeing Dorian and pursuing a relationship
with him.172 As Basil continues to scrutinize the face in the portrait, he
is pleased to see that the artwork retains a seductive quality. There are
no apparent signs of spiritual corruption in Wilde’s description, only
signs of ageing. The evidence of Dorian’s ageing is counterbalanced by
a muted colour palette that marks his enduring beauty; there is “some
gold,” “some scarlet,” “something of the [blue]” left in the aged body.
The language of desire is most palpable when Basil’s gaze rests on “the
sensual mouth.” After momentarily yielding to “passion of the eye,”
to use Nunokawa’s expression, Basil moderates his desire by aestheti-
cizing the body as a well-proportioned, finely chiselled sculptural arte-
fact.173 Evangelista recognizes that this sculptural motif pervades the
entire novel. He argues that we are encouraged “to ‘read’ the character
of Dorian in completely plastic terms, as if he were a statue” from the
moment that he steps onto the dais in Basil’s studio. 174 All the while,
however, “the reader remains remain conscious of the fact that Dorian’s
body is not marble but flesh.”175
The interpretation of the portrait is entirely subjective, and, like any
artwork, the portrait has the power to produce drastically different
responses. Basil is able to look beyond the horror to find elements of
beauty in the portrait, but Dorian is unable to perform the same aes-
thetic analysis. For him, the canvas is a living-dead entity that represents
his soul’s decay: “What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be
to the painted image on the canvas. They would mar its beauty, and
eat away its grace. They would defile it, and make it shameful. And yet
the thing would still live on. It would always be alive.” 176 Since Dorian
applies a Christian reading to the portrait, he therefore understands the
corruption as evidence of the unending cycle of sin and shame that has
taken hold of his life. The portrait reminds Dorian of death, and, when
viewing it, he cannot discount the possibility that eternal damnation
awaits him: “His own soul was looking out at him from the canvas and
calling him to judgement.”177
188 L.
While Dorian and Basil are together in the attic, Dorian eagerly
watches and waits for a verbal response, perhaps anticipating another
confession. Nunokawa is precise in describing this situation as “a mur-
derous entrapment in which the painter is set up to get caught looking
as he gazes, yet again, at the picture of Dorian Gray.”178 When Basil
does speak, he does not mention the effect of seeing the supernatu-
ral image. Instead, he denies that the portrait is his own creation and
rationalizes the corruption as the result of mildew or a mineral poi-
son in the paint.179 In the past, he feared that Dorian “would not have
understood” his “mad worship.”180 In this encounter, Dorian deploys
the vocabulary of Basil’s confession speech to block his evasive line of
reasoning:
“Can’t you see your ideal in it?” said Dorian, bitterly.

“My ideal, as you call it …”
“As you called it.”
“There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me
such an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr.”
“It is the face of my soul.”181
Dorian’s remarks are contrived to coerce Basil into admitting that his
worship was not so innocent. To avoid the question, Basil modifies
Dorian’s phrasing (“My ideal, as you call it”) in order to distance him-
self from the image. In response, Dorian reverts to the past tense (“As
you called it”) to illustrate that he remembers Basil’s confession perfectly
and will not let the subject slip so easily. We have seen that Basil already
made the connection between his aesthetic ideal and the altered portrait,
but his impression of the image changes under the pressure of Dorian’s
antagonistic questioning. There is no mention of the pleasurable
moment of recognition or the sculptural imagery that flooded his mind
a moment ago. Now, Basil refers to the face on the canvas as an ugly,
lecherous satyr. He may be using this term loosely to evoke the image of
the elderly satyrs or silenoi. In Greek iconography, the silenoi are repre-
sented as fat, bald, snub-nosed, and bearded figures, and they are asso-
ciated with lasciviousness. On a superficial level, Basil could be implying
that Dorian has aged very badly. The link between Dorian and the satyr
also extends the anti-Socratic metaphor that was introduced earlier in
the novel. In this instance, Basil alludes to Alcibiades’s speech to remind
Dorian that he has strayed very far from the Platonic ideal. The portrait
reveals that Dorian is spiritually and intellectually vacuous, and there is

nothing divine or fascinating about this painted satyr. Unlike Socrates,
Dorian has dedicated his life to the pursuit of physical pleasure and is
empty inside. This loaded term also serves as Basil’s last line of defence.
It is positioned at the end of the sentence in which he clarifies that there
was “nothing evil,” “nothing shameful” (i.e. nothing sexual) about his
attachment to Dorian. Once more, Basil returns to his non-corporeal
imagining of Dorian as the unseen ideal in order to protect his homosex-
ual identity.182 The tragedy and horror of this exchange are heightened
through Dorian’s self-conscious objectification of his immortal soul. Like
the fascinating personality that is visible to the naked eye, the portrait
reduces the life of the soul into a tangible aesthetic object, a painted
image of a face.
When aestheticism fails, Basil tries to placate Dorian by switching to
a Christian vocabulary. He calls on the name of Christ and denounces
the portrait as a demonic image: “Christ! what a thing I must have wor-
shipped! It has the eyes of a devil.” 183 In this instance, Basil’s vision of
the portrait aligns with the Christian reading that Dorian enacted in pri-
vate. He uses the metaphor of false worship to allude to homosexual
desire and portrays himself as an accidental sinner. 184 The alarmed out-
burst suggests that he did not realize it was wrong to worship Dorian’s
beauty, and the past tense (“I must have worshipped!”) makes this
admission seem all the more remote. If Basil did entertain this desire
at some point, he has not engaged in an idolatrous worship of Dorian
in recent times. But this half-hearted show of repentance further frus-
trates Dorian, who is determined to implicate Basil in the story of his
moral decay: “Each of us has Heaven and Hell in him, Basil.”185 With
this statement, Basil loses his capacity to find any signs of beauty in the
portrait. When he looks again, he sees “the leprosies of sin … slowly eat-
ing the thing away” and shields his eyes from the hideous image. 186 In a
final gesture of friendship, Basil reassures Dorian that he is not alone in
his sin:
“Pray, Dorian, pray,” he murmured. “What is it that one was taught to say
in one’s boyhood? ‘Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. Wash
away our iniquities.’ Let us say that together. The prayer of your pride
has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be answered also.
I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You worshipped yourself
too much. We are both punished.”187
190 L.
For Guy Willoughby, this call to prayer establishes Basil as a “truly

Christian spokesman, [who] insists on his own imperfection as well,”
albeit Basil is hardly an ideal one, given that he vaguely recalls the Lord’s
Prayer.188 Basil admits that his desire/worship was sinful, but in the des-
perate rush to remember his prayers, he makes one fatal mistake. He
confuses the order of the verses and forgets the principle of extending
forgiveness to others: “And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them
that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation.” 189 This omis-
sion is significant because Basil does not remind Dorian to be a forgiving
Christian, and Dorian is determined to lay the blame on Basil: “Years
ago, when I was a boy … you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be
vain of my good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours,
who explained to me the wonder of youth.” 190 Dorian conveniently
forgets that he insisted on speaking with Lord Henry himself, and this
oversight allows him to hold Basil accountable for the loss of his inno-
cence. Yet again, Basil does not find the right words to charm Dorian. As
Basil persists with his muddled prayers, he further pains Dorian by
asking him to recall the prayers of his boyhood. Instead of comforting
Dorian, Basil’s prayers torment and infuriate him to such an extent that
he is compelled to end the conversation with an act of violence.
Meanwhile, Basil has no inkling that he is endangering his life through
his poor choice of words.
Ultimately, the murder of Basil Hallward is a gruesome manifestation
of the breakdown in communication in his relationship with Dorian.
Dorian resorts to blasphemy in order to stifle Basil’s prayers: “Those
words mean nothing to me now.” 191 This indifferent statement is cal-
culated to attract Basil’s attention, and the severe wording provides a
warning that Dorian cannot bear to hear any more speeches on sin and
salvation. Instead of tightening his lips, Basil unwittingly escalates the
verbal tension by instructing Dorian to be quiet: “Hush! don’t say that.
You have done enough evil in your life.”192 It is at this point that Dorian
is overwhelmed by a sudden hatred that fills him with the desire to kill.
Marshall has suggested that “the murder of the historical Winckelmann
could have been the inspiration for the murder of Basil Hallward in
Wilde’s novel.”193 Both men are attacked from behind, and Marshall
notes that Winckelmann “was the gentle victim of his tendency to
befriend young men when he was murdered.” 194 Indeed, Wilde invites
us to make this comparison when he describes Basil’s love for Dorian in
Chapter 10:
He shuddered, and for a moment regretted that he had not told Basil
the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil would
have helped him to resist Lord Henry’s influence, and the still more poi-
sonous influences that came from his own temperament. The love that
he bore him—for it was really love—had nothing in it that was not noble
and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty that
is born of the senses, and that dies when the senses tire. It was such love
as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, and
Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. But it was too late
now.195
The terms “noble and intellectual” were central to the popular construct
of Platonic eros, as seen in Jowett’s and Pater’s respective writings. In
this passage, however, Wilde is amplifying the absence of the Platonic
ideal. When we examine the dialogue between Basil and Dorian, we
see that there is little evidence to support the view that there is more
to Basil’s love than “physical admiration.” Basil is counted among the
greatest poets, artists, and philosophers of the Western tradition, but
this is not enough to offset his inadequacies as a lover. Dorian is
suscepti- ble to Lord Henry’s poisonous influence because Basil does not
know how to facilitate an open dialogue with his beloved. When they
do talk in private, their discourse is uncomfortable and combative, and
we see that Dorian is prone to fits of anger. All the while, Basil longs for
Dorian to remain as a still, silent model, and when Dorian refuses to play
this part, Basil walks away. In the end, Dorian exacts revenge for this
objectification by permanently silencing the artist: “He rushed at him,
and dug the knife into the great vein that is behind the ear, crushing the
man’s head down on the table, and stabbing again and again.” 196 He
repeatedly attacks Basil in the neck and by doing so inhibits him from
uttering any last words. But even in his dying moments, Basil manages to
defy Dorian: he gives up his life with “a stifled groan, and the horrible
sound of some one choking with blood.”197
Jowett and Pater are important sources for understanding how the
aestheticism of The Picture of Dorian Gray complicates and defies the
Victorian construct of Platonic eros. Both of these Oxford scholars cre-
ated a literary vocabulary that positioned male love in a positive light.
Jowett’s “Introduction” to the Symposium validates Platonic love as a
friendly, spiritual bond that has the potential to provide England with
the best and noblest men. The fact that Jowett took such care to evade
192 L.
the sexual meaning of eros indicates that, for him, male love was also a
dangerous concept. Yet, Jowett remained confident that a flawed attempt
at Platonic love was still preferable to no attempt at all. When we turn
to Pater’s counter-discourse in The Renaissance, we are confronted with
another mixed message. Pater’s Winckelmann is a pioneering scholar
because he found the freedom to live and love like a pagan. The young
men in Winckelmann’s life informed his theories on Classical sculpture,
but Winckelmann’s “fervent friendships” also left him vulnerable.
In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Basil Hallward synthesizes these com-
peting Platonic discourses. Basil is obsessed with the male body, but he
cannot speak plainly about his attraction to Dorian. In the private dia-
logues between Basil and Dorian, we see that Basil cannot live up to his
own aesthetic philosophy. The safety measure of intellectualizing desire
to avert exposure fails when Basil is at his most vulnerable; in those face-
to-face encounters that follow the death of Sibyl Vane. The dark irony
of The Picture of Dorian Gray is that intellectual dialogue is not a part
of the creative and personal relationship between Basil and Dorian. The
lovers in Wilde’s novel do not find the “harmony of soul and body,”
and the sexual energy of the Socratic style of dialectic exchange is
warped into an anguished agon, a struggle for silence, which empties the
Platonic ideal of its positive meanings.
NOTES
1. The Picture of Dorian Gray was published in April 1891; it was followed
by Intentions (May 1891), Lord Arthur Saville’s Crime and Other Stories
(June 1891), and A House of Pomegranates (November 1891). All of
these works first appeared in periodicals, with the exception of two
short stories from A House of Pomegranates: “The Fisherman and His
Soul” and “The Star Child.” The publication history for these works is
outlined by Josephine M. Guy and Ian Small, Oscar Wilde’s Profession:
Writing and the Culture Industry in the Late Nineteenth Century
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 47.
2. Joseph Bristow, ‘Introduction’, in The Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890
and 1891 Texts, ed. Joseph Bristow, in The Complete Works of Oscar
Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–contin-
uing), 3: xiii. Bristow establishes that Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine
“enjoyed a solid reputation as a respected United States periodical
renowned for its publication of modern, mostly American, fiction”:
Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xiii. The magazine published novelettes
rather than serialized stories, and the publication of The Picture of

Dorian Gray marks the point when Lippincott’s began to publish the
work of British authors. See Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xvi–xvii.
3. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xii.
4. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xiii.
5. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xix. Yet another duality arises from the fact
that the book was published in small and large editions that targeted
different audiences. The small-paper edition was sold at the standard
price of 6 shillings, which would have attracted readers who were
reasonably well off. By contrast, the large, deluxe editions were printed
on handmade paper and signed by Wilde. The deluxe edition featured
lettering and floral designs by Charles Ricketts, and it sold for 21
shillings (or 1 guinea). The price, along with the high-end presentation
of the novel, signalled that it was intended for a select audience, which
included wealthy con- noisseurs and book collectors. See Bristow,
‘Introduction’, 3: xxi.
6. This idea echoes the sentiments of Pater’s controversial conclusion
to Studies of the History of the Renaissance (1873). When reflecting on
the brevity of life, Pater urges his reader to “grasp at any exquisite
passion … or any stirring of the senses, strange dyes, strange colours,
and curious odours, or work of the artist’s hands, or the face of one’s
friend … What we have to do is to be for ever curiously testing new
opinions and courting new impressions, never acquiescing in a facile
orthodoxy, of Comte, or of Hegel, or of our own”: The Renaissance:
Studies in Art and Poetry—The 1893 Text, ed. Donald L. Hill
(Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press,
1980), 189. The ‘Conclusion’ was omitted from the revised 1877 and
1888 editions of the text because Pater was concerned that his ideas
would be misinterpreted by young readers, but it was restored in the
1893 edition. See Joseph Bristow, ‘Commentary’, in The Picture of
Dorian Gray: The 1890 and 1891 Texts, ed. Joseph Bristow, in The
University Press, 2000–continuing), 3: 360.
7. Wilde’s copy of the Symposium is held at the British Library (Eccles col-
lection, 478). The item is catalogued as a book “Formerly owned by
Oscar Wilde with extensive pencil marginal notes, comments and scor-
ings in Wilde’s hand throughout.” I have included a list of the markings
that I observed in Appendix.
8. When commenting on the cultural impact of Jowett’s translations, Frank
M. Turner remarks that “[h]is translations were small masterpieces of
English prose that brought the dialogues into the mainstream of good
literature in the same way that Pope’s translation had transformed
Homer into an English classic”: The Greek Heritage in Victorian Britain
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981), 415.
194 L.
9. This work is commonly referred to as The Renaissance, which is a short-

ened form of Pater’s revised title.
10. A number of scholars have established that Dorian is seduced by
Wotton’s words, which are a pastiche of Pater’s suggestive aes-
thetic prose. See Nikolai Endres, ‘Locating Wilde in 2004 and in the
Fourth Century BCE’, Irish Studies Review 13, no. 3 (2005): 307–8;
Stefano Evangelista, British Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism,
Reception, Gods in Exile (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 155;
and Camille Paglia, Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti
to Emily Dickinson (Cumberland: Yale University Press, 1990), 516–17.
11. Bristow, ‘Commentary’, 3: 361–62. This information came to light
when Wilde was questioned about The Picture of Dorian Gray during
his libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry, which I mention in
Chapter 6. It is uncertain if Wilde was telling the truth about his con-
nection with Pater. Gerald Monsman argues that Wilde had the oppor-
tunity to visit Pater in Oxford in February 1890. He therefore suggests
it is possible that Pater read the manuscript on this occasion. See Gerald
Monsman, ‘The Platonic Eros of Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde: “Love’s
Reflected Image” in the 1890s’, English Literature in Transition, 1880–
1920 45, no. 1 (2002): 27. See also Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xxxix.
12. Paiderastia is an Ancient Greek word that means “the love of boys.” A
paiderastic relationship is a male–male relationship involving an adult
and an adolescent youth.
13. When commenting on the reception of The Picture of Dorian Gray
(1890), Bristow mentions that Wilde received a lot of fan mail from
American readers. He also points out that he “has found no evidence
of hostility in the American press”: Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: l, li, n.
101.
14. This list of adjectives is based on Gagnier’s survey of the British reviews
of The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). See Regenia Gagnier, Idylls of
the Marketplace: Oscar Wilde and the Victorian Public (Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press, 1986), 58–59.
15. Linda K. Hughes, ‘Periodical Poetry, Editorial Policy, and W. E.
Henley’s Scots and National Observer’, Victorian Periodicals Review 49,
no. 2 (Summer 2016): 202–3. The Scots Observer was originally based in
Edinburgh and operated under this title until 15 November 1890, when
it was re-branded as the National Observer. By 1891, the National
Observer had relocated to London.
16. Unsigned notice, Scots Observer, 5 July 1890, 181, in Stuart Mason
[Christopher Sclater Millard], Art and Morality: A Record of the
Discussions Which Followed the Publication of “Dorian Gray” (London:
Frank Palmer, 1912), 75.
17. Unsigned notice, Scots Observer, 5 July 1890, 181, in Mason, Art and
Morality, 76.
18. Unsigned notice, Scots Observer, 5 July 1890, 181, in Mason, Art and
Morality, 76.
19. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xlviii.
20. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xlviii.
21. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: xlviii. In 1895, Wilde was prosecuted under
the same law and received the harshest sentence, which was two years
imprisonment with hard labour. I discuss Wilde’s three criminal trials
and the law (commonly known as the “Labouchere Amendment”) that
prohibited homosexual acts in Chapter 6.
22. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: l.
23. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: lii–liii.
24. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: lii–liii.
25. Bristow, ‘Introduction’, 3: liv. Please refer to Bristow’s introduction to
the 1890/1891 editions of The Picture of Dorian Gray for a detailed list
of additions and deletions that Wilde made to manuscript and
typescript copies when preparing the 1891 text. See Bristow,
‘Introduction’, 3: lii–lv.
26. One month before the 1891 edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray was
released, Wilde published his preface (under the title “A Preface to
‘Dorian Gray’”) in the March 1891 issue of the Fortnightly Review.
27. Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray [1891], in The Picture of
Dorian Gray: The 1890 and 1891 Texts, ed. Joseph Bristow, in The
University Press, 2000–continuing), 3: 167.
28. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 167, 168.
29. Wilde’s letter is dated 27 June 1890, but it was published on 28 June.
See Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Editor of the St. James’s Gazette’, 27 June
1890, in The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and
Rupert Hart-Davis (London: Fourth Estate, 2000), 429–31.
30. Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Editor of the St. James’s Gazette’, 27 June 1890, in
31. Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Editor of the St. James’s Gazette’, 27 June 1890, in
Complete Letters, 430–31.
32. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 167.
34. Turner, Greek Heritage, 414.
35. This essay was published in Essays and Reviews, which included contri-
butions from seven Anglican clergymen. Dowling describes these essays
as “a controversial collection of ‘Germanizing’ theological speculation.”
See Linda Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford
36. Daniel Orrells, Classical Culture and Modern Masculinity (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2011), 113.
196 L.
37. For example, when Karl Otfried Mü ller addressed the Spartan culture
of paiderastia in Die Dorier (1824), he endeavoured to “state the exact
circumstances of this relation and then make some general remarks on
it; but without examining it in a moral point of view”: Mü ller, as quoted
by Orrells, Classical Culture, 82. The English translation of Die Dorier
was published in 1839 and was entitled The History and Antiquities of
the Doric Race. See Orrells, Classical Culture, 77.
38. Along with Jowett, Bristow Wilson, and Roland Williams were also
prosecuted for their contributions to Essays and Reviews. See Richard
Dellamora, Masculine Desire: The Sexual Politics of Victorian Aestheticism
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), 59.
39. Turner, Greek Heritage, 415–16.
40. Turner, Greek Heritage, 431.
41. Lesley Higgins, ‘Jowett and Pater: Trafficking in Platonic Wares’,
Victorian Studies 37, no. 1 (Autumn 1993): 48.
42. Higgins, ‘Jowett and Pater’, 48.
44. Benjamin Jowett, ‘Introduction’ to Symposium, in The Dialogues of Plato,
2nd ed., vol. 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1875), 4.
45. Jowett, ‘Introduction’, 7. Pausanias and Agathon are an example of a
male couple who shared a sexual relationship and became long-term
companions. Pausanias was the elder partner in the relationship, and
Agathon was his beloved. Little is known about Pausanias, although he
does have a large speaking role in the Symposium. Agathon was a tragic
poet, but his plays have not survived. He is often portrayed as a hand-
some, sophisticated young man in Plato’s works. In the Protagoras,
Pausanias and Agathon are mentioned among the guests who witness
the argument between Socrates and the famous sophist philosopher,
Protagoras.
46. Plato, Symposium, trans. Christopher Gill (London: Penguin, 1999),
212d–e.
47. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 215a–219e.
48. Jowett, ‘Introduction’, 20.
51. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 210a–b.
52. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 211c. Gill’s emphasis.
53. Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality, 71. When Dowling makes this
statement, she is referring more broadly to Jowett’s lectures and his
introductions to the dialogues.
54. Jowett, ‘Introduction’, 18. Jowett is referring to Dante Alighieri’s nar-
rative poem, the Divine Comedy, which is a Christian rethinking of the
katabasis narrative. Katabasis myths focus on a hero’s journey to and

safe return from the Underworld, as in Homer’s Odyssey and Virgil’s
Aeneid. In the case of the Divine Comedy, the poet Dante embarks upon
a heroic quest that leads him through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven.
On the journey, Dante is assisted and guided by his love, Beatrice, who
dwells in Heaven.
55. Stefano Evangelista, ‘Walter Pater’s Teaching in Oxford: Classics and
Aestheticism’, in Oxford Classics: Teaching and Learning, 1800–2000,
ed. Christopher Stray (London: Duckworth, 2007), 73.
56. Wilde also refers to Augustine’s City of God in Part II of “The Critic
as Artist.” When Gilbert reflects on aesthetic contemplation and fin
de siècle culture, he remarks: “To us the citta divina is colourless, and
the fruitio Dei without meaning”: Oscar Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’,
in Criticism: Historical Criticism, Intentions, the Soul of Man, ed.
Josephine M. Guy, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 4: 175.
57. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 208e–209b.
58. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 209b.
59. Wilde marks this line with an ‘x’. The latter part of the paragraph is
marked with a line in the margin (‘regarded as … to the human mind’)
and the word ἔρως (erōs).
61. Plato, Symposium, in The Dialogues of Plato, trans. Benjamin Jowett, 2nd
ed., vol. 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1875), 60. Jowett does not label
the sections of Plato’s text. My references therefore relate to the page
numbers in Jowett’s book.
62. The expression “intellectual procreancy” is a term that I have taken
from Dowling’s research on the positive homosexual discourse that was
fostered through the Platonic revival at Oxford.
64. Jowett, ‘Introduction’, 19
67. Orrells maintains that Jowett’s approach to managing these incidents
was “severe,” yet “tender”: Classical Culture, 101–3.
68. There is some dispute as to when the Pater-Hardinge scandal took
place. Laurel Brake has argued that the break between Jowett and
Pater occurred before 1874, whereas Richard Ellmann suggests that
Jowett became aware of the relationship in early 1876. Billie Andrew
Inman has uncovered letters from Hardinge’s friends, which suggest
that he was sent down from Oxford in 1874. See Billie Andrew Inman,
‘Estrangement and Connection: Walter Pater, Benjamin Jowett and
198 L.
William M. Hardinge’, in Pater in the 1990s, eds. Laurel Brake and Ian
Small (Greensboro, NC: ELT Press, 1991), 1–5.
69. Hardinge’s poetry is discussed by Inman, ‘Estrangement’, 13; also
Stefano Evangelista, ‘Walter Pater’s Teaching’, 67.
70. Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988), 60.
71. Rumours suggest that Pater may have been blackmailed by Jowett.
This is recorded in the diary of Arthur Benson, who produced the first
biography on Pater, and was a Balliol undergraduate around the time
when the alleged scandal took place. Benson’s diary (dated between
November 1904 and September 1905) mentions that his friend,
Edmund Gosse, “heard a rumour about Jowett being in possession of
some letters, which he had threatened to use against Pater”: Orrells,
Classical Culture, 104. Another theory is that Pater’s sister, Clara, dis-
covered the letters and alerted Jowett in order to protect her brother’s
reputation. See Inman, ‘Estrangement’, 13.
72. According to Dowling, the proctorship would have provided Pater and
his dependent sisters with an additional income of at least £600. See
Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality, 102–3, n. 16.
73. Pater withdrew his candidacy from the Oxford Professorship in Poetry
in the light of the controversy that was sparked by his ‘Conclusion’ to
the Renaissance. See Bristow, ‘Commentary’, 3: 360. John Addington
Symonds was also overlooked for the Professorship in Poetry, although
he and Pater had been the favoured candidates. Evangelista regards this
outcome as another consequence of their involvement in homosexual
scandals, see Stefano Evangelista, ‘Against Misinterpretation: Benjamin
Jowett’s Translations of Plato and the Ethics of Modern Homosexuality’,
Recherches Anglaises et Nord-Américaines 36 (2003): 14.
74. Evangelista, ‘Walter Pater’s Teaching’, 68.
75. Evangelista, British Aestheticism, 27.
76. Pater, Renaissance, 143.
77. Pater, Renaissance, 143–44.
79. Pater, Renaissance, 150. The Ancient Greek word ὀψιμαθεῖς (opsi-
matheis) can be translated as “late in learning” or “late to learn.”
Donald L. Hill believes that this quote originally appeared in a letter
Winckelmann wrote eleven years after he arrived in Rome. See Donald
L. Hill, ‘Critical and Explanatory Notes’, in The Renaissance: Studies
in Art and Poetry—The 1893 Text, ed. Donald L. Hill (Berkeley, Los
Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1980), 420.
80. Pater, Renaissance, 152. Madame de Staël (Anne Louise Germaine de
Staël-Holstein) was a Swiss-born Enlightenment intellectual and writer
who lived in France during the time of the French Revolution. She
produced novels, travel writing, plays and essays and was influential in
establishing a theory of Romanticism. Pater is quoting from Madame
de Staël’s study of German culture in De l’Allemagne (Germany), 1810,
which was included in Oeuvres completes (1861). See Hill, ‘Notes’, 421.
81. Pater, Renaissance, 145. The Lysis is another Platonic dialogue in which
Socrates assists a love-struck man named Hippothales. Hippothales is in
love with a boy named Lysis, but his love is unrequited. Socrates offers
to speak to Lysis to demonstrate how Hippothales should go about
wooing him. For much of the dialogue, Socrates converses with Lysis
and his friend Menexenus on the nature of male friendship.
86. Heather K. Love has addressed the seductive ambiguity of Pater’s prose
in her study of the ‘Conclusion’ to The Renaissance. She observes that
Pater’s prose style is “both forward and shrinking, both suggestive and
withdrawn”: Heather K. Love, ‘Forced Exile: Walter Pater’s Queer
Modernism’, in Bad Modernisms, eds. Douglas Mao and Rebecca L.
Walkowitz (Durham: Duke University Press, 2006), 28.
90. Orrells provides a good survey of queer scholarship that responds to the
legacy of the Wilde trials. See Orrells, Classical Culture, 188–91.
100. Endres, ‘Locating Wilde’, 311. Since publishing this work, Endres
has revised his position on this subject. In a recent publication, he
argues that The Picture of Dorian Gray presents an idea of sexual rec-
iprocity that is more in line with Roman amor than Greek paider-
astia because it allows for more variation. He considers Petronius’s
Satyricon and Suetonius’s Lives of Ceasar as possible sources for the
homosexual relationships in the novel. See Nikolai Endres, ‘From Eros
to Romosexuality: Love and Sex in Dorian Gray’, in Oscar Wilde and
200 L.
Classical Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and

Iarla Manny (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 251–66. For
more on Dorian Gray and Roman literature, see Iarla Manny, ‘Oscar
as (Ovid as) Orpheus: Misogyny and Pederasty in Dorian Gray and
the Metamorphoses’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity, 267–85.
101. The Dorians were renowned for their self-discipline and military prow-
ess, and, in the nineteenth century, they were believed to have invented
the culture of Greek love. The name Dorian also evokes the title of
Mü ller’s book, History and Antiquities of the Doric Race. See Paul
Cartledge, ‘The Importance of Being Dorian: An Onomastic Gloss
on the Hellenism of Oscar Wilde’, Hermathena 147 (Winter 1989): 7–
15; Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality, 124; Evangelista, British
Aestheticism, 152; and Iain Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 170–
73.
102. Endres, ‘Locating Wilde’, 305.
105. Endres, ‘Locating Wilde’, 307. For example, Ancient Greek vases and
wall paintings depict the elder man touching the shoulder and genitals
of the younger man, and both male figures tend to be shown wearing
floral garlands. These features (excluding the reference to genitals) also
arise when Dorian and Lord Henry converse together in the garden. See
Endres, ‘Locating Wilde’, 307.
107. Endres, ‘Locating Wilde’, 309–10.
109. Marylu Hill, ‘Wilde’s New Republic: Platonic Questions in Dorian
Gray’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley,
Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2017), 235.
110. Hill, ‘Wilde’s New Republic’, 236.
111. Hill, ‘Wilde’s New Republic’, 236–37.
113. Hill, ‘Wilde’s New Republic’, 246.
116. Walter Pater, ‘A Novel by Mr. Oscar Wilde’, The Bookman (October
1891): 59–60, in Mason, Art and Morality, 188.
120. “In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the
full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty”:
Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 169.
121. For descriptions of the dé cor in Wilde’s rooms at Magdalen College,
see Anne Anderson, ‘At Home with Oscar: Constructing the House
Beautiful’, The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies 24 (2009):
29–30; Christopher Armitage, ‘Blue China and Blue Moods: Oscar
Fashioning Himself at Oxford’, in Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings,
and His World, ed. Robert N. Keane (New York: AMS, 2003), 17–18;
John Dougill, Oxford in English Literature: The Making, and Undoing,
of ‘The English Athens’ (162); and Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 45–46.
Some biographical accounts suggest that Wilde also set up a decora-
tive easel in the house he shared with Frank Miles on Sailsbury
Street. See Anderson, ‘At Home with Oscar’, 29–30. More recently,
Bristow has revealed that the house was located on Tite Street, and
Miles’s art studio was in fact located on Sailsbury Street. See Joseph
Bristow, ‘Introduction’, in Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories,
Archives, ed. Joseph Bristow (Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
in association with the UCLA Center for Seventeenth- and
Eighteenth-Century Studies and the William Andrews Clark
Memorial Library, 2013), 14.
123. Wilde attended the opening of the Grosvenor Gallery and published a
review of this event (entitled “The Grosvenor Gallery”) in the July 1877
issue of the Dublin University Magazine. Wilde established a connec-
tion with Pater by sending him a complimentary copy of the article.
Fortunately, Pater’s response has survived because Wilde made a copy
of the letter for his friend, William Ward. See Oscar Wilde, ‘Wilde to
William Ward’, 19 July 1877 in Complete Letters, 59.
125. Dorian Gray is not defined in relation to any institutions of education.
We learn of the solitary and private nature of Dorian’s earlier education
in Chapter 10, when he places his portrait in the attic, which was previ-
ously used as a school room. Dorian’s education is exceptional because
he remains confined within the home and is prevented from forming
any friendships with boys or young men of his own age and social rank.
130. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 173. Similar language is used when Basil recalls
the moment he asked to be introduced to Dorian: “Suddenly I found
202 L.
myself face to face with the young man whose personality had so
strangely stirred me”: Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 174.
131. Along similar lines, Ross characterizes the relationship between Lord
Henry and Dorian as “a decadent re-enactment of Alkibiades with
Socrates”: Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 168.
132. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 215c–d.
133. Plato, Symposium, trans. Jowett, 68. Gill translates this passage as fol-
lows: “I don’t know if any of you have seen the statues inside Socrates
when he’s serious and is opened up. But I saw them once, and they
seemed to me so divine, golden, so utterly beautiful and amazing, that–
to put it briefly–I had to do whatever Socrates told me to”: Plato,
Symposium, trans. Gill, 216e–217a.
134. Plato, Symposium, trans. Jowett, 67.
135. Paglia, Sexual Personae, 519. Paglia’s analysis refers to Plato’s Phaedrus.
She interprets Basil’s paleness and terror as “the ‘shudder,’ ‘awe’ and
‘fever’ and ‘perspiration’ afflicting the philosopher who encounters a
human embodiment of ‘true beauty’”: Paglia, Sexual Personae, 519.
136. Jeff Nunokawa, Tame Passions of Wilde: The Styles of Manageable Desire
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003), 139–40.
137. Nunokawa, Tame Passions, 139.
142. These figures also feature in Wilde’s story, “The Young King” (1891),
which also interlinks themes of aesthetic consumption with homo-
sexual desire. See Naomi Wood, ‘Creating the Sensual Child: Paterian
Aesthetics, Pederasty and Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales’, Marvels and Tales
16, no. 2 (2002): 163; John Charles Duffy, ‘Gay-Related Themes in the
Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde’, Victorian Literature and Culture 29, no. 2
(September 2001): 335.
146. Ann Herndon Marshall, ‘Winckelmann and the Anti-Essentialist Thrust
in Dorian Gray’, in Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings and His World,
ed. Robert N. Keane (New York: AMS Press, 2003), 156; Wilde,
Dorian Gray, 3: 177.
148. Plato, Symposium, trans. Jowett, 60.
149. Plato, Symposium, trans. Gill, 209d.

153. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 182, 183. Dorian Gray mimics this relationship
dynamic in his romance with Sibyl Vane. Sibyl’s performance does not
require a verbal response from Dorian, who enjoys watching Sibyl from
a distance. One could argue that Dorian’s aestheticism is more detached
than Basil’s because he is reluctant to become acquainted with Sibyl.
The romance unravels soon after Dorian makes himself known to Sibyl
and declares his love in person.
167. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 264; original ellipsis.
170. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 293–95.
171. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 297–98.
173. The expression “passion of the eye” derives from Nunokawa’s analysis of
Salomé and The Picture of Dorian Gray: Tame Passions, 121–60.
181. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 299; original ellipsis.
182. Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 264, 177.
184. Jarlath Killeen interprets the theme of false worship in Dorian Gray as
“an ironically perverted version of Catholicism”: The Faiths of Oscar
204 L.
Wilde: Catholicism, Folklore and Ireland (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave

Macmillan, 2005), 99. Dorian and his admirers “worship a man whose
body and soul have been split apart, rather than the glorified body and
soul of Christ in its resurrected and transubstantiated form”: Killeen,
Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 99. Conversely, Frederick S. Roden argues that
“Dorian Gray concerns the transformation of a soul through a body,”
and therefore, Dorian can be regarded as both Christ and the anti-
Christ: Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture (New York:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), 141.
188. Guy Willoughby, Art and Christhood: The Aesthetics of Oscar Wilde
(Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1993), 73;
Wilde, Dorian Gray, 3: 299.
189. I am quoting the version of the prayer (from the Book of Common
Prayer) that is included in Bristow’s Commentary. See Bristow,
‘Commentary’, 3: 420.
193. Marshall, ‘Winckelmann’, 150. In Pater’s account, Winckelmann is
strangled in his hotel room by a “fellow-traveller” named Arcangeli and
is discovered in time to receive the last sacrament: Pater, Renaissance,
156–57. Most biographical accounts suggest that Winckelmann stag-
gered onto the staircase at his hotel and died of multiple stab wounds.
See Marshall, ‘Winckelmann’, 157.
194. Marshall, ‘Winckelmann’, 155.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anderson, Anne. ‘At Home with Oscar: Constructing the House Beautiful’. The
Armitage, Christopher. ‘Blue China and Blue Moods: Oscar Fashioning Himself
at Oxford’. In Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings, and His World. Edited by
Robert N. Keane, 15–24. New York: AMS, 2003.
Bristow, Joseph. ‘Commentary’. In The Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890 and
1891 Texts. Edited by Joseph Bristow, 358–456. In The Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde. Vol. 3. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Bristow, Joseph. ‘Introduction’. In The Picture of Dorian Gray: The 1890 and
1891 Texts. Edited by Joseph Bristow, xi–lxviii. In The Complete Works of Oscar
Wilde. Vol. 3. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Bristow, Joseph. ‘Introduction’. In Wilde Discoveries: Traditions, Histories,
Archives. Edited by Joseph Bristow, 3–39. Toronto: Toronto University
Press in association with the UCLA Center for Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-
Century Studies and the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, 2013.
Cartledge, Paul. ‘The Importance of Being Dorian: An Onomastic Gloss on the
Hellenism of Oscar Wilde’. Hermathena 147 (Winter 1989): 7–15.
Dellamora, Richard. Masculine Desire: The Sexual Politics of Victorian
Aestheticism. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990.
English Athens’. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1988.
Duffy, John Charles. ‘Gay-Related Themes in the Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde’.
Victorian Literature and Culture 29, no. 2 (September 2001): 327–49.
Endres, Nikolai. ‘Locating Wilde in 2004 and in the Fourth Century BCE:
Platonic Love and Closet Eros in the Picture of Dorian Gray’. Irish Studies
Review 13, no. 3 (2005): 303–16.
Endres, Nikolai. ‘From Eros to Romosexuality: Love and Sex in Dorian Gray’.
In Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity. Edited by Kathleen Riley, Alastair J.
L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 251–66. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2017.
Evangelista, Stefano. ‘Against Misinterpretation: Benjamin Jowett’s Translations
of Plato and the Ethics of Modern Homosexuality’. Recherches Anglaises et
Nord-Américaines 36 (2003): 221–22.
Evangelista, Stefano. ‘Walter Pater’s Teaching in Oxford: Classics and
Aestheticism’. In Oxford Classics: Teaching and Learning, 1800–2000. Edited
by Christopher Stray, 64–77. London: Duckworth, 2007.
Press, 2000.
Higgins, Lesley. ‘Jowett and Pater: Trafficking in Platonic Wares’. Victorian
Studies 37, no. 1 (Autumn 1993): 43–72.
Hill, Donald L. ‘Critical and Explanatory Notes’. In The Renaissance: Studies
in Art and Poetry—The 1893 Texts. Edited by Donald L. Hill, 277–463.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980.
206 L.
Hill, Marylu. ‘Wilde’s New Republic: Platonic Questions in Dorian Gray’. In

Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity. Edited by Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L.
Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 231–50. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Hughes, Linda K. ‘Periodical Poetry, Editorial Policy, and W. E. Henley’s Scots
and National Observer’. Victorian Periodicals Review 49, no. 2 (Summer
2016): 202–7.
Inman, Billie Andrew. ‘Estrangement and Connection: Walter Pater, Benjamin
Jowett and William M. Hardinge’. In Pater in the 1990s. Edited by Laurel
Brake and Ian Small, 1–20. Greensboro, NC: ELT Press, 1991.
Jowett, Benjamin. ‘Introduction’ to Symposium. In The Dialogues of Plato. 2nd
ed. Translated by Benjamin Jowett, 3–22. Vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1875.
Love, Heather K. ‘Forced Exile: Walter Pater’s Queer Modernism’. In Bad
Modernisms. Edited by Douglas Mao and Rebecca L. Walkowitz, 19–43.
Durham: Duke University Press, 2006.
Manny, Iarla. ‘Oscar as (Ovid as) Orpheus: Misogyny and Pederasty in Dorian
Gray and the Metamorphoses’. In Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity.
Edited by Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 267–
85. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Marshall, Ann Herndon. ‘Winckelmann and the Anti-Essentialist Thrust in
Dorian Gray’. In Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings and His World. Edited
by Robert N. Keane, 149–62. New York: AMS Press, 2003.
Mason, Stuart [Millard, Christopher Sclater]. Art and Morality: A Record of the
Discussions Which Followed the Publication of “Dorian Gray”. London: Frank
Palmer, 1912 [c. 1907].
Monsman, Gerald. ‘The Platonic Eros of Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde: “Love’s
Reflected Image” in the 1890s’. English Literature in Transition, 1880–1920
45, no. 1 (2002): 26–45.
Nunokawa, Jeff. Tame Passions of Wilde: The Styles of Manageable Desire.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.
Paglia, Camille. Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily
Dickinson. Cumberland: Yale University Press, 1990.
Pater, Walter. The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry—The 1893 Text.
Edited by Donald L. Hill. Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of
California Press, 1980.
Plato. Symposium. In The Dialogues of Plato. 2nd ed. Translated with

Introductions by Benjamin Jowett, 23–74. Vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1875.
Plato. Symposium. Translated by Christopher Gill. London: Penguin Books,
1999.
Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
Press, 2013.
Turner, Frank M. The Greek Heritage in Victorian Britain. New Haven, CT: Yale
Wilde, Oscar. ‘The Critic as Artist’. In Criticism: Historical Criticism,
Intentions, the Soul of Man. Edited by Josephine M. Guy, 123–206. Vol.
4. In The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2000–continuing.
Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray [1891]. In The Picture of Dorian Gray:
The 1890 and 1891 Texts. Edited by Joseph Bristow. Vol. 3. In The Complete
Willoughby, Guy. Art and Christhood: The Aesthetics of Oscar Wilde. Rutherford,
NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1993.
Wood, Naomi. ‘Creating the Sensual Child: Paterian Aesthetics, Pederasty and
Oscar Wilde’s Fairy Tales’. Marvels and Tales 16, no. 2 (2002): 156–70.
CHAPTER 6
Wilde and Douglas:

Redefining the Beloved
In the seventeen years since completing his degree at Oxford, Oscar

Wilde established himself as an intellectual of many guises. His literary
career brought him fame, fortune, and the notoriety he had longed for in
his younger years. But for Wilde, the creative process was not just a mat-
ter of writing; it also involved enjoying the company of young men. Many
of Wilde’s younger friends were emerging artists, poets, and
intellectuals, the likes of which included Robert Ross, André Gide, Pierre
Louÿs, John Gray, and, of course, Lord Alfred Douglas (who was
commonly known as “Bosie”). Wilde encouraged his friends in their
artistic endeavours and was inspired by them in turn. That said, his
interactions with young men did not exactly accord with the code of
intellectual intimacy that was central to collegial life at Oxford, as
discussed in Chapter 5.
The relationship between Wilde and Lord Alfred Douglas began in
1891. Douglas was a great fan of The Picture of Dorian Gray and accom-
panied his cousin, Lionel Johnson, on a visit to see Wilde at his home
in Tite Street, Chelsea.1 At the time, Douglas was studying Classics at
Magdalen College and had become interested in writing sonnets, much
like Wilde in his undergraduate years (see Chapter 2). While at Oxford,
Douglas was a renowned homosexual figure. He expressed his sexu-
ality through his poetry and his role as the editor of the Spirit Lamp,
which was an undergraduate literary magazine.2 Under Douglas’s edi-
torship, the Spirit Lamp embraced the publication of homoerotic poetry

210 L.
and attracted contributions from famous homosexual authors, includ-

ing Wilde, John Addington Symonds, and Lord Henry Somerset. 3
Between 1894 and 1895, however, the connection between Wilde and
Douglas became problematic because Douglas’s father, John Sholto
Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensberry, objected to their relation-
ship. Queensberry attempted to intervene by writing threatening letters
to his son, and when this tactic failed, he began to intimidate Wilde.
Queensberry stalked Wilde and Douglas when they were together in
public, threatened Wilde at his home, and had to be prevented from
humiliating him at the opening night of The Importance of Being Earnest
(1895).4
On 28 February 1895, Wilde received a slanderous calling card
from Queensberry at the Albemarle Club. Wilde decided to sue for
criminal libel because the message implied that he was a sodomite. 5
Queensberry’s handwriting was difficult to decipher; it looked as though
the message addressed Wilde as a “ponce and somdomite” [sic.], but it
was later revealed that the Queensberry had accused him of “posing as
a sodomite.”6 The libel trial began on 3 April. It was a devastating case
for Wilde because Queensberry pleaded not guilty on the grounds of jus-
tification, and worse still, he produced witnesses to prove his case. Most
of the witnesses for the defence were young men associated with male
prostitution, and their involvement in the case was quite unexpected
because they had to incriminate themselves by speaking out against
Wilde.7 According to Section 11 of the 1885 Criminal Law Amendment
Act (also known as the Labouchere Amendment), homosexual inti-
macy was a criminal offence, even in cases where the sex was consensual
and carried out in private. 8 On account of this law, Wilde’s case against
Queensberry was withdrawn (on 5 April) before any of the witnesses for
the defence had a chance to testify. Unfortunately for Wilde, the witness
statements were sent to the authorities, and on the same day, he was
arrested for gross indecency.9
The first criminal trial against Wilde commenced on 26 April and
concluded on 1 May. It was a complicated case because Wilde was
tried together with Alfred Taylor, a man who, in the words of Douglas
Murray, “made a living by introducing wealthy aristocratic men to
young working-class lads willing to offer sex for ready money.” 10 The
pair were charged with committing twenty-five counts of indecency
and conspiring to commit those acts, although the conspiracy charge
was dropped during the trial.11 The case against Wilde was based on
6 WILDE AND DOUGLAS: REDEFINING THE BELOVED
evidence relating to events that had taken place in September 1893, and
as Wilde’s lawyer, Sir Edward Clarke, argued, the witness accounts could
not be relied upon given the significant lapse in time. 12 Literary evi-
dence from the Queensberry trial was revisited, which included passages
from The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde’s “Phrases and Philosophies for
the young”, two of Wilde’s love letters to Douglas, along with homo-
erotic literature that was written by Douglas and other authors. 13 The
court heard evidence from several young men who described the expen-
sive gifts and private dinners they received from Wilde. These witnesses
also recalled occasions when they had stayed in Wilde’s hotel rooms and
detailed the intimate acts they had performed with him. When the case
concluded, the jury found Taylor not guilty, but failed to reach a verdict
on the charges against Wilde.14 Consequently, Wilde’s case was retried at
the next available criminal court session.15
The evidence used against Wilde in the second trial was unchanged,
but on 25 May, he was convicted for committing seven counts of inde-
cency.16 Although Wilde was tried individually, he received the harshest
sentence permitted by the law, which was two years prison with hard
labour. Based on Michael S. Foldy’s study of the Wilde trials, we know
that there were several reasons why the final case went against Wilde.
For starters, Wilde’s second trial commenced as soon as Taylor had been
retried and convicted.17 The jury’s perception of Wilde would have been
influenced by the recent newspaper coverage of Taylor’s case, as well as
the extensive publicity surrounding Wilde’s previous criminal trial, and
his failed suit against Queensberry.18 The judge who presided over the
second trial, Sir Alfred Wills, demonstrated his bias against Wilde by
repeatedly commenting on the abhorrent nature of his alleged crimes
during the trial and by encouraging the jury to convict in his summation
speech.19 Justice Wills also sealed Wilde’s fate by allowing the jury to
consider the result of libel trial and the literary evidence from that case;
this evidence had been rejected in the previous trial.20
This chapter considers the way that Wilde evokes the intellectu-
al-spiritual paradigm of eros when addressing his relationship with Lord
Alfred Douglas in writing that he produced before and during the time
of his imprisonment. I argue that Wilde conceptualizes eros as an intel-
lectual collaboration which ought to facilitate artistic production. The
first part of my analysis draws on H. Montgomery Hyde’s record of
the three criminal cases in The Trials of Oscar Wilde: Regina (Wilde) v.
Queensberry, Regina v. Wilde and Taylor (1948). Hyde’s reconstruction
212 L.
of the Wilde trials is based on newspaper reports, the memory of wit-

nesses who attended the trials, and previous publications on the sub-
ject.21 My analysis begins by focusing on Wilde’s court testimony, as
he emphasizes Douglas’s status as a fellow poet and intellectual to talk
his way around the subject of male-male desire. This information will
be compared with the love letters Wilde wrote to Douglas as the inde-
cency trials were taking place, between April and May 1895. In these let-
ters, Wilde reflects on the spiritual significance of his relationship with
Douglas and portrays his lover as a spiritual teacher, an object of wor-
ship, and a source of artistic inspiration.
Most of the discussion in this chapter relates to Wilde’s prison let-
ter to Douglas, which is approximately 55,000 words in length. 22 It is
thought that Wilde composed this text over a period of three months,
between January and March 1897, while he was serving the final part
of his sentence at HM Prison Reading (also known as Reading Gaol). 23
The prison letter is a unique prose work because it fulfils two objectives:
it begins and ends with a bitter assessment of Wilde’s love affair with
Douglas; however, the middle section of the text includes a critical com-
mentary on the aesthetic significance of Christ’s life and teachings. As I
noted in the Introduction, several versions of this document have sur-
faced since Wilde’s death. I will be working with Rupert Hart-Davis’s
edition because this text is derived from Wilde’s original prison manu-
script, which is housed in the British Library.24
In the prison letter, we see Wilde deploying mythical narratives to
produce a finely crafted, but highly antagonistic, record of his history
with Douglas. This personal agenda leads Wilde to modify the intimate,
educational philosophy of Oxford, as he begins to assess whether his pre-
vious relationships enhanced or detracted from his creative work as an
author. As Wilde engages in a painstaking analysis of Douglas’s character
flaws, he realizes that Douglas failed to satisfy his intellectual needs and
begins to view Christ as an alternative beloved. In prison, Wilde had to
forgo his attachment to aesthetic objects and the comforts of the “house
beautiful,” but, he discovered that he could continue to practise aesthetic
consumption by contemplating and responding to the gospels of the
New Testament. The boundless love of Christ inspires Wilde to contem-
plate the spiritual significance of his time in prison and to respond to
the radical aesthetic of sorrow, which is associated with Christ’s artistic
legacy.
1 CLASSICISM IN THE COURTROOM

In the presence of William Butler Yeats, a fellow Irishman and poet,
Wilde made a pertinent observation about the two cultures that gave
him a love of the spoken word: “we Irish are too poetical to be poets;
we are a nation of brilliant failures, but we are the greatest talkers since
the Greeks.”25 Wilde was recognized as one of the greatest talkers of
his age, and his comment to Yeats indicates that his remarkable talent
was influenced by his Irish heritage, as well as his Classical education.
Wilde’s ability to captivate audiences is recorded in his famous speech
on “the love that dare not speak its name,” which was an expression that
Lord Alfred Douglas used to allude to homosexual love in his sonnet,
“Two Loves.”26 Douglas wrote the poem in 1892 and published it in
the December 1894 issue of the Chameleon: a single-issue Oxford under-
graduate magazine that featured homosexual literary content. 27 “Two
Loves” is well-known today because Wilde was questioned about the
moral implications of the poem during the libel trial, and also in the sub-
sequent indecency trials.
In all three cases, the lawyers opposing Wilde attempted to position
him as a sexual predator who posed a danger, both to society, and young
society men, like Douglas. For example, Charles F. Gill, the Crown
Prosecutor in the first indecency trial, argued that Douglas’s poem
“relates to natural love and unnatural love.”28 Wilde, however, did not
falter under the pressure of cross-examination. He responded by assign-
ing male love a Classical and Biblical precedence, suggesting that it is the
basis of Western culture and the stuff of great art:
“The Love that dare not speak its name” in this century is such a great
affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and
Jonathan, such as Plato made the very basis of his philosophy, and such as
you find in the sonnets of Michelangelo and Shakespeare. It is that deep,
spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect. It dictates and pervades
great works of art like those of Shakespeare and Michelangelo, and those
two letters of mine, such as they are. It is in this century misunderstood,
so much misunderstood that it may be described as the “Love that dare
not speak its name,” and on account of it I am placed where I am now.
It is beautiful, it is fine, it is the noblest form of affection. There is noth-
ing unnatural about it. It is intellectual, and it repeatedly exists between
an elder and a younger man, when the elder man has intellect, and the
214 L.
younger man has all the joy, hope and glamour of life before him. The
world mocks at it and sometimes puts one in the pillory for it.
Loud applause, mingled with some hisses.29
Wilde’s vindication of “the love that dare not speak its name” was so
compelling that it warranted loud applause. When considering the
“spontaneous applause of the Old Bailey spectators,” Linda Dowling
argues that “Wilde’s triumph must at a deeper level also be seen as the
triumph of a Victorian Hellenism that had been gradually developing
throughout the nineteenth century.”30 In court, Wilde reverted back
to the popular construction of Platonic love as an intellectual relation-
ship between an elder and a younger man. He even mimicked Benjamin
Jowett’s mode of translation by grouping Biblical scripture, Plato, and
Renaissance poetry (which I have discussed in Chapter 5), together in
one powerful sentence. We have seen a similar description of male-male
love in The Picture of Dorian Gray, although the novel does not refer to
the Biblical lovers, David and Jonathan, or to the lovers in Plato’s dia-
logues. As Wilde defended this ideal in the witness stand, he reinforced
the link between intellectual intimacy and artistic creativity. When
speaking publicly about the private interactions between men, Wilde
inserted himself into the Western tradition of poet-lovers who found
their inspiration in the beauty of a young man.
Wilde consistently described his relationship with Douglas as an artis-
tically motivated friendship, especially when his love letters to Douglas
were discussed in court. The most well-known letter is often referred to
as the “Hyacinthus letter” because Wilde draws a connection between
Douglas and the mythological youth, Hyacinthus, who is loved by the
god Apollo. Hyacinthus experiences an untimely death when he is acci-
dently killed while playing a game of discuss with Apollo. Upon his
death, Hyacinthus’s body transforms into a hyacinth flower. 31 Wilde
wrote the “Hyacinthus letter” in January 1893, in response to an aes-
thetic love poem that he received from Douglas.32 The letter fell into
the hands of blackmailers after it was “found” by Alfred Wood—a young
unemployed clerk who was known to both Wilde and Douglas. 33 The
blackmail attempts on Wilde were unsuccessful, but the original letter
was produced as evidence in the libel trial by Wilde’s lawyer (Edward
Clarke) in order to explain the literary significance of the text. Of
course, when Queensberry’s lawyer (Edward Carson) questioned Wilde
about the letter, he suggested that it presented Douglas as an object of
homosexual desire. Carson asked Wilde to explain why he addressed

Douglas, “a boy nearly twenty years younger” than himself, in the fol-
lowing terms34:
My Own Boy, Your sonnet is quite lovely, and it is a marvel that those red
rose-leaf lips of yours should have been made no less for music of song
than for madness of kisses. Your slim gilt soul walks between passion and
poetry. I know Hyacinthus, whom Apollo loved so madly, was you in
Greek days.35
Wilde firmly defended the artistic integrity of his writing, claiming that
it would be more appropriate to view his letter to Douglas as a prose
poem. When asked if he adored Douglas, Wilde defused the sexual impli-
cation of the question by replying: “No, but I have always liked him. I
think it is a beautiful letter. It is a poem. I was not writing an ordinary
letter. You might as well cross-examine me as to whether King Lear or
a sonnet of Shakespeare was proper.” 36 As Wilde stressed, the relation-
ship that he shared with Douglas was founded on a mutual interest in
literature. For this reason, Wilde conveyed his appreciation of Douglas’s
poetry through a suggestive, poetic letter of his own.
We should note that Wilde’s justification was true in the sense that his
letter had inspired the French Symbolist poet, Pierre Louÿs, to produce a
poetic translation of Wilde’s text. Wilde and Louÿs met in Paris and had
been friends since 1891.37 As their friendship progressed, Wilde enlisted
the help of Louÿs when he was correcting the language in the original
French version of Salomé.38 Louÿs’s Hyacinthus sonnet was written in
French and it appeared in the 4 May 1893 issue of the Spirit Lamp with
a note stating that it was “[a] letter written in prose poetry by Mr. Oscar
Wilde to a friend, and translated into rhymed poetry by a poet of no
importance.”39
The “Hyacinthus letter” was revisited in the second indecency trial,
when it was read out in full. In this instance, Wilde was examined by
Sir Frank Lockwood, who was the Solicitor-General. Lockwood asserted
that the reference to Hyacinthus was downright indecent:
Lockwood: Why did you choose the words, ‘My own Boy,’ as a mode of
address?
Wilde: I adopted them because Lord Alfred Douglas is so much younger
than myself. The letter was a fantastic, extravagant way of writing to
216 L.
a young man. As I said at the first trial, it does not seem to me to be

a question of whether a thing is right or proper, but of literary expres-
sion. It was like a little sonnet of Shakespeare.
Lockwood: I did not use the word proper or right. Was it decent?
Wilde: Oh decent? Of course; there is nothing indecent in it.
Lockwood: Do you think that was a decent way for a man of your age to
address a man of his.
Wilde: It was a beautiful way for an artist to address a young man of cul-
ture and charm. Decency does not enter into it.40
Once again, Wilde invoked the legacy of Shakespeare and reinforced

Douglas’s status as a fellow poet, which is encompassed in the expres-
sion, “young man of culture.” Nevertheless, Lockwood asked Wilde if he
was “speaking of love between men.” In reply, Wilde altered the mythol-
ogy of Apollo and Hyacinthus on the spot: “What I meant by the phrase
was that he was a poet, and Hyacinthus was a poet.” 41 When comment-
ing on the discourse surrounding Wilde’s letter, Stefano Evangelista
argues that Wilde formed “an aesthetic understanding of his own homo-
sexuality” in the process of “rewriting Douglas as Hyacinthus.”42 Such
an understanding is true in terms of Wilde’s private correspondence and
the intimate conversations between Basil and Dorian, which are staged
throughout The Picture of Dorian Gray. In court, however, Wilde’s
aesthetic interpretation was undermined by Lockwood’s solid effort to
draw out the sexual implications of the Hyacinthus reference. The other
problem with Wilde’s argument was that Hyacinthus is not commonly
regarded as a poet figure. He is a handsome young Spartan who attracts
the attention of the god of poetry, but that is where the poetic connec-
tion ends. It would be more accurate to say that Wilde misrepresented
the mythology of Hyacinthus in order to deflect attention from the
image of Douglas’s kissable lips.
It is also helpful to consider the love letters that Wilde wrote to
Douglas as the trials were taking place, between April and May 1895,
because these sources expose the spiritual dimension of their relation-
ship. Douglas’s family and friends urged him to leave England, for fear
that he too would be arrested. 43 Douglas, however, chose to stay and
made daily visits to see Wilde in Holloway Prison. 44 When Wilde real-
ized that Douglas’s freedom was at stake, he also advised him to travel
abroad, and so, he departed for France on 24 April.45 A few days later,
on 29 April, Wilde was awaiting the verdict of the first trial. He wrote
to Douglas to assure him that a prison sentence would not destroy their
love:
My dearest boy, This is to assure you of my immortal, my eternal love for

you. Tomorrow all will be over. If prison and dishonour be my destiny,
think that my love for you and this idea, this still more divine belief, that
you love me in return will sustain me in my unhappiness and will make me
capable, I hope, of bearing my grief most patiently.46
When facing the possibility of losing his freedom, Wilde chose to direct
his faith towards Douglas. As if speaking of a profound religious mys-
tery, Wilde professed that his love for Douglas was eternal and divine. 47
When contemplating his separation from Douglas, Wilde implored his
beloved to find comfort in writing poetry: “As for you (graceful boy with
a Christ-like heart), as for you, I beg you, as soon as you have done all
that you can, leave for Italy and regain your calm, and write those lovely
poems which you do with such a strange grace.” 48 Where previously
Wilde associated Douglas’s poetic talent with Classical archetypes, in
this instance, he is reminded of Christ’s unconditional love for humanity.
Wilde’s letter implies that Douglas’s physical and spiritual beauty is
channelled into his poetic compositions; therefore, the writing process
is conceptualized as a sacred, mysterious ritual that is performed by
Douglas.
Similar sentiments are raised in two surviving letters that Wilde
wrote in May, while he was released on bail, before the second trial had
commenced. In the first letter, Douglas gains a miraculous healing
power over Wilde, who believes that he can escape “the thought of
horrible and infamous suffering” by recalling the memory of his lover:
“the simple thought of you is enough to strengthen me and heal my
wounds.”49 The Platonic dynamic is reversed as Wilde identifies the
boyish Douglas as the spiritual teacher in the relationship:
Our souls were made for one another, and by knowing yours through love,
mine has transcended many evils, understood perfection, and entered into
the divine essence of things.
Pain, if it comes, cannot last forever; surely one day you and I will meet
again, and though my face be a mask of grief and my body worn out by
solitude, you and you alone will recognise the soul which is more beau-
tiful for having met yours, the soul of the artist who found his ideal in
you, of the lover of beauty to whom you appeared as a being flawless and
218 L.
perfect. Now I think of you as a golden-haired boy with Christ’s own heart
in you. I know now how much greater love is than everything else. You
have taught me the divine secret of the world.50
Here, Douglas is portrayed as a prophet who shows Wilde that love is

the “divine secret” of life. Douglas’s perfection, in body and soul, is a
source of spiritual and creative revelation. Much like Basil Hallward, the
artist in The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde imagines that Douglas is the
living incarnation of his artistic ideal. If Wilde is to return from prison
with a body that is scarred and worn from his exposure to suffering, his
soul will still be worthy of Douglas’s love.
The second letter dates from 20 May 1895, which marks the start of
the second criminal trial. In this letter, Wilde humbles himself further
still and pledges to revere his beloved through his darkest hours:
[Parting from you] would have mutilated my life, ruined my art, broken
the musical chords which make a perfect soul. Even covered with mud I
shall praise you, from the deepest abysses I shall cry to you. In my solitude
you will be with me. I am determined not to revolt but to accept every
outrage through devotion to love, to let my body be dishonoured so long
as my soul may always keep the image of you. From your silken hair to
your delicate feet you are perfection to me.51
In the process of venerating Douglas, Wilde casts himself as a willing sac-

rificial victim. He had already endured public shaming and anticipated
that he would soon endure physical degradation as a prisoner. Wilde
suffers because the world misunderstands his devotion to the one per-
son who serves as his artistic muse. Like his fictional counterpart, Basil
Hallward, Wilde cherishes the image of his beloved, and his notion of
beauty is bound to the appearance of Douglas’s physical form. But Wilde
elevates his love beyond the physical realm, promising that he will cry
out to Douglas instead of calling on Christ or God. The choice of words,
“I shall praise you, from the deepest abyss I shall cry to you” modifies
the language of Psalms 130, which begins: “From the depths of my
despair I call to you, Lord” (Psalms 130:1). By appropriating the psalm-
ist’s words of devotion and supplication to God, Wilde makes a god
of Douglas.52 In the love letters that predate Wilde’s prison sentence,
Douglas embodies all that is sacred to Wilde in his life as an artist, and
as a lover who seeks to approximate the spiritual-intellectual aspects of
Oxford Hellenism, without ignoring Douglas’s physical beauty.
2 FINDING FAULT
Within five days of writing to Douglas, Wilde’s worst fears were real-
ized, as the second criminal trial resulted in a guilty verdict. This part
of the analysis will address Wilde’s lengthy prison letter to Douglas. In
this text, the imperfection of Douglas’s nature is laid bare to the reader
before Christ enters the narrative and assumes the mantle as the ideal
beloved. As Wilde makes clear at the beginning of his letter, he was furi-
ous at Douglas for generating more unwanted publicity about the tri-
als while he was serving out his prison sentence. At that point, Douglas
was effectively living in exile in France and Italy. Douglas was ostracized
and hounded by the press because of his connection with Wilde, yet, he
remained loyal and took to writing in order to defend Wilde’s reputa-
tion.53 ln August 1895, Douglas was invited to write an article about the
Wilde trials for the Mercure de France. Douglas began work on the arti-
cle and planned to include excerpts from love letters Wilde had written
to him as the trials were taking place. 54 The problem was that Douglas
was unable to contact Wilde and ask for his permission to reproduce the
letters.55 Wilde was only allowed to receive and write one letter every
three months, amounting to a total of four letters per year. 56 Douglas
mistakenly assumed that Wilde would be in favour of the article, but
when Wilde learned about it from his friend, Robert Sherard, he asked
Sherard to intervene on his behalf. Sherard contacted the editor of the
Mercure de France and made it clear that Wilde did not authorize the
publication of his letters.57 When Douglas found out about Wilde’s reac-
tion, he chose to abandon the article, as he could not bear to release it
without making any reference to Wilde’s personal writing.58
Tensions between Wilde and Douglas were further strained when
Douglas was preparing his first collection of poetry for publication.
Douglas’s poems were being published by the book division of the
Mercure de France, and so, the journal cross-promoted Douglas’s forth-
coming work by publishing his introduction in the 1 June 1896 issue. 59
In this piece, Douglas reflected on the injustice of the Wilde trials and
offered a defence of homosexuality. As Murray has noted, Douglas’s
comments provoked “a stream of criticism from the public and from
journalists,” which was certainly not the response he had hoped for. 60
Despite the negative publicity, Douglas intended to dedicate his book to
Wilde; once again, he failed to consult Wilde on the matter. 61 Douglas
did not take account of the possibility that Wilde would not want to be
220 L.
associated with a book of homosexual love poetry, especially one that

included two of the sonnets that were mentioned in his trials: “Two
Loves” and “In Praise of Shame.”62 When Douglas finally grasped the
negative implications for Wilde, he called-off the publication. The
book, however, was eventually released in October 1896 without a
dedication.63
As readers and scholars, we must be cautious when approaching
Wilde’s representation of Douglas in his prison letter. Throughout
the letter, Wilde tends to misrepresent the past in order to dramatize
his present state of suffering. In fact, a number of commentators have
acknowledged that Wilde’s writing is influenced by the tradition of
confessional religious writing.64 Ellis Hanson interprets Wilde’s letter
as a text that transforms the act of confession into an elaborate literary
performance.65 Wilde, Hanson says, is “the author of the framework
through which his sins are to be interpreted,” and these “[s]ins become
precious works of art that decorate and sustain his own Christian trag-
edy.”66 By comparison, Regenia Gagnier views the letter as an autobi-
ography that is filtered through “a self-serving biography of Douglas.” 67
With this in mind, it is necessary to consider Douglas as a literary charac-
ter who features in Wilde’s aestheticized record of the past.
The prison letter was clearly addressed to Douglas, and Wilde
intended for him to have the original copy of the manuscript when
he was working on it in prison. After Wilde completed his prison sen-
tence, he entrusted his friend, Robert Ross, with the responsibility of
creating typescript copies of the letter and forwarding the original text
to Douglas.68 Interestingly, Ross went against Wilde’s wishes by send-
ing Douglas a typescript copy; he did so because he feared that Douglas
would destroy the original. Douglas claimed that he never received
the document and there are two variations of his story. The first is that
Douglas recalled receiving a long, typed letter from Ross when Wilde
was still in prison, and he was living in France. This document included
some quotes from Wilde’s letters, but after reading the first few pages,
Douglas tore it up and threw it into the Marne River.69 Upon reflec-
tion, he later conceded that the destroyed text could have been a
copy of Wilde’s prison letter. But, as Murray suggests, it is unlikely
that Douglas ever received the prison letter; if he had, he would have
surely recognized some of the material in Ross’s excised version of the
text, which was published in 1905 under the title of De Profundis.70
The second version of events came to light in 1913, when Douglas
sued Arthur Ransome (who was an English journalist and biographer)

for libel following the publication of his book, Oscar Wilde: A Critical
Study (1912).71 At the time of the court case, Douglas alleged that he
was unaware of the existence of the complete prison manuscript and did
not know it was addressed to him until he read about it in Ransome’s
book.72 When commenting on this case, Ian Small acknowledges
that Douglas’s claim is quite plausible, given that it would have been
extremely reckless to sue Ransome unless he genuinely “had no prior
knowledge of the full contents of Wilde’s prison manuscript.” 73 Either
way, it was impossible for Douglas to access the original manuscript
because it had been sealed away in the British Museum Library for fifty
years. Ross made this decision to avoid legal action from Douglas and
his family, but, as Bristow has pointed out, “Douglas protested (per-
haps rightly) that the document initially placed in Ross’s hands, and then
handed over to the museum, was his.”74
So far, Regenia Gagnier’s study of the complete prison letter remains
one of the most influential works of scholarship because it addresses
how the structure of Wilde’s writing reflects the conditions of the
Victorian prison system. Wilde served his prison sentence while the Du
Cane system was in effect (1877–1898). The Du Cane system was
designed to deter criminal activity by subjecting prisoners to prolonged
periods of solitary confinement and enforced silence. According to
Gagnier, these conditions “frequently resulted in permanent
insanity.”75 In light of this historical context, Gagnier identifies a
structural split between romance and realism in Wilde’s writing. It
should be noted, however, that the structure and narrative focus of
prison letter can be nar- rowed-down to three key sections. Wilde adopts
a highly accusatory tone at the beginning of the letter, as he endeavours
to document Douglas’s past mistakes and the character flaws he
observed over the course of their relationship. The autobiographical
component of the prison letter involves an obsessive tallying-up of
times, dates, locations, and the expenses Wilde incurred because of
Douglas. For Gagnier, the inclusion of such mundane details is indicative
of Wilde’s need to recreate the real world outside and “make sense of his
own confinement.”76
Towards the middle of the letter, the obsessive, angry passages
are offset by Wilde’s desire to forgive Douglas and to find a spiritual
meaning for his imprisonment. Importantly, the subject of forgiveness
prompts Wilde to reflect on Christ’s identity as an artist and an individu-
alist. As Gagnier has noted, Wilde “seems to forget Douglas altogether”
222 L.
as his attention shifts towards the romantic aestheticization of Jesus

Christ.77 In the final section of the letter, Wilde revives his attack on
Douglas, but he also expresses a desire to reunite with Douglas when he
imagines what life will be like after his release from prison.
Wilde’s representation of Douglas is fractured by two conflicting
motives: Wilde seeks to reform Douglas by documenting all of his mis-
takes, and, at the same time, he cannot resist the urge to blame Douglas
for the suffering he has endured. These two aims are signalled early
on, as the manuscript begins with a rebuke. Wilde establishes that he
is writing to Douglas to alleviate the disappointment of “[passing]
through two long years of imprisonment without ever having received a
single line from you, or any news or message even, except such as gave
me pain.”78 Here, it seems that Wilde is alluding to Douglas’s contri-
butions to the Mercure De France and his controversial book of poetry.
Initially, Wilde tries to lessen the sting of his attack by insisting that
he is confronting painful memories to help Douglas achieve personal
growth:
The real fool, such as the gods mock or mar, is he who does not know
himself. I was a such a one too long. You have been such a one too
long. Be so no more. Do not be afraid. The supreme vice is shallowness.
Everything that is realised is right. Remember also that whatever is misery
to you to read, is still greater misery to me to set down.79
Linda Dowling proposes that the exercise of writing to Douglas is an

attempt, on Wilde’s part, “to restore the true relations between older
lover and younger beloved, erastēs and erōmenos, which had been so
inverted in their actual friendship, returning it to the ‘hearer/inspirer’
dyad of Dorian and Platonic love.” 80 Douglas can be liberated from his
vices “by genuinely hearing what his lover now teaches,” and ultimately
“realize himself as a man.”81 At the same time, the restorative, educa-
tional, premise of the letter is undermined by Wilde’s impulse to mythol-
ogize Douglas’s cruelty and indifference:
To you the Unseen Powers have been very good. They have permitted you
to see the strange and tragic shapes of Life as one sees shadows in a
crystal. The head of Medusa that turns living men to stone, you have been
allowed to look at in a mirror merely. You yourself have walked free
among the flowers. From me the beautiful world of colour and motion has
been taken away.82
In mythology, Medusa is a female monster known as a gorgon and is

often portrayed with a hideous face, serpentine hair, and glaring eyes.
As Wilde mentions, anyone who met Medusa’s gaze turned to stone,
and she retained this incredible power after she was decapitated by the
hero Perseus. Perseus succeeded in killing the gorgon because the gods
provided him with an arsenal of divine weapons, which included a mir-
ror-like shield from the goddess, Athena. Perseus set upon Medusa while
she was sleeping and averted her deadly gaze by looking at the reflective
surface of his shield.83 In context of Wilde’s prison letter, Medusa is the
monster that Wilde battles in his day-to-day life in prison.
In other correspondence from this period, Wilde used the metaphor
of turning to stone to describe the emotional hardening that results from
institutionalization. For instance, Wilde repeated this idea in a letter to
Robert Ross, dated 1 April 1897: “In point of fact, Robbie, prison-life
makes one see people and things as they really are. That is why it turns
one to stone.”84 As the world of colour and motion outside the prison
felt increasingly out of reach, Wilde feared that he was becoming more
withdrawn, more isolated, and less capable of communicating. Writing
to Douglas was the only action he could take to mitigate what we might
call the “Medusa-effect” of the prison system. But, if we are to believe
Wilde’s account, Douglas emerges as a cowardly figure who witnesses
the unfolding of Wilde’s tragedy from a safe distance.
After his release from HM Prison Reading, Wilde wrote a letter to the
editor of the Daily Chronicle (a left-leaning English newspaper) on the
issue of prison reform. In this reflective article, Wilde provides an insight
into the physical and mental isolation that prisoners experienced on a
daily basis:
Deprived of books, of all human intercourse, isolated from every humane

and humanising influence, condemned to eternal silence, robbed of all
intercourse with the external world, treated like an unintelligent animal,
brutalised below the level of any of the brute creation, the wretched man
who is confined in an English prison can hardly escape becoming insane. 85
The passage quoted above emphasizes the intellectual restrictions that

were imposed on prisoners. For Wilde, the most devastating aspect of
prison life was that it denied him the freedom to talk with others and
significantly limited his access to literature. Wilde and his friends had to
appeal to prison authorities for special permission to donate books and
224 L.
provide Wilde with access to writing materials. 86 During the first three
months of his sentence, he could not access any literature apart from
the King James Bible, a prayer book, and a hymn book, which were on
hand in his cell.87 When Wilde was granted permission to request new
books for the prison (in July 1896), he requested a number of reli-
gious texts, including a copy of the Greek New Testament. Until these
books arrived, he had to occupy his mind with the contents of the prison
library. The library collection contained basic books on education, reli-
gion, and popular fiction; all of which had been censored by the prison
chaplain.88 We encounter yet another reference to petrification when
Wilde addresses the restrictions to letter writing (see above). Wilde
believed that this policy was unnecessarily cruel: “One of the tragedies
of prison life is that it turns a man’s heart to stone. The feelings of nat-
ural affection, like all other feelings, require to be fed. They die easily of
inanition.”89
When reflecting on his involvement with Douglas, Wilde retrospec-
tively measures the quality of this relationship in relation to his own
artistic output. Contrary to court testimonies and the letters Wilde lov-
ingly addressed to Douglas in 1895, his prison letter suggests that there
was nothing intellectual nor inspirational about his love for Douglas:
I blame myself for allowing an unintellectual friendship, a friendship

whose primary aim was not the creation and contemplation of beautiful
things, to entirely to dominate my life. From the very first there was too
wide a gap between us. You had been idle at your school, worse than idle
at your university. You did not realise that an artist, and especially such an
artist as I am, one, that is to say, the quality of whose work depends on the
intensi- fication of personality, requires for the development of his art the
companionship of ideas, and intellectual atmosphere, quiet, peace and
solitude. … you could not understand the conditions requisite for the
production of artistic work.90
In his aesthetic criticism, as discussed in Chapter 4, Wilde establishes

that idleness is tied to intellectual contemplation, and the freedom to
abstain from work facilitates the production of art. Wilde alleges that
Douglas’s idleness was disruptive, and this meant that their partnership was
intellectually empty. Douglas is no longer described as a fellow poet or a
man of culture; rather, he is an inattentive schoolboy who cannot
comprehend the needs of an artist. Contrary to Wilde’s assertion, we
could argue that Douglas received a better education than Wilde
because he attended
Winchester College, which was a prestigious English public school that

attracted pupils from aristocratic families, as well as studying at Oxford.
Although Douglas was not as dedicated to his studies as Wilde was, it
is not fair to suggest that he was an idle student. While Douglas was at
Winchester, he co-founded, edited, and contributed to a popular school
magazine called the Pentagram.91 As I mentioned earlier, he also pur-
sued his passion for literature at Oxford through his work on the Spirit
Lamp.
At one point, Wilde attempted to assist Douglas with his studies
while he was preparing for the Greats exam. Wilde invited Douglas and
his tutor, Campbell Dodgson, to stay with him at a holiday house in
Babbacombe, Devon. In a letter to Douglas’s tutor, Wilde humorously
signs off as “Oscar Wilde, Headmaster Babbacombe School,” and ends
the letter with a humorous study-timetable that he devised for Douglas:
Babbacombe School
Headmaster – Mr Oscar Wilde
Second Master – Mr Campbell Dodgson
Boys – Lord Alfred Douglas
Rules.
Tea for masters and boys at 9.30a.m.
Breakfast at 10.30.
Work. 11.30-12.30.
At 12.30 Sherry and biscuits for headmaster and boys (the second master
objects to this).
12.40-1.30. Work.
1.30. Lunch.
2.30-4.30. Compulsory hide-and-seek for headmaster.
5. Tea for headmaster and second master, brandy and sodas (not to
exceed seven) for boys.
6-7. Work.
7.30. Dinner, with compulsory champagne.
8.30-12. Ecarté, limited to five-guinea points.
12-1.30. Compulsory reading in bed. Any boy found disobeying this rule
will be immediately woken up.92
If anything, it seems that Wilde indulged Douglas’s disinclination

to study. Most of the time in the school schedule is allotted to eating,
drinking, and playing cards, which leaves Douglas with three hours
of study and some reading time in bed to cram for a difficult exam.93
226 L.
Douglas’s tutor also recognized that his student was more interested in
leisurely pursuits than ensuring that he a good grasp of all of the phil-
osophical material that was covered in the Greats curriculum. Dodgson
acknowledged that Douglas was “enchanted with Plato’s sketch of dem-
ocratic man” but he was wary of his student’s casual attitude towards
his studies: “[w]e do no logic, no history, but play with pigeons and
children and drive by the sea.” 94 Quite tellingly, William F. Shuter
reminds us that Douglas was not interested in achieving academic suc-
cess: “Douglas left Oxford in the summer of 1893 without taking
Greats, writing to the college authorities, ‘I really don’t care twopence
about having a degree’.”95 It turned out that Douglas was ill when the
honours exams took place, and he passed on the offer to sit a private
exam to complete his degree. 96 By contrast, Wilde was very proud of his
Double First and believed that his time at Oxford was a defining period
in his adult life. This personal connection is most poignantly expressed
in the prison letter when Wilde writes: “I want to get to the point when
I shall be able to say, quite simply and without affectation, that the two
great turning-points of my life were when my father sent me to Oxford,
and when society sent me to prison.”97 Wilde was certainly aware that
Douglas was not a natural scholar, but perhaps this was part of his
charm. After all, Wilde’s letter from Babbacombe reveals that studying
with Douglas was a great deal of fun because he prioritized leisure over
academic work.
Interestingly, Wilde emphasizes Douglas’s failure to achieve aca-
demic success at school and university and even questions whether it is
appropriate to consider him as an Oxford gentleman. He suggests that
Douglas lacked the intellectual flexibility that was the mark of a graduate
who had been shaped by Greats: “you had not yet been able to acquire
the ‘Oxford temper’ in intellectual matters, never, I mean, been one
who could play gracefully with ideas but had arrived at violence of opin-
ion merely.”98 The assault on Douglas is especially cutting when Wilde
remarks: “during the whole time we were together I never wrote one
single line … my life, as long as you were by my side, was entirely sterile
and uncreative.”99 This statement appears to be another exaggeration on
Wilde’s part, considering that Douglas was with Wilde when he wrote his
most celebrated play, The Importance of Being Earnest.100 Furthermore,
Murray alerts us to the fact that “Douglas claimed that much of the
repartee in the play was the result of conversations between him and
Wilde.”101 There is another inconsistency to consider when evaluating
Wilde’s attack against Douglas. Although Douglas is blamed for arresting

Wilde’s artistic development, we must concede that this so-called sterile
and uncreative relationship inspired Wilde to write under the most diffi-
cult circumstances.
When Dowling reflects on the vitriolic passages in Wilde’s prison let-
ter, she determines that “the inescapable irony” of Wilde’s text is not
that the “Victorian public could not understand what Wilde meant by
a ‘pure’ Platonic love or a ‘higher life’ of spiritual procreancy, but that
the Oxford Hyacinthus, Douglas himself, could not.”102 Moreover,
as Wilde reflects on his motives for writing the “Hyacinthus letter,” he
undermines the earlier construction of Douglas as a talented poet who
warranted his admiration. Wilde implies that the allusion to Hyacinthus
should have been interpreted as an artful expression of flattery:
You [Douglas] send me a very nice poem, of the undergraduate school

of verse, for my approval: I reply by a letter of fantastic literary conceits.
I compare you to Hylas, or Hyacinth, Jonquil or Narcisse, or someone
whom the great god of Poetry favoured, and honoured with his love.
The letter is like a passage from one of Shakespeare’s sonnets, transposed
to a minor key. It can only be understood by those who have read the
Symposium of Plato, or caught the spirit of a certain grave mood made
beautiful for us in Greek marbles.103
Although Wilde concedes that Douglas’s poem was “very nice,” he

undercuts this compliment by noting that it was a juvenile work, written
by an undergraduate who was merely flirting with poetry. By extension,
Wilde features as the Apollonian counterpart to Douglas, the youthful
Hyacinthus who does not fully appreciate the fantastic letter that Wilde
penned for him. Interestingly, Wilde claims that he would have written
the same sort of letter “to any graceful young man of either University
who had sent me a poem of his own making, certain that he would have
sufficient wit, or culture to interpret rightly its fantastic phrases.” 104
That is to say, Wilde regrets that he entrusted the letter to Douglas and
assumed that he would treasure it, rather than allowing it to enter into
the public domain where “every construction but the right one [was]
put on it.”105
Wilde, however, is so focused on defining the limitations of his rela-
tionship with Douglas that he fails to explain how he contributed to
Douglas’s intellectual life. It is as though Wilde felt entitled to some sort
of intellectual gain from his young lover, and in retrospect, he concluded
228 L.
that Douglas did not contribute very much to the creative process. In
another revealing passage from the prison letter, Wilde describes his
involvement with Pierre Louÿs (whom I mentioned earlier), and the
English poet, John Gray, to emphasize the intellectual disparity between
himself and Douglas:
When I compare my friendship with you to my friendship with such still

younger men as John Gray and Pierre Louÿs I feel ashamed. My real life,
my higher life was with them and such as they.
Of the appalling results of my friendship with you I don’t speak at pres-
ent. I am thinking merely of its quality while it lasted. You had the rudi-
ments of an artistic temperament in its germ. But I met you either too late
or too soon, I don’t know which.106
In this passage, Wilde acknowledges that Douglas showed potential as a

writer, but lacked the artistic maturity to sustain a productive, inspiring
relationship. Gray and Louÿs exemplify the longed-for Classical arche-
type of male love; however, Louÿs was born in the same year as Douglas,
and John Gray was four years older. 107 It appears that Wilde lied about
their ages to strengthen the idea of a Platonic partnership, which
involved an elder and younger man. Wilde’s connection with Gray and
Louÿs began in the early 1890s, although, it is odd that Wilde mentions
these two men, given that his friendship with them ended in 1893.
Wilde and Gray were on close terms before Wilde’s involvement
with Douglas intensified. It is commonly thought that Wilde named the
hero of his novel Dorian Gray in honour of John. As time went by Gray
became more uncomfortable with his association with Wilde because he
did not want to draw attention to his sexuality.108 By contrast, Louÿs was
delighted with Wilde and his circle of young male companions when he
visited England in 1892; it was at this time that Louÿs formed a friend-
ship with Gray. Louÿs decided to terminate his connection with Wilde
after witnessing his cruelty towards his wife, Constance. Louÿs was visit-
ing Wilde at the Albemarle Hotel, where he was living with Douglas. 109
Constance arrived the hotel to deliver Wilde’s mail and begged him to
return home. She left in tears after Wilde callously remarked that he
had forgotten the address.110 Although these relationships failed, Wilde
stresses that he was better off spending time with Gray and Louÿs,
instead of directing his attention to Douglas, who proved to be a lesser
man and a lesser poet.
After pointing out Douglas’s intellectual deficiencies, Wilde accounts

for the expenses and debts that he incurred because of Douglas. These
financial details reveal that the experience of pleasure was, for the most
part, defined by acts of consumption. Wilde begins by blaming himself
“for having allowed [Douglas] to bring me to utter and discreditable
financial ruin,” and estimates that “between the autumn of 1892 and
the date of my imprisonment I spent with you and on you more than
£5000 in actual money, irrespective of the bills I incurred.” 111 This exor-
bitant figure is broken down into the cost of luncheons, dinners, alcohol,
general amusements, gambling, transport expenses, and accommoda-
tion for Douglas. Despite adopting a self-reproaching attitude, Wilde
accuses Douglas of devouring his earnings on everyday frivolities: “You
demanded without grace and received without thanks. You grew to think
that you had a sort of right to live at my expense.” 112 Jarlath Killeen
regards this blaming as a rhetorical technique that absolves Wilde of all
culpability:
These self-accusations, however, place Wilde in a completely passive role.

It turns out that he did nothing actively wrong that put him in prison,
but merely allowed certain things to be done to him. In other words,
the self-accusations are really attacks on Douglas. … Self-blame is both
accepted and denied persistently. Wilde berates himself for having wasted
his life in the pursuit of Pleasure, while claiming that he is not in fact sorry
for having eaten of the Tree of Knowledge.113
Following Killeen’s reading, we might add that Wilde retreats into the
role of the passive lover, and in doing so, he avoids the issue of his failure
as the elder lover in the relationship. Effectively, Wilde was quite willing
to shower Douglas with material goods to maintain a relationship that
was based on physical attraction and enjoyment, rather than intellectual
companionship.
The debts that remain in Wilde’s name are also evidence of the love
that he expressed through consumption. Towards the end of the prison
letter, Wilde’s list of outstanding debts transforms into a sumptuous cat-
alogue of the fine food and wine that he and Douglas shared in happier
times:
The Savoy dinners – the clear turtle-soup, the luscious ortolans wrapped in
their crinkled Sicilian vine-leaves, the heavy amber-coloured, indeed almost
230 L.
amber-scented champagne – Dagonet 1880, I think, was your favour-

ite wine? – all have still to be paid for. The suppers at Willis’s, the special
cuvée of Perrier-Jouet reserved always for us, the wonderful pâtés
procured directly from Strasburg, the marvellous fine champagne served
always at the bottom of great bell-shaped glasses that its bouquet might
be the better savoured by the true epicures of what was really exquisite
in life – these cannot be left unpaid, as bad debts of a dishonest client.114
For Gagnier, the scenes that recreate life with Douglas are an antidote
to the stasis and the monotony that Wilde experienced in prison: “with
the remembrance of French, French food, and French style, and the rep-
etition of how things ‘always’ were ‘served’ and ‘reserved’ for him, the
pre-prison world is triumphantly reconstituted in the kind of timelessness
that fixed the world of imprisonment.”115 As he recalls these imported
delicacies and fragrant champagnes, Wilde reconnects with the world
beyond prison and the world beyond England as well. Wilde’s recollec-
tion of the decadent Savoy menu attests to the fact that he and Douglas
both appreciated that fine food and wine could be enjoyed as another
form of aesthetic consumption. At the same time, these pleasurable
memories are dampened by the awareness of the significant debts Wilde
incurred, which are a painful reminder of his former connoisseur
lifestyle. At another point in the letter, Wilde appropriates the lion-
cub parable from Aeschylus’s Agamemnon (720–730) to vilify
Douglas. In Aeschylus’s drama, the Chorus of Mycenean elders
interprets the fall of Troy as the consequence of Paris’s doomed
marriage to Helen. Aeschylus ominously refers to this union as a κῆδος
(kēdos), which can mean either a “connection by marriage” or
“mourning.”116 The Chorus likens this fatal union to the story of a man
who raises a lion-cub and is destroyed by the creature that he has loved
and cared for. Aeschylus’s words reso- nate with Wilde, as he identifies
Douglas as the lion-cub in his own per-
sonal tragedy:
Of course I should have got rid of you. I should have shaken you out of
my life as a man shakes from his raiment a thing that has stung him. In the
most wonderful of all his plays Aeschylus tells us of the great Lord who
brings up in his house the lion-cub, the λέοντος ἶνιν [leontos inin], and
loves it because it comes bright-eyed to his call and fawns on him for its
food: ϕαιδρωπὸς ποτὶ χεῖρα, σαίνων τε γαστρὸς ἀνάγκαις [phaidrōpos poti
cheira, sainōn te gastros anagkais].117 And the thing grows up and shows
the nature of its race, ἦθος τὸ πρὸσθε τοκὴων [ēthos to prosthe tokēōn], and
destroys the lord and his house and all that he possesses. 118 I feel that I
was such a one as he. But my fault was, not that I did not part from you,
but that I parted from you far too often.119
The parallel between Helen and the lion-cub offers a rich source of
ammunition for Wilde.120 Like the lion-cub, Douglas is said to have
gained fine food, presents, and money from Wilde. Moreover, this trou-
bled alliance devastated Wilde and his family, as the decision to sue
Queensberry resulted in Wilde’s bankruptcy and left him estranged
from his wife and two sons. Wilde even claims that he was sent to prison
because he made the mistake of showing kindness to Douglas and his
relatives: “But for my pity and affection for you and yours, I would not
now be weeping in this terrible place.” 121 In Wilde’s account, Douglas
features as a beautiful monster and an agent of ruin, whereas Wilde
assumes the role of the unwitting victim who tried, but failed, to extri-
cate himself from a fatal friendship.
Society and the justice system deemed Wilde to be a sexual pred-
ator who preyed upon young, vulnerable men, however, Wilde uses
Aeschylus’s words to stress that he was manipulated by Douglas all
along. The choice to align Douglas with the lion-cub—the beast that
shows the “nature of its race”—implies that he is as nasty as his father.
Although Queensberry was an absent father throughout most of
Douglas’s childhood, he created tension in the family by writing threat-
ening letters to his wife, Lady Sibyl Queensberry. In fact, Queensberry’s
treatment of his wife was so bad that the courts granted her a divorce
on the grounds of adultery and cruelty. 122 Unfortunately, the hateful let-
ters continued after the divorce, and Queensberry also vented his anger
towards his adult sons.123
An example of Queensberry’s maliciousness can be seen in a letter to
Douglas, from 1 April 1894, which addresses the relationship between
his son and Wilde. In this letter, Queensberry discloses that he is pre-
pared to disown and disinherit his son if continues his relationship with
Wilde. Queensberry emphasizes the disgust he felt upon seeing the pair
together and mentions a rumour about Wilde’s sexuality:
I am not going to try and analyse this intimacy, and I make no charge; but
to my mind to pose as a thing is as bad as to be it. With my own eyes I saw
you both in the most loathsome and disgusting relationship as expressed
by your manner and expression. … Also I hear on good authority, but this
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may be false, that his wife is petitioning to divorce him for sodomy and
other crimes … If I thought the actual thing was true, and it became
public property, I should be quite justified in shooting him at sight.124
When Douglas replied to this letter, he provoked his father even fur-
ther by resorting to a humorous insult. Queensberry mentioned that
he refused to read any more letters from his son, therefore, Douglas
responded via telegram with the message: “What a funny little man you
are.”125 As the hostilities increased, Douglas felt it necessary to carry a
pistol at all times in case of a violent encounter with his father.126
In Wilde’s prison letter, the paternal association between
Queensberry and Douglas is reinforced with the expression, “leontos
inin,” which can be translated as the “son of a lion.” 127 Most translators
tend to favour gender-neutral terms like “lion’s cub” or “lion’s offspring,”
but a gen- dered translation might be more appropriate in this case
because Wilde is implying that Douglas is just as bad as his father. At one
point, Wilde mentions that Douglas has a tendency to write “revolting
and loathsome letters” when he is overcome with rage, and Wilde
perceives this behaviour as a “dreadful mania you inherited from your
father.”128 The subject of paternal ancestry is raised again when Wilde
refers to his correspondence with Douglas’s mother: “She saw, of
course, that heredity had burdened you with a terrible legacy, and
frankly admitted it, admitted it with terror: he is ‘the one of my children
who has inherited the fatal Douglas temperament,’ she wrote of you.” 129
If Wilde is to attack Douglas for his past actions, he must also concede
that aggression is in his blood; it is a “terrible legacy” that has been
passed on from father to son. The allusion to what Killeen has termed as
“the mad, bad, Douglas race” implies that nature has also had a hand in
Wilde’s undoing, as it is within Douglas’s nature to attack and hurt those
who love him most.130 By adapting Aeschylus’s poetry for his own
purposes, Wilde retaliates against Douglas and dramatizes his own
victimization in one eloquent strike. Hatred did not prevail over Wilde.
Despite his tendency to criticize Douglas for his lack of self-awareness,
Wilde wanted to teach him about the intellectual and spiritual
discoveries that he made in prison.
3 FINDING CHRIST
The competing representations of Douglas in the 1895 love letters and
in the more severe passages of Wilde’s prison letter suggests that Wilde’s
perception of Douglas changed as a result of his conviction. In the latter
work, Douglas’s Christ-like virtues are all but forgotten, however, we

will see that the figure of Christ plays an increasingly important role in
Wilde’s discourse on intellectual friendship. When analysing the prison
letter, Frederick S. Roden recognizes that Wilde transfers his devotion
from the body of Douglas to the immaterial body of Christ: “Bosie’s
body is no longer present and Wilde seeks the spiritual without the
material, instead of through it.”131 Roden therefore argues that “Christ
and Bosie exist as respective substituents: as alternate lovers, one flesh
and the other spirit.”132 We might add that Wilde was moving towards
an aesthetic philosophy that did not require access to well-crafted, aes-
thetically pleasing objects at this stage in his life. Previously, Wilde’s
aestheticism centred on cultivating an intellectual life through the expo-
sure to aesthetic interior design and the consumption of aesthetic liter-
ature. When writing to Douglas from prison, Wilde’s imagination was
sparked by studying the Bible, and he was eager to inform Douglas of
the spiritual and intellectual growth he achieved through the reading
and writing process. Such growth signals a return to the style of creative
criticism that is mentioned in “The Critic as Artist,” although Wilde was
no longer situated in an aesthetically beautiful environment.133
The remaining part of my analysis will examine how Wilde continues
to associate Platonic love with artistic collaboration when he reflects on
Christ’s aesthetic legacy. Wilde refers to Christ as a revolutionary artist
who inspires others to engage with the subject of sorrow, and, much like
Douglas in the 1895 letters, Christ is identified as a lover, a poet, and a
muse. Moreover, the life of Christ is exalted as the perfect artwork when
Wilde writes: “He is just like a work of art himself. He does not really
teach one anything, but by being brought into his presence one becomes
something.”134
Although Wilde found little comfort in his love for Douglas, he felt it
was necessary to forgive all that had transpired between them in order
to begin a new life after prison. For this reason, Wilde redefines his
imprisonment as a spiritual experience: “I have got to make everything
that has happened to me good for me … There is not a single degradation
of the body which I must not try and make into a spiritualising of the
soul.”135 Nonetheless, Wilde admits that he cannot direct his faith
towards the doctrines of any particular organized religion:
Religion does not help me. The faith that others give to what is unseen, I
give to what one can touch, and look at. My Gods dwell in temples made
with hands, and within the circle of actual experience is my creed made
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perfect and complete: too complete it may be, for like many or all of those
who have placed their Heaven in this earth, I have found in it not merely
the beauty of heaven, but the horror of Hell also. When I think about
Religion at all, I feel as if I would like to found an order for those who
cannot believe: the Confraternity of the Fatherless one might call it, where
on an altar, on which no taper burned, a priest, in whose heart peace had
no dwelling, might celebrate with unblessed bread and a chalice empty of
wine.136
During his time at Oxford, Wilde drew poetic inspiration from the mys-
tery of the resurrection, as symbolized by the Roman Catholic Eucharist
(see Chapter 2). In his prison letter, by comparison, the objects associ-
ated with the communion—the candle, the altar, the bread and wine, the
priest himself—symbolize the emptiness of such rituals to an individual
who is far removed from the ceremony, ritual, and aesthetic grandeur of
the Catholic Church. Wilde, the devoted aesthete, finds God in temples
crafted by human hands, and the Bible is a temple of this sort: it is a
tangible, manmade object, a thing that “one can touch and look at” and
open up to find God in its pages. When stripped of the freedom to con-
verse with others, Wilde retreated into a solitary, literary dialogue with
the scriptures of the New Testament. The willingness to consume the
Bible as an aesthetic text meant that it was possible for Wilde to estab-
lish a literary relationship with Christ, although he no longer believed in
religion.137
The legacy of Greats also influences Wilde’s interpretation of the life
and teachings of Christ. The critical section of the prison letter empha-
sizes Christ’s humanity, and Wilde’s reading of the Bible is informed
by historicist scholarship. Stephen Arata suggests that Ernest Renan’s
Vie de Jésus (The Life of Jesus) (1863) is a key source that shapes Wilde’s
characterization of Christ. Arata acknowledges that Renan’s study “was
harshly criticised not just for denying the divinity of Christ but for
his overall insistence that the Bible be read as a set of historical docu-
ments rather than as divine revelation.”138 This comment could easily
apply to Benjamin Jowett’s early work as a New Testament scholar (see
Chapter 5). Wilde’s historicist approach to reading the Bible is most
noticeable when he refers to the miraculous works of Christ—such as
curing the deaf and blind, expelling demons, feeding the masses, and
resurrecting the dead—as metaphors for a charming personality.139
As Killeen has established: “Wilde constructs a thoroughly secular and
humanist life of Jesus of Nazareth,” to such point that it seems “[t]he

Jesus of faith has simply dropped out of the equation.” 140 Not only does
Wilde reconstruct Jesus as an exceptional individual, above all else, he
regards Christ as an unconventional artist who challenges conventional
notions of beauty by transforming himself into “the image of the Man
of Sorrows.”141 Although this phrase seems to indicate that the human
image is still central to Wilde’s notion of aestheticism, yet, Christ sym-
bolizes the artist’s imaginative capacity to honour and embrace ugliness,
which Wilde interprets as the outward expression of spiritual beauty.
This is a major departure from the aestheticism Wilde promoted in the
1880s and early 1890s, which delights in beautiful surfaces, such as the
sculpturesque body of Dorian Gray, and the catalogues of art objects
that are characteristic of aesthetic interior decoration.
In a particularly revealing passage, Wilde emphasizes the romantic,
poetic elements of Christ’s narrative. As Wilde elaborates on the connec-
tion between Christ and idyllic poetry, Christ begins to assume the quali-
ties that Wilde once admired in Douglas:
Yet the whole life of Christ – so entirely may Sorrow and Beauty be made
one in their meaning and manifestation – is really an idyll, though it ends
with the veil of the temple being rent, and the darkness coming over the
face of the earth, and the stone rolled to the door of the sepulchre. One
always thinks of him as a young bridegroom with his companions, as
indeed he somewhere describes himself, or as a shepherd straying through
a valley with his sheep in search of green meadow or cool stream, or as
a singer trying to build out of music the walls of the city of God, or as a
lover for whose love the whole world was too small.142
Of all of these evocative images, the definition of Christ as a “young

bridegroom” and “lover” stand out most. Figuratively speaking, Christ
is a bridegroom or heavenly spouse to the men and women who take
orders in the Roman Catholic Church and commit themselves to a life
of celibacy and prayer.143 Wilde’s use of pastoral imagery means that it
is also possible to view Christ as a poet-lover from the Classical tradi-
tion. For instance, Guy Willoughby argues that Christ’s rural personae as
a bridegroom, shepherd, singer, and lover all “correspond to the conven-
tional aspects of the shepherd-poet who is both the creator of the Greek
idyll and the principal performer in it.”144 Wilde also reiterates this idea
when he writes: “Christ’s place indeed is with the poets. His whole
236 L.
conception of Humanity sprang right out of the imagination and can

only be realised by it.”145 It is as if Wilde is gently signalling to Douglas
that he has found another male figure to inspire his art, and by compari-
son, Christ is absolutely flawless in his capacity to love. Before Wilde was
sent to prison, he pledged his eternal devotion to Douglas and described
him as a gifted poet, a spiritual teacher, and a loving soul; in this respect,
Wilde’s Hellenized image of Christ is a counterpart to Douglas. As we
have seen, Wilde’s prison letter sheds light upon the uglier aspects of
Douglas’s character, but this information also helps Wilde to clarify his
vision of an aesthetic practice that accommodates suffering.
During the trials, Wilde testified that his sonnet-letter to Douglas was
not motivated by sexual desire, but by the desire to exchange ideas with
him. The same dynamic arises in the prison letter to Douglas; however,
in this case, Wilde believes that he can develop as an artist by studying
Christ’s “imaginative sympathy” with human nature:
[T] he very basis of his nature was the same as that of the nature of the art-
ist, an intense and flamelike imagination. He realised in the entire sphere
of human relations that imaginative sympathy which in the sphere of Art
is the sole secret of creation. He understood the leprosy of the leper, the
darkness of the blind, the fierce misery of those who live for pleasure, the
strange poverty of the rich.146
In his analysis of Wilde’s paradoxical use of Hellenism, Pau Gilabert

Barberà recognizes that that Christ shares Wilde’s paradoxical charm. In
his public life, Wilde was famous for his paradoxical axioms, and accord-
ing to Barberà , Christ is a symbol of perfection who “paradoxically,
comes near to imperfection.”147 We might add that Christ is the perfect
artist precisely because his art and love extends to those who are phys-
ically imperfect or spiritually flawed; Wilde’s criticisms against Douglas
would suggest that he fits into the latter category. Moreover, the para-
doxical figure of Christ is also significant for Wilde because he expected
to return to society as a proverbial leper:
For I have come, not from obscurity into the momentary notoriety of
crime, but from a sort of eternity of fame to a sort of eternity of infamy
… Still, in the very fact that people will recognise me wherever I go, and
know all about my life, as far as its follies go, I can discern something good
for me. It will force on me the necessity of again asserting myself as an art-
ist, and as soon as I possibly can.148
Here, Wilde acknowledges that he ranks alongside the downtrodden

members of Victorian society, which included the “oppressed nationali-
ties, factory children, thieves, people in prison, and outcasts, those who
are dumb under oppression and whose silence is heard only of God.” 149
Wilde had already tasted fame and notoriety in his public life and antici-
pated that he would re-enter society as an infamous outcast. He expected
to be judged and condemned by strangers who knew of the scandalous
trials and were familiar with the details of his conviction.
The aesthetic precedent set by Christ also gives Wilde reason to hope
that he will be recognized for his artistic accomplishments in the future.
He admits that he tried to avoid the uglier elements of life (failure,
dis- grace, poverty, and despair) before his conviction, but asserts
that this is not true of his literature. According to Wilde, the painful
life lessons that he set down in his prison letter were “foreshadowed
and prefigured in [his] art.”150 He goes on to cite several of his works:
“The Happy Prince,” “The Young King,” “The Critic as Artist,” The
Picture Dorian Gray, The Soul of Man, and Salomé. For all of his losses,
Wilde imagines that he will return to the world as a better artist
because of his time in prison: “I now see that sorrow, being the
supreme emotion of which man is capable, is at once the type and test
of all great Art.”151
Through his association with sorrow, Christ functions as a Socratic
teacher figure who assists Wilde to overcome his attachment to
Douglas’s beautiful body. Indeed, Wilde reminds Douglas of the correla-
tion between Christ and Plato’s philosophy of eros when he recalls a con-
versation with another young literary friend: “I remember saying once to
André Gide, as we sat together in some Paris café, … there was nothing
that either Plato or Christ had said that could not be transferred imme-
diately into the sphere of Art, and there find its complete fulfilment.” 152
According to Christ’s “conception of the beautiful,” the soul is perfected
through suffering:
Truth in Art is the unity of a thing with itself: the outward rendered
expres- sive of the inward: the soul made incarnate: the body instinct with
spirit. For this reason there is no truth comparable to Sorrow. There are
times when Sorrow seems to me to be the only truth. … For the secret of
life is suffering. It is what is hidden behind everything. When we begin to
live, what is sweet is so sweet to us, and what is bitter so bitter, that we
inevita- bly direct all our desires towards pleasure, and seek not merely
for a ‘month or twain to feed on honeycomb’, but for all our years to taste
no other food, ignorant the while [sic.] that we may be really starving the
soul.153
238 L.
When writing to Douglas, in 1895, Wilde warned his lover that his time
in prison would disfigure his body and render his face as an unrecognis-
able “mask of grief.”154 But, when he was composing his lengthy prison
letter he wanted Douglas to know that ugliness is the distinguishing fea-
ture of a soul that has been awakened to a higher truth. To communicate
this message, Wilde uses food as a metaphor to suggest that spiritual and
philosophical development are often inhibited by the desire to seek
pleasure instead of pain, thereby keeping the beautiful body intact. In
addition to this, Arata’s analysis of the prison letter reveals that Wilde
says very little about the body of Christ: “his Jesus is an oddly
disembodied figure … [and] Wilde seldom avails himself of the
vocabularies of decadence, eroticism, or even physical beauty when he
writes of Christ.”155 Rather, the Wildean Christ is a poet who articulates
“the voiceless world of pain,” and a compassionate individual who
transforms oppression into a sublime rite of passage: “all who come in
contact with his personality
… somehow find that the ugliness of their sins is taken away and the
beauty of their sorrow revealed to them.”156
If Christ is the ultimate muse for Wilde, he is also the greatest source
of inspiration for modern artists. At one point, Wilde disputes whether
the literary corpus of Ancient Greece, the writings of Dante and
Shakespeare, and the mythic tradition of Ireland, could ever match the
exquisite tragedy of Christ’s crucifixion: “is there anything that for sheer
simplicity of pathos wedded and made one with sublimity of tragic effect
can be said to equal or even approach the last act of Christ’s Passion.” 157
The more Wilde reflects upon Christ’s exceptional mode of aesthetics,
the more he begins to reassert his identity as an artist of the modern
school. It is the bold, iconoclastic Wilde who detects the influence of
Christ in modern literature: “We owe to him the most diverse things
and people. Hugo’s Les Misérables, Baudelaire’s Fleurs du Mal, the note
of pity in Russian novels, the stained glass and tapestries and work of
Burne-Jones and Morris, Verlaine and Verlaine’s poems.”158
Wilde makes a similar observation later in the manuscript when he
reflects on the terrible fate of the satyr, Marsyas.159 In Classical mythol-
ogy, Marsyas is known for inventing or discovering the flute (aulos): in
the latter version of the myth, Athena invents the instrument and dis-
cards it because it distorts her facial features. Marsyas becomes such a
skilled musician that he challenges Apollo to a music contest, but Apollo
wins the contest because he is able to play his lyre (kithara) upside
down. As a result of his defeat, Marsyas is skinned alive by Apollo.160
When Wilde mentions this gruesome mythical episode, he makes refer-

ence to the final section of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy:
When Marsyas was ‘torn from the scabbard of his limbs’ – dalla vagina
delle membra sue, to use one of Dante’s most terrible, most Tacitean
phrases – he had no more song, the Greeks said. 161 Apollo had been victor.
The lyre had vanquished the reed. But perhaps the Greeks were mistaken.
I hear in much modern Art the cry of Marsyas. It is bitter in Baudelaire,
sweet and plaintive in Lamartine, mystic in Verlaine.162
Why is it that Wilde refers to Marsyas instead of Christ? Marsyas may

be viewed as another radical artist who challenges the establishment—
as represented by Apollo and the lyre. Like Christ, Marsyas dies for the
sake of his art and is subjected to an excruciating, undignified death.
Wilde specifically associates the cry of Marsyas with the work of
nineteenth-century French poets, but given the circumstances under
which Wilde was writing, he too emerges as a modern-day Marsyas. In
this instance, Wilde recasts himself as another visionary poet who truly
understands the modernist aesthetic. The modern voice of poetry is
beautiful because it is so uncomfortable, full of anguish, and, importantly
for Wilde, this mode of expression liberates the artist from the
commercial imperative to appeal to a popular audience.163
Just as sorrow coloured the work of his artistic peers, Wilde pre-
dicted that he would only want to write about the truths he confronted
in prison in the future: “If I ever write again, in the sense of producing
artistic work, there are just two subjects on which and through which I
desire to express myself: one is ‘Christ, as the precursor of the romantic
movement in life’: the other is ‘the Artistic life considered in its relation
to Conduct.’”164 The incongruity of this statement has not escaped the
notice of Willoughby, who recognizes that Wilde sufficiently addresses
both of these topics in his prison letter, as well as in the critical and cre-
ative works that came before it. 165 Indeed, Wilde had already made his
mark on literary culture, and he reminded Douglas not to forget his
achievements: “I was a man who stood in symbolic relations to the art
and culture of my age. I had realised this for myself at the very dawn
of my manhood, and had forced my age to realise it afterwards.” 166 At
this point in the letter, Wilde dismisses society’s hold, hinting that he
may never feel the urge to write again. Perhaps this is because writing
to Douglas was a way to initiate the healing process and alleviate the
240 L.
unbearable silence he had to endure in prison. Despite his best inten-

tions, the romance of Christ loses momentum, as Wilde slips back into
another damning assault on Douglas towards the end of the prison letter.
But, for a time, Wilde rises above his resentment and shines through as
the sorrowful lover who is determined to share his wisdom with
Douglas. Of all the literary works that Wilde has produced, his prison
letter to Douglas stands apart as the most personal, emotionally charged
example of aesthetic criticism. It can be difficult to process Wilde’s
ideas as he shifts back and forth between his thoughts on Douglas and
Christ, from his life in prison, to his thoughts on what the future may
hold. Based on Hyde’s account of Wilde’s court testimony and the
surviving love letters he addressed to Douglas, we can recognize that
the ennobling ideals of Oxford Platonism and the tutorial culture of
male friendship also shaped the way that Wilde viewed his relationship
with Douglas. Before he was sent to prison, Wilde honoured Douglas as
a poet who enriched his intellectual life. Yet, Wilde’s prison letter
offers a completely different representation of Douglas’s character.
For the most part, he is the lover at fault: a profligate, an idler,
someone who is spiteful and selfish, an Oxford gentleman who is more
interested in eating and drinking than
playing with ideas.
Then again, we cannot overlook the fact that Wilde’s prison letter
facilitates an intellectual exchange between an elder and a younger man.
Although this dialogue is textual and one-sided, it is a critical, intimate
work, and through it, Wilde strengthens his interpretation of Platonic
eros as a partnership between two artists. Christ, the bridegroom, poet,
lover, and Man of Sorrows, unites with Wilde, the devoted aesthete.
In the process of writing to Douglas, Wilde proved that he could still
experience aesthetic beauty in prison, although the oppressive
conditions often tested his sanity, diminished his use of language, and
made him wonder if his heart had turned to stone.
NOTES
1. Douglas admitted to reading Wilde’s novel nine or fourteen times over
(there is some variation in the surviving accounts). When Douglas met
Wilde for the second time, he received a signed presentation copy of The
Picture of Dorian Gray as a gift. See Douglas Murray, Bosie: A Biography
of Lord Alfred Douglas (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 2000), 32.
2. Murray, Bosie, 43–44. Douglas edited six issues of the Spirit Lamp
between November 1892 and June 1893. For a discussion of the homo-
sexual themes in Douglas’s poetry, see Murray, Bosie, 35–40.
3. Joseph Bristow provides a detailed discussion on the publication his-
tory of the Spirit Lamp and its association with homoerotic poetry in
the Appendix to his forthcoming book about the Wilde trials. See
Joseph Bristow, Oscar Wilde on Trial: The Criminal Proceedings—From
Arrest to Imprisonment, 3 April 1895–25 May 1895 (New Haven: Yale
University Press, Forthcoming). Bristow’s study was not available when
I prepared the research for this chapter; please refer to his book for
updated information about the three criminal trials.
4. For more information on Queensberry’s harassment of Wilde and his
reasons for targeting Wilde, see Michael S. Foldy, The Trials of Oscar
Wilde: Deviance, Morality, and Late-Victorian Society (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1997), 22–24; Murray, Bosie, 66–74; and Ashley H.
Robins, Oscar Wilde: The Great Drama of His Life: How His Tragedy
Reflected His Personality (Brighton, UK and Portland, OR: Sussex
Academic Press, 2011), 6–13.
5. Ashley H. Robins suspects that Queensberry sought legal advice on the
wording and the method of delivering the card to trap Wilde into liti-
gation. In order to sue for criminal libel, it was necessary to prove that
the libel was published to a third party. This was true in Wilde’s case
because Queensberry had written the card in the presence of a por-
ter and left it with him, instead of handing it to Wilde in person. See
Robins, Oscar Wilde, 18–19.
6. When the porter from the Albemarle Club testified before the
Malborough Street Police Court, he stated that he interpreted the mes-
sage as “To Oscar Wilde, ponce and sodomite.” Queensberry inter-
rupted and clarified that he had written “posing as sodomite”: Robins,
Oscar Wilde, 15–16.
7. The witnesses must have come to an arrangement with authorities
in exchange for their testimony against Wilde. The details on this are
unclear, but Ellmann suggests that Queensberry paid the witnesses £5
a week from the beginning of the libel suit to the time of Wilde’s con-
viction. See Richard Ellmann, Oscar Wilde (New York: Alfred A. Knopf,
1988 [c. 1984]), 475.
8. Foldy, The Trials, x.
9. Wilde was arrested on 5 April 1895 and was jointly charged with Alfred
Taylor on the following day for committing offences under Section 11
of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1885.
242 L.
10. Murray, Bosie, 43. Ellmann has described Taylor as “the errant son of
a cocoa manufacturer, and once a public schoolboy at Malborough”:
Oscar Wilde, 389. Taylor refused to testify against Wilde, although it is
likely that charges would have been dropped against him if he agreed to
cooperate with the authorities. See Murray, Bosie, 82.
11. Foldy, The Trials, 31.
13. Wilde was questioned on Douglas’s poems, “In Praise of Shame” and
“Two Loves,” and a short story called “The Priest and the Acolyte”
(published anonymously by John Francis Bloxam). All three of these
works were published in the first and only issue of the Chameleon
(December 1894). See Foldy, The Trials, 7–13; Ellmann, Oscar Wilde,
448.
17. Foldy, The Trials, 40. Clarke asked the judge, Sir Alfred Wills, to
delay Wilde’s re-trial until the next court sessions, but his request was
rejected. Wilde was released on bail while Taylor’s case was heard. See
Foldy, The Trials, 40.
18. When commenting on this point, Foldy writes: “The bad news for Wilde
was that his co-defendant at the previous trial had just been convicted
of an ‘abominable’ crime, and that virtually everyone in London knew
about it, including, presumably, the members of his own jury”: The
Trials, 41.
21. Hyde was drawing on material from Stuart Mason’s [Christopher Sclater
Millard] Oscar Wilde: Three Times Tried (1912) and Charles Grolleau’s
The Trial of Oscar Wilde (1906). See Foldy, The Trials, xiv.
22. Ian Small, ‘Introduction’, in De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et
Vinculis’, ed. Ian Small, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to
date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 2: 1.
23. Small suspects that Wilde may have started writing the prison letter a
year earlier, after he was granted access to writing materials in July
1896. See Small, ‘Introduction’, 2: 10.
24. I will be referring to the text that is reproduced in Merlin Holland’s
and Rupert Hart-Davis’s edition of The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde
(2000) throughout this chapter.
26. Douglas’s poem takes up an idea that is raised in Shakespeare’s sonnet
144. The persona in Shakespeare’s poem compares two of his lovers
(one being a man, and the other, a woman) and positions male love in a
favourable light. See Murray, Bosie, 35–36.
27. Murray, Bosie, 35.
28. H. Montgomery Hyde, The Trials of Oscar Wilde: Regina (Wilde) v.
Queensberry, Regina v. Wilde and Taylor (London: Hodge, 1948), 236.
29. Hyde, Trials, 236. In his analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray and the
Wilde trials, Daniel Orrells notes that “Wilde gave a similar speech at a
ritual at the Crabbet Club”: Classical Culture and Modern Masculinity
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 197. The Crabbet Club was a
literary society for men that held annual meetings at Crabbet Park; the
estate of Wilfred Blunt. Wilde was invited to join this society, but he did
not return after this occasion. See Orrells, Masculine Desire, 197–98.
30. Linda Dowling, Hellenism and Homosexuality in Victorian Oxford
31. The most detailed version of this myth features in Ovid’s
Metamorphoses (10: 161–219). In Attic vase paintings of Hyacinthus’s
death, Zephyrus (the god of the West wind) causes the accident by
blowing the discuss off course. See ‘Hyacinthus’, in The Oxford
Classical Dictionary, 4th ed., eds. Simon Hornblower and Antony
Spawforth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 713.
32. Douglas sent Wilde a copy of his sonnet, “In Sarum Close.” See Murray,
Bosie, 39.
33. Wood supposedly “found” the letter in the pocket of an old suit that
Douglas had given him. Murry believes it is more likely that Wood stole
the letter from Douglas’s rooms at Magdalen College, while he was
working for Douglas as a valet. See Murray, Bosie, 83.
34. Hyde, Trials, 112.
35. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, in The Complete Letters of Oscar
Wilde, eds. Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis (London: Fourth
Estate, 2000), 544. Two of Wilde’s letters to Douglas were used as evi-
dence in the libel case and two indecency trials; this letter was written
from Babbacombe.
36. Hyde, Trials, 133.
39. The French text is reproduced by Ellmann as a footnote. See Ellmann,
Oscar Wilde, 393–94. Ellmann suggests that Louÿs wrote the poem
as a favour to Wilde in order to diminish the threat of blackmail. See
Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 393. For an English translation of Louÿs’s origi-
nal text, see Bristow, Oscar Wilde on Trial, Forthcoming.
40. Hyde, Trials, 312–13
41. Hyde, Trials, 312–13.
244 L.
42. Stefano Evangelista, British Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism,

Reception, Gods in Exile (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 126.
43. At the time of the Wilde trials, many men fled the country in fear of the
legal precedent that had been set by the Crown’s prosecution of Wilde.
Many of Wilde’s close friends and acquaintances left in England, includ-
ing Robert Ross, Maurice Schwabe, and Reginald Turner. See Murray,
Bosie, 80.
46. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, 29 April 1895, in Complete
Letters, 646.
47. Wilde’s sign-off also has a hint of religious passion: “I am now, as ever
since the day we met, yours devotedly and with an immortal love—
Oscar”: ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, 29 April 1895, in Complete Letters,
647.
48. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, 29 April 1895, in Complete
Letters, 646. A similar pattern can be seen in Wilde’s letters to Robert
Ross, which were written after Wilde’s release from prison. See
Frederick S. Roden, Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture
(New York: Palgrave, 2002), 153.
49. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, May 1895, in Complete
Letters, 650. In another letter, Wilde contemplates his reunion with
Douglas and casts his lover as a divine healer once again: “O dearest
of created things, if someone wounded by silence and solitude comes
to you, dishonoured, a laughing–stock to men, oh! you can close his
wounds by touching them and restore his soul which unhappiness had
for a moment smothered”: ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, 20 May 1895, in
50. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, May 1895, in Complete Letters,
650–51.
651.
52. When Robert Ross published an excised version of Wilde’s prison letter,
he derived the title “De Profundis” from this very psalm. According to
Killeen, Ross’s title highlights the parallel between Wilde’s manuscript
and Saint Augustine’s Confessions, which also employs the language and
imagery of the psalms. See Jarlath Killeen, The Faiths of Oscar Wilde:
Catholicism, Folklore and Ireland (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2005), 168.
53. In his prison letter to Douglas, Wilde criticizes his decision to write
about his circumstances in letters to the press. See Oscar Wilde, ‘To
Lord Alfred Douglas’, January to March 1897, in Complete Letters, 710–
12.
54. Douglas later destroyed the letters that he had intended to publish. See
Murray, Bosie, 94.
55. Wilde also discusses Douglas’s intentions to publish his letters without
consent at various points in his prison letter. See Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord
Alfred Douglas’, January to March 1897, in Complete Letters, 717–19,
722, 761.
56. Murray, Bosie, 93. Wilde also mentions the restricted access to mail in
his open letter on prison reform. See Oscar Wilde, ‘To the Editor of the
Daily Chronicle’, 24 March 1898, in De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere
Et Vinculis’, ed. Ian Small, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols.
to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 2: 333.
57. Murray, Bosie, 93–94.
59. Murray, Bosie, 94. The title of this work was The Collected Poems of Lord
Alfred Douglas.
61. Wilde comments on Douglas’s plans regarding the dedication of his
book in his prison letter. See Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’,
January to March 1897, in Complete Letters, 722.
62. Murray, Boise, 96–97.
63. Murray, Boise, 97.
64. See Guy Willoughby, Art and Christhood: The Aesthetics of Oscar Wilde
(Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1993), 103;
Roden, Same-Sex Desire, 146; and Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 162–78.
65. Ellis Hanson develops this line of enquiry in an article, “Wilde’s
Exquisite Pain.” He argues that Wilde draws on Romantic and
Decadent archetypes of pleasurable pain to express his personal suffer-
ing. Through the process of aestheticizing his pain, Wilde facilitates
a pleasurable reading experience for his audience. See Ellis Hanson,
‘Wilde’s Exquisite Pain’, in Wilde Writings: Contextual Conditions, ed.
Joseph Bristow (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006), 101–23.
66. Ellis Hanson, Decadence, and Catholicism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1997), 295. For a discussion of Wilde’s engage-
ment with Greek tragedy in the prison letter, see Kathleen Riley,
‘‘All the Terrible Beauty of a Greek Tragedy’: Wilde’s ‘Epistola’ and
the Euripidean Christ’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity, eds.
Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2017).
67. Regenia Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace: Oscar Wilde and the Victorian
Public (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1986), 180.
68. Wilde instructed Ross to make two typed copies of the prison letter.
See Oscar Wilde, ‘To Robert Ross’, 1 April 1897, in Complete Letters,
781–82.
246 L.
69. Murray, Bosie, 102. Douglas’s recollection of this event is mentioned in

his autobiography as follows: “Ross, while Wilde was in prison, had sent
me a letter containing extracts from remarks which he alleged Wilde
had made about me, but whether these remarks had been written or
merely repeated by word of mouth I did not gather, because, as soon
as I realized the nature of Ross’s letter (which was a very long one of
many pages), I tore it to pieces in a rage and hurled the fragments into
the River Marne by whose banks I was living at the time. It is quite
possible that this letter of Ross’s contained extracts from Wilde’s De
Profundis letter to me”: Alfred Douglas, The Autobiography of Lord
Alfred Douglas (London: Martin Secker, 1931), 134–35; as quoted by
Small, ‘Introduction’, 2: 16.
71. Small, ‘Introduction’, 2: 15–16.
72. Douglas explained his position on this subject in a letter to Robert Ross.
See Small, ‘Introduction’, 16; Murray, Bosie, 170.
73. Small, ‘Introduction’, 2: 17. Small suggests that Ransome may have
gained access to one of the typescript copies from Robert Ross. See
Small, ‘Introduction’, 2: 17.
74. Joseph Bristow, ‘Introduction’, in Oscar Wilde and Modern Culture,
ed. Joseph Bristow (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2008), 21.
The prison manuscript was taken out of the library for the court pro-
ceedings, however, the court ruled in Ransome’s favour. See Bristow,
Modern Culture, 21–23.
75. Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace, 182. A government inquiry into the
Du Cane system was conducted between 1894 and 1895. The inquiry
found that the system failed to reform prisoners and had debilitating
effects on first offenders. The recommended reforms were not imple-
mented until 1898; by that point, Wilde had already completed his two-
year sentence. See Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace, 184.
76. Gagnier, Idylls of the Marketplace, 187.
78. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, January to March 1897, in
83. This version of the Medusa myth is recounted in Apollodorus’s Library.
See Apollodorus, Library, in Apollodorus’ Library and Hyginus’ Fabulae:
Two Handbooks of Greek Mythology, trans. R. Scott Smith and Stephen

M. Trzaskoma (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2007), 2.4.1–2.
84. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Robert Ross’, 1 April 1897, in Complete Letters, 782.
This imagery occurs again in the prison letter when Wilde writes, “The
most terrible thing about it [prison] is not that it breaks one’s heart—
hearts are made to be broken—but that it turn’s one’s heart to stone”:
‘To Lord Alfred Douglas’, January to March 1897, in Complete Letters,
739.
85. Oscar Wilde, ‘Prison Reform: To the Editor of the Daily Chronicle’, 24
March 1898, in De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et Vinculis’, ed. Ian
Small, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 2: 332.
86. Initially, the Liberal MP Richard Haldane lodged these appeals to the
Home Office on Wilde’s behalf. See Thomas Wright, Oscar’s Books, 243;
Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 506–9.
87. Wright, Oscar’s Books, 243.
88. Wright, Oscar’s Books, 246. Any novels that contained content relating
to sex, prison or politics were altogether excluded from the library. See
Wright, Oscar’s Books, 246.
89. Wright, Oscar’s Books, 333.
91. For more on the Pentagram, see Murray, Bosie, 21–25.
92. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Campbell Dodgson’, 23 February 1893, in Complete
Letters, 556.
93. Please see the Introduction of this book for a historical overview of the
Greats curriculum.
94. Letter from Dodgeson to Lionel Johnson; as quoted by William F.
Shuter, ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’, English
Literature in Transition 1880–1920 46, no. 3 (2003): 264. See also
Murray, Bosie, 48.
95. Shuter, ‘Greats’, 265.
96. Murry, Bosie, 48.
Complete Letters, 686. Please see the Introduction to this volume for a
discussion on the meaning of the expression “Oxford temper.”
100. Murray, Bosie, 64–65. Between August and October of 1894, Wilde and
his family were staying in Worthing. During that time, Douglas went to
Worthing to visit Wilde with his brother Percy. See Murry, Bosie, 64.
248 L.

107. Ian Small, ‘Commentary’, in De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et
Vinculis’, ed. Ian Small, in The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to
date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing), 2: 205.
108. According to Bristow, Gray was embarrassed by a newspaper article
that referred to him as Wilde’s “protégé” because this term that implied
he and Wilde were lovers. The remark appeared in a review of Gray’s
lecture, “The Modern Actor”, which was published on the 12 February
1892 in the Daily Telegraph. See Bristow, Oscar Wilde on Trial,
Forthcoming.
109. Ellmann states that the incident occurred at the Savoy Hotel, however,
Horst Schroeder has established that Wilde was actually staying at the
Albemarle Hotel: see Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 394; Horst Schroeder,
Additions and Corrections to Richard Ellmann’s Oscar Wilde (Self-
Published, 2002), 141.
Complete Letters, 687–88. We should be wary of the points where
Wilde discusses his finances. As Murray writes, “Wilde’s distorted
obses- sion about money at this time was able to be seen in more
than just his gripes against Douglas, he accused many people who had
been kind friends to him of ruining his finances including the
Leversons, More Adey and Ross”: Bosie, 101.
113. Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 169.
116. Hugh Lloyd-Jones, ‘Commentary’, in Aeschylus, Agamemnon, trans.
Hugh Lloyd-Jones (London: Prentice-Hall, 1970), 55.
117. “… a lion’s offspring … bright–eyed, and fawning on the hand as it’s
belly’s needs compelled it”: Aeschylus, Agamemnon, trans. Hugh
Lloyd-Jones (London: Prentice-Hall, 1970), 720–25.
118. “the temper it had from its parents”: Aeschylus, Agamemnon, trans.
Hugh Lloyd-Jones, 730.
120. In the nineteenth century, the connection between Helen and the lion-
cub was taken for granted by English commentators and it appears that
Wilde accepted this reading. Bernard Knox is one of the first commenta-
tors to argue against this reading. He argues that the symbol of the lion-
cub can apply to all of the main characters in the Oresteia trilogy. See
Bernard M. W. Knox, ‘The Lion in the House’ [Agamemnon 717–36],
Classical Philology 41, no. 1 (January 1952): 18.
123. The rift between Queensberry and his eldest son Francis (who was
known as Drumlanrig) is another well-documented example of
Queensberry’s hostile behaviour. Francis served as the Private Secretary
to Lord Archibald P. Primrose Rosebery, the Foreign Secretary. In
1893, he was promoted to the role of Lord-in-waiting to the Queen.
Queensberry was angry because he had lost his seat in the House of
Lords and believed that his son was promoted because he was involved
in a homosexual relationship with Lord Rosebery. Queensberry
responded by writing threatening letters to Rosebery, Prime Minister
Gladstone, and Queen Victoria. He then followed Rosebery to
Hamburg, intending to beat him with a dog whip, but the Prince
of Wales prevented Queensberry from carrying out the attack. See
Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 404–5; Murray, Bosie, 66; and Robins, Oscar
Wilde, 8–10.
124. Murray, Bosie, 57. Letter from Queensberry to Lord Alfred Douglas,
1 April 1894; as quoted by Murray, Bosie, 56–57. Almost a year later,
Queensberry made a similar threat in a letter to his daughter-in-law,
Minnie (who was the wife of Percy Douglas). In this letter, Queensberry
states: “If I were to shoot this hideous monster [Wilde] in the street, I
should be perfectly justified, for he has almost ruined my so-called son”:
Letter from Queensberry to Minnie Douglas, 4 March 1895; as quoted
by Robins, Oscar Wilde, 14.
127. ἶνις (inis) applies to both genders, therefore, λέοντος ἶνιν (leontos inis)
is expressed in gender neutral terms as a “lion’s cub” in most English
translations of the Agamemnon. For example, Hugh Lloyd-Jones trans-
lates λέοντος ἶνιν as a “lion’s offspring,” while Herbert Weir Smyth and
Gilbert Murray adopt the expression, “lion’s whelp.”
250 L.
129. Oscar Wilde, ‘To Lord Alfred Douglas,’ January to March 1897, in
130. Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 175. With this phrase, Killeen draws atten-
tion to the racial differences between the English Douglas and the Irish
Wilde. He argues that “Wilde insists on his nationality three times in the
course of the letter, as marking him out as of a different temperament to
Douglas’s Englishness”: Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 175.
2000–continuing), 4: 153–54.
Complete Letters, 753. Here, Wilde is adapting a quotation from Pater’s
essay on the German art historian, Johann Joachim Winckelmann:
“‘One learns nothing from him,’ he says to Eckermann, ‘but one
becomes something’”: Walter Pater, The Renaissance: Studies in Art and
Poetry—The 1893 Text, ed. Donald L. Hill (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and
London: University of California Press, 1980), 147.
137. Some of the religious texts included in Wilde’s first list of book requests
included a copy of the Greek New Testament, Henry Hart Milman’s
History of the Jews (1829) and History of Latin Christianity (1855),
Frederic Farrar’s Life and Works of St. Paul (1879), Ernest Renan’s Vie
de Jésus (1863) and Les Apôtres (1866), John Henry Newman’s Essays
Critical and Historical (1871). Three of the request lists have sur-
vived and are reproduced in Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 508–9; also Wright,
Oscar’s Books, 319–22.
138. Stephen Arata, ‘Oscar Wilde and Jesus Christ’, in Wilde Writings:
Contextual Conditions, ed. Joseph Bristow (Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 2003), 261.
140. Killeen, Faiths of Oscar Wilde, 162, 167.
143. Elizabeth A. Clarke has noted that the metaphor of Christ as a
“celibate bridegroom” appears in early Christian writing from the third
and fourth centuries C. E. For example, both the Bishop Alexander of
Alexandria and John Chrysostom (fourth century) used erotic
language to portray Christ as the lover of virgins who committed
themselves to celibacy: See Elizabeth A. Clarke, ‘The Celibate
Bridegroom and His Virginal Brides: Metaphor and the Marriage of
Jesus in Early Christian Ascetic Exegesis’, Church History 77, no. 1
(2008): 11–12. There are several Biblical passages which refer to
Christ as a bridegroom: II Corinthians 11:2, Matthew 25:1–13,
Matthew 22:1–14, John 3:29–30, Ephesians 5, Revelation 19:6–9. See
Clarke, ‘The Celibate Bridegroom’, 10.
144. Willoughby, Art and Christhood, 111–12.
147. Pau Gilabert Barberà , ‘Anti-Hellenism and Anti-Classicism in Oscar
Wilde’s Works: The Second Pole of a Paradoxical Mind’, ITACA,
Quaderns de Cultura Clássica 21 (2005): 14.
Complete Letters, 741. Like Pierre Louÿs, André Gide (1869–1951) was
another young French author connected with the Symbolist movement.
Wilde and Gide met in Paris and developed a relationship over three
weeks in late November 1891. The pair were together almost every
day, and Gide, who was also a homosexual, understood his attraction
to Wilde as a spiritual form of seduction. Gide documented his meet-
ings with Wilde in letters to friends and in his journal, although, he later
tore out the journal entries that related to his time with Wilde. After
1891, the meetings between Wilde and Gide were sporadic; they saw
each other in Florence (in 1894), and Algiers (in 1895), and Gide vis-
ited Wilde when he was living in France after his release from prison.
See Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, 352–54, 540–42.
252 L.
650–51.
155. Arata, ‘Oscar Wilde and Jesus Christ’, 261.
Complete Letters, 747. Victor Hugo (1802–1885) was a celebrated
French author associated with the Romantic movement. His pop-
ular historical novel, Les Misérables (1862), is set in France over a fif-
teen-year period, spanning from the battle of Waterloo, in 1815, up to
the Revolution of 1830. The main narrative of the novel follows the
life of an escaped convict named Jean Valjean. Although Valjean rein-
vents himself as a morally upright citizen, his freedom is threatened by
a relentless police officer who is intent on capturing him and bringing
him to justice. Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) was a French poet,
critic, and translator who is generally classed as a decadent author. His
collection of lyric poetry, Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil) (1857)
was revolutionary work of lyric poetry because it drew inspiration from
the experience of living in a modern industrialized city. Baudelaire’s
poetry also explored man’s propensity for sin by combining the themes
of sex and death. Following the publication of this volume, Baudelaire
and his publisher were sued for breaching France’s laws against religion
and morality. Thirteen of the poems from Les Fleurs du mal were put to
trail. Baudelaire was found guilty and received a fine. Six of the poems
were banned and had to be excised from future reprints of Les Fleurs du
mal until the ban was lifted in 1949. Edward Burne-Jones (1833–1898)
and William Morris (1834–1896) were friends, collaborators and busi-
ness partners who made significant contributions to the English Arts
and Crafts Movement, which championed the return of pre-industrial
craft techniques (see Chapter 3). Burne-Jones is recognized as a Pre-
Raphaelite painter, but he was also a talented designer and craftsman
who produced stained-glass windows for numerous churches through-
out England. William Morris was an author, socialist campaigner, and
craftsman who is well-known for popularizing arts and style furnishing
and interior decoration through his company, Morris & Co. (previously
Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co.). Morris drew much of his inspira-
tion from medieval imagery and reinvented this style in his wallpaper
designs, handwoven tapestries, bookbinding, and illuminated printing.
See Chapter 3 for a discussion on Wilde’s response to Morris’s ideas

regarding aesthetic reform. Paul Verlaine (1844–1896) was a French
Symbolist poet and is regarded as a key proponent of the Decadent
movement. Like Wilde, Verlaine served a two-year prison sentence.
Verlaine was imprisoned in 1873, following a violent argument in which
he shot and wounded his lover, Arthur Rimbaud, in the wrist. Wilde
and Verlaine met in Paris in 1883; at this point, Verlaine was mourning
the death of his friend and lover, Lucien Létinois. We have little infor-
mation about the connection between Wilde and Verlaine, but Ellmann
suggests that Wilde was initially “put off by [Verlaine’s] seedy appear-
ance, but recognized his genius”: Oscar Wilde, 228. See also Small,
‘Commentary’, 2: 231.
159. Satyrs or silenoi are lustful woodland deities associated with the god
Dionysus. They have an ugly human-animal form, as satyrs tend to be
represented as bald, fat-figured creatures with tails, and goat-like feet.
160. This version of the myth is mentioned in Apollodorus’s Library
and Ovid’s Metamorphoses. See Apollodorus, Library, 1.4.2; Ovid,
Metamorphoses, trans. David Raeburn (London: Penguin Books, 2004),
6: 382–400.
161. The Divine Comedy is a medieval narrative poem that was written in
Italian and completed by Dante in 1320. The poem follows Dante’s
journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. Wilde is quoting from
the Paradisio (1.20), which is the third and final section of the Divine
Comedy. In the following sentence, Wilde aligns Dante’s poetry with
the writing of the Roman historian, Tacitus, who produced accounts
of the reigns of the Roman emperors. Tacitus was a prose writer who
adopted a uniquely compact, but powerful style of expression. Wilde
studied Tacitus at Oxford and first mentioned the link between Dante
and Tacitus in his undergraduate notebooks. See Oscar Wilde’s Oxford
Notebooks: A Portrait of Mind in the Making, eds. Philip E. Smith II and
Michael S. Helfand (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 130;
Small, ‘Commentary’, 2: 272.
Complete Letters, 755–56. For information on Baudelaire and Verlaine,
see note 158. Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869) was a poet, histo-
rian, and politician. Following the publication of his first collection of
poetry, Les Méditations Poétiques (1820), he quickly rose to fame as a
leading figure of the Romantic movement in France. It is likely that
Wilde was introduced to Lamartine’s poetry at an early age, given that
his mother, Jane, prepared English translations of two of his books. See
Small, ‘Commentary’, 2: 273.
254 L.
163. As I noted in Chapter 5, Wilde’s resistance towards being a popular

author is signalled in preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891). This
theme is more forceful in The Soul of Man (see Chapter 3) and the let-
ters Wilde wrote in defence of the 1890 edition of The Picture of Dorian
Gray (see Chapter 4).
165. Willoughby, Art and Christhood, 114.
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Schroeder, Horst. Additions and Corrections to Richard Ellmann’s Oscar Wilde.
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Shuter, F. William. ‘Pater, Wilde, Douglas and the Impact of Greats’. English
Small, Ian. ‘Introduction’. In De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et Vinculis’.
Edited by Ian Small, 1–29. Vol. 2. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
256 L.
Small, Ian. ‘Commentary’. In De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et Vinculis’.

Edited by Ian Small, 199–307. Vol. 2. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–continuing.
Smith II, Philip E., and Michael S. Helfand, eds. Oscar Wilde’s Oxford
Notebooks: A Portrait of Mind in the Making. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1989.
Wilde, Oscar. ‘Prison Reform: To the Editor of the Daily Chronicle’ [24 March
1898]. In De Profundis: ‘Epistola: In Carcere Et Vinculis’. Edited by Ian
Small, 330–34. Vol. 2. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2000–continuing.
Willoughby, Guy. Art and Christhood: The Aesthetics of Oscar Wilde. Rutherford,
NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1993.
Wright, Thomas. Oscar’s Books. London: Chatto & Windus, 2008.
EPILOGUE: SOME THOUGHTS
ON AESTHETIC EDUCATION
Almost ten years ago, I began to explore Wilde’s aesthetic literature

out of a desire to create a research project that combined my interest in
Classical reception and the Victorian Hellenic revival. I began by delving
into Wilde’s poetry and some of his short stories, and I was struck by the
abundance of Classical allusions. I was also intrigued by his use of Greek
and Latin words and expressions, as most of these were untranslated.
When I learned of Wilde’s plans to become a Classical scholar, I knew
that he would be the subject of my doctoral dissertation, and the basis
of this book. Although Wilde achieved such unparalleled success in his
final year at Oxford, he was not destined to become a don and live a life
within the cloisters of a college. As an undergraduate, Wilde knew that
he would make a name for himself, and somehow he was able to predict
that his desire for fame might lead to his downfall. To this day, Wilde’s
contribution to English literature continues to be assessed in relation
to his personal life and his public exposure as a homosexual writer and
cultural icon. This book has certainly engaged in a biographical-histori-
cal reading of Wilde’s aesthetics, but, overall, the intention has been to
situate this analysis within the broader narrative of Wilde’s history with
Oxford, and the remarkable Greats curriculum.
By linking Wilde’s aestheticism with the Oxford Classical curriculum,
we can appreciate that Wilde approached aestheticism as a personalized,

257
258 EPILOGUE: SOME THOUGHTS ON AESTHETIC
self-directed learning experience. In fact, he made the connection

between aestheticism and education at the outset of his North American
lecture tour. In an interview with the New York Tribune, he explained:
“you cannot teach a knowledge of the beautiful; it must be revealed
… the knowledge of the beautiful is personal and can only be acquired
by one’s own eyes and ears. This truth was the origin of the theory of
beautiful surroundings.”1 The final point is particularly significant, as
it implies that Plato’s “theory” of aesthetics informs Wilde’s aesthetic
philosophy. Like any capable student of Greats, Wilde knew The
Republic inside out, and evidently, he paid special attention to Plato’s
discourse on the influence that art can have on impressionable young
minds.2 In the early stages of his career, Wilde was also responding to
the aesthetic theories of John Ruskin and William Morris. Like them, he
stressed the social and moral implications of aesthetic reform, but he
was more interested in the potential to use aesthetic consumption as a
mode of self-expression.
In Wilde’s aesthetic fiction and criticism, we encounter a cast of
Oxford gentlemen, including Lord Henry, Basil Hallward, Gilbert, Lord
Alfred Douglas, and Wilde himself. The “house beautiful” is the place
where intellectuals delight in the pleasure of collecting, admiring, and
using beautiful objects. They can retreat from the world by contemplat-
ing the different impressions that arise from reading an evocative piece
of literature or handling a beautifully bound book. Intellectual conver-
sations are also carried out in the home, as exemplified by the erudite
aesthetic dialogue that is exchanged between Gilbert and Ernest in “The
Critic as Artist.” As they “chatter about art,” these aesthetes remark on
the failings of the British Empire and demand a higher standard of pop-
ular art.3 The home can be a creative domain too: it is where Basil paints
and is free to admire Dorian’s boyish good looks. Importantly, this rela-
tionship is forged and broken in domestic spaces, beginning in the art
studio, and ending in the attic. When Wilde was sent to prison, he lost
his beautiful home, his treasured books, and possessions, and he was iso-
lated from his friends and family. But instead of abandoning aestheticism
altogether, he shifted his thinking and found beauty in the mind’s eye.
In their life outside of the university, Wilde’s aesthetes enjoy the
advantage of being able to play with ideas without having to commit to
them. This aspect is reflected in Wilde’s aesthetic prose, which
prioritizes subjectivity, welcomes elaborate flights of fancy, and is open
to borrowing or even misrepresenting the ideas of other authors. Of
course, these men of culture should not be confused with professional
scholars and
EPILOGUE: SOME THOUGHTS ON AESTHETIC EDUCATION 259
educators. It is helpful to turn to “The Critic as Artist” once again, as

Gilbert offers some remarks on the difference between the two types. He
begins by describing how meaningful it is to encounter someone who
has succeeded in mastering the art of “self-culture”:
For the development of the race depends on the development of the

individual, and where self-culture has ceased to be the ideal, the
intellectual standard is instantly lowered, and, often, ultimately lost. If you
meet at dinner a man who has spent his life in educating himself—a rare
type in our time, I admit, but still one occasionally to be met with—you rise
from table richer, and conscious that a high ideal has for a moment
touched and sanctified your days.4
In this instance, Gilbert provides a very positive image of the result

of an aesthetic education. It implies that those who cultivate a profound
and ongoing relationship with art will also transform themselves into
exceptional individuals. The self-cultured intellectual is unforgettable; it
is an honour and a pleasure to be in his company because he embod-
ies the aspirational values of the Aesthetic Movement. By contrast, the
professional educator is derided by Gilbert because he spends his days
repeating the same lessons and spares little time and effort on his own
intellectual development: “to sit next a [sic.] man who has spent his life
in trying to educate others! What a dreadful experience that is! … the
nuisance of the intellectual sphere is the man who is so occupied in try-
ing to educate others, that he has never had any time to educate him-
self.”5 In making this statement, Gilbert suggests that we must find
our own way towards self-culture. From Wilde’s aestheticism, we learn
that consumer culture can provide us with all that we need to sustain
a rich and rewarding intellectual life. The popularity of the Aesthetic
Movement meant that more people were talking about art than ever
before, and Wilde used his talents to keep the discussion flowing; first as
a lecturer, then as an anonymous reviewer, and, ultimately, as an author
of the aesthetic school.
NOTES
1. ‘The Theories of a Poet’, New York Tribune, 8 January 1882, 7, in
Oscar Wilde in America: The Interviews, eds. Matthew Hofer and Gary
Scharnhorst (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010), 19.
260 EPILOGUE: SOME THOUGHTS ON AESTHETIC
2. For more on Wilde’s engagement with The Republic, see Chapters 3 and
4 in this volume. See also, Leanne Grech, ‘Imagining Utopia: Oxford
Hellenism and the Aesthetic Alternative’, in Oscar Wilde and Classical
Antiquity, eds. Kathleen Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 170–74.
Intentions, the Soul of Man, ed. Josephine M. Guy, in The Complete Works
of Oscar Wilde, 8 vols. to date (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000–
continuing), 4: 141.
5. Wilde, ‘The Critic as Artist’, in Critcism, 4: 181–82.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Riley, Alastair J. L. Blanshard, and Iarla Manny, 161–74. Oxford: Oxford
Hofer, Matthew, and Gary Scharnhorst, eds. Oscar Wilde in America: The
Interviews. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010.
APPENDIX:
NOTES FROM OSCAR WILDE’S COPY
OF THE SYMPOSIUM
This Appendix consists of notes that I gathered while viewing Wilde’s

copy of Benjamin Jowett’s The Dialogues of Plato (1875, 2nd ed.). This
item is held in the British Library in the Eccles Collection. The item
description is listed as follows: “Copy at Eccles 478. Formerly owned by
Oscar Wilde. MS. ownership inscriptions on h.t. verso of vol. I: ‘Oscar
F. O. F. W. Wilde. Oxford.’ With extensive pencil marginal notes, com-
ments and scorings in Wilde’s hand throughout. With a note on
prove- nance from Bertram Rota booksellers tipped into vol. I.”
These notes refer to markings that Wilde made in Jowett’s
“Introduction” to the Symposium and in the translated text. Most of
Wilde’s markings include sections of underlined text with some mar-
ginal markings (X, U, Ɔ, >) and vertical lines to mark paragraphs. All
of the notes were made in lead pencil. I have reproduced the passages
that Wilde underlined and have used brackets (<…>) to approximate
the sections of the text that Wilde marked with a line or symbol in
the margin.

261
262 APPENDIX: NOTES FROM OSCAR WILDE’S COPY OF THE
JOWETT’S INTRODUCTION TO THE SYMPOSIUM

Page 7, question mark in margin and underline:
Some raillery ensues first between Aristophanes and Eryximachus, and <
then between Agathon, who fears a few select friends more than 30,000
spectators, and Socrates, who is disposed to begin an argument. >
Page 12, paragraph 3, margin marked with X:
< But Plato seems also to be aware that there is a mystery of love in man
as well as in nature, extending beyond the mere immediate relation of the
sexes. >
Page 12, paragraph 3, margin note (ἔρως) and line in margin:
< … He is conscious that the highest and noblest things in the world are
not easily severed from the sensual desires, or may even be regarded as a
spiritualised form of them. We may observe that Socrates himself is not
represented as originally unimpassioned, but as one who has overcome his
passions; the secret of his power over others partly lies in his passionate
but self-controlled nature. In the Phaedrus and Symposium love is not
merely the feeling usually so called, but the mystical contemplation of
the beautiful and the good. The same passion which may wallow in the
mire is capable of rising to the loftiest heights—of penetrating the inmost
secret of philosophy. The highest love is the love not of a person, but of
the highest and purest abstraction. This abstraction is the far off heaven on
which the eye of the mind is fixed in fond amazement. The unity of truth,
the consistency of the warring elements of the world, the enthusiasm for
knowledge when first beaming upon mankind, the relativity of ideas to the
human mind, and of > the human mind to ideas, the faith in the invisible,
the adoration of the eternal nature, are all included, consciously or uncon-
sciously, in Plato’s doctrine of love.
Page 13, paragraph 2, U mark in margin and underline:
< … That confusion begins in the concrete, was the natural feeling of a
mind dwelling in the world of ideas. >
APPENDIX: NOTES FROM OSCAR WILDE’S COPY OF THE SYMPOSIUM 263
Page 18, paragraph 3, line in margin:
As the Christian might speak of hungering and thirsting after < righteous-
ness; or of divine loves under the figure of human (cp. Eph. v. 32: ‘This
is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church’); as the
mediaeval saint might speak of the ‘fruitio Dei;’ as Dante saw all things
contained in his love of Beatrice, so Plato would have us absorb all other
loves and desires in the love of knowledge. >
Page 18, paragraph 3, Ɔ mark in margin:
< Here is the beginning of Neoplatonism, or rather, perhaps, a proof (of

which there are many) that the so-called mysticism of the East was not
strange to the Greek of the fifth century before Christ. >
Page 19, U mark in margin and underline:
< … The union of the greatest comprehension of knowledge and the

burning intensity of love is a contradiction > in nature, which may have
existed in a far-off primeval age in the mind of some Hebrew prophet or
other Eastern sage, but has now become an imagination only.
Page 20, paragraph 1, > mark and line in margin:
Such an [sic.] union is not wholly untrue to human nature, < which
is capable of combining good and evil in a degree beyond the power of
imagination to conceive. The Platonic Socrates (for of the real Socrates
this may be doubted: cp. Xenophon’s Mem. I. 2, 29, 30) > does not
appear to regard the greatest evil of Greek life as a matter of abhorrence,
but as a subject for irony, and is far from resenting the imputation of such
attachments.
Page 27, paragraph 2, U mark in margin and underline:
… For you would have filled me full of much and beautiful wisdom, in
comparison of which my own is of a very mean and questionable sort, no
better than a dream; but yours is bright and only beginning, and was man-
ifested forth in all the splendour of youth the day before yesterday, < in the
presence of more than thirty thousand Hellenes. >
264 APPENDIX: NOTES FROM OSCAR WILDE’S COPY OF THE
JOWETT’S TRANSLATION OF PLATO’S SYMPOSIUM

Page 53, U mark in margin and underline:
< ‘… do you not see that there is a mean between wisdom and
ignorance?’ ‘And what may that be?’ I said. >
Page 67, line in margin:
<… For my heart leaps within me more than that of any Corybantian rev-
eller, and my eyes rain tears when I hear > them.
Page 67, U mark in margin:
… For he makes me confess that I ought not to live as I do, neglecting

the wants of my own soul, and busying myself with the concerns of the
Athen-
< ians; therefore I hold my ears and tear myself away from him. >
Page 68, “ mark in margin:
… But when I opened him, and looked within at his serious purpose, I saw
in him < divine and golden images of such fascinating beauty that I was >
ready to do in a moment whatever Socrates commanded: they may have
escaped the observation of others, but I saw them.
INDEX
A American lecture tour, 15, 20, 79–81,

Aeschylus, 3, 10, 230, 231, 232 83, 93, 96, 97, 101, 104, 108,
Agamemnon, 3, 10, 230 110
Aesthetic consumption, 16, 79, 92, Annunciation (of Virgin Mary), 58–
96, 101, 102, 109, 126, 133, 59, 73n145
145, 177, 212, 230, 233 Apollo
Aesthetic costume, 80, 84, 87, 88, 93, Mount Parnassus and, 139
94, 96, 110 poetry and, 216; Hyacinthus
Aesthetic criticism, 16, 125–126, 140, and, 214–215; Marsyas and, 238–
143, 146, 148–149, 174, 224, 239
240 Aristotle, 10–11, 13
Aesthetic education, 2, 16, 19n6, Ethics, 10–11
20n6, 81, 104, 105–108, Poetics, 10
119n100, 126, 133, 137, 141 Arnold, Thomas
Aesthetic interior design, 145, 233 ancient history and, 127–128
Aesthetic Movement, 2–3, 16, 20–21, Oxford classics and, 126, 127
79, 80, 82, 83, 89, 91, 92, Arts and Crafts Movement, 82, 93,
97–98, 101, 104, 105, 108, 110, 100, 141
133, 138, 140, 144–145, 178
decorative arts and the, 80, 100
Aesthetic reform, 7, 80, 88, 92, 103, B
126, 138, 144, 149 Babbacombe School, 225, 226
Allen, William Dennis, 40 Baraccio. See Raphael, Annunciation
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019 265

266
Barrett Browning, Elizabeth

‘Critic as Artist, The,’ 2, 3, 12, 13,
‘The Dead Pan’ (1844), 52–53
15, 17, 18, 124, 125, 126–127,
Bosie. See Douglas, Lord Alfred Bruce
133–135, 140, 141, 177, 233,
Boston Pilot, The, 20, 43, 50, 55
237
Bunthorne, 16, 21, 79, 80, 83, 84,
criticism of Oxford education in,
86–87, 88–89, 92, 111n2
133, 135, 138
Burne-Jones, Edward, 98
Gilbert, character of, 134–135, 140–
Byron, Lord, 94
142, 143, 144, 145, 146
imperialist rhetoric in, 126, 136
Platonic dialogue in, 134
C politics of, 126–127
Canada
representation of Oxford in, 21,
Wilde in, 106, 108 141–142, 143, 161
Catholic Church
traditional English craftsmanship
anti-Catholic rhetoric, 42
and, 138, 144
eucharist and resurrection, 45, 47, utopian aesthetics, 106
234 Curzon, George
ritual, 31, 33, 36, 37, 45 Wilde’s letter to, 132
Virgin Mary, 52, 54, 58–59, 63
Wilde and conversion to, 35, 37, 42
Wilde’s engagement with, 33, 35, D
42, 44–45 Daily Graphic, 88, 89, 90, 91
Cerberus, 148 Danae, 56, 58, 72n134
Chancellor’s English Essay prize, 5 De Profundis, 19–20, 26n56, 220. See
Christ, 33, 45, 48, 52–54, 57, 58–63, also prison letters and Epistola:
212, 217, 218, 221, 233, 234, in Carcere et Vinculis
237, 239 Dionysus, 58–59
as an alternative beloved to Douglas, Divinity (exam), 8–9
235–236 Dodgson, Campbell
characterisation of in prison letters, Douglas’s tutor at Babbacombe,
233–235 225
Wilde’s aestheticization of, 15, 222, Donahoe’s Magazine, 34
235 Douglas, Lord Alfred Bruce
Wilde’s ‘muse’ as, 238 failure to achieve the ‘Oxford tem-
Church of England per,’ 226–227
Thirty-nine Articles, 6n28, 8, 36–37 Mercure de France and, 219, 222
Classical education (at Oxford), 2, 10, poetry and, 209, 212–213, 216,
12. See also Greats 219
exclusivity of, 7, 17, 18 preparation for Greats at
Clough, Arthur Hugh Babbacombe, 225
Amours De Voyage, 50, 51 relationship with Wilde, 2, 14,
Crane, Walter, 82 19–21, 173. See also prison
letters Dorian Gray and Wilde
INDEX
relationship with Queensberry,

H
210, 231–232
Hadrian, Roman Emperor, 181
Spirit Lamp, editor of, 209–210,
Harding, Reginald, 49, 66n23
225, 241n2, 241n3
Hardinge, William Money, 169, 170,
D’Oyly Carte, Richard, 79, 88, 89,
198n68
115n42, 116n44
Harris, Frank
Dublin University Magazine, 84
Oscar Wilde: His Life and
Confessions, 5
Hellenic revival, 170
E
Holland, Vyvyan, 20
Epistola: in Carcere et Vinculis, 20. See
Holloway Prison, 216
also De Profundis
Homer
Eros, 12, 14, 18, 21, 26n60, 164–167,
Iliad, 51
170, 171, 174, 176, 177, 182,
Odyssey, 10, 51, 62
191–192, 211, 237, 240. See also
Homosexuality, 15, 19, 172, 219. See
‘intellectual’ friendship; male love;
also male-male desire; male-male
Platonic eros; Platonic love
love
Euripides, 4, 9
an aspect of Winckelmann’s
Hellenism, 170–172
as a criminal offence, 161–162
F
in Picture of Dorian Gray, 159–160,
Fox, Reverend Father Prideaux, 34
162, 164, 173, 175
Fra Angelico
Plato’s philosophy and, 161, 213
frescos at San Marco, 59
Hunter-Blair, David, 35–36, 41,
48–49, 50, 57, 63, 73n153
In Victorian Days, 4
G Hyacinthus, 214–216, 227
Gambier, Marc, 86, 87
Gide, André , 209, 237
Gill, Charles F. (Crown Prosecutor),
I
213
Illustrated Monitor, 57
Godwin, E.W., 82
Indian Civil Service, 126, 128–130
Gray, John, 209, 228
Classical studies and, 128–129
Great Exhibition, London (1851), 82
Intellectual friendship, 12, 18, 19, 42,
Greats, 4, 8, 9–12, 15, 17, 33, 37,
160–161, 169, 171, 178, 179,
126, 127–128, 129, 131, 132,
192, 214, 224, 228, 233
134–135, 136, 140, 141, 148,
Irish Monthly, 31, 58, 61, 62
173, 175, 225–226, 234
Irving, Henry, 145–146
Greece, 3, 16, 23n13, 31, 33, 48–52,
Italy, 3, 31, 43, 57
54–57, 63
268
J M
Jowett, Benjamin Macmillan, George, 4, 23n13, 49,
academic trajectory of, 14, 164 54–55, 71n107
curricular reforms at Oxford and,
‘A Ride Across the Peloponnese,’
17, 126, 127–129, 148
54
eros and, 167–168 Magdalen College, Oxford, 2, 3–4, 5,
German historicism and, 14, 164, 13, 15, 31, 33, 39, 81, 88, 91,
165, 167 116n48
Indian Civil Service recruitment Mahaffy, Reverend John Pentland, 3,
exam and, 12, 17, 128,
23n13, 31, 40, 43, 48–50, 54–55,
129–130
59, 62–63
‘On the Interpretation of Scripture,’
Rambles and Studies in Greece, 54
164
Male body, 174, 181, 192
Oxford and, 39, 164–165, 169
Male-male desire, 166
Oxford Classics and, 39–40,
Male-male love, 169, 214
97–101, 148
Male-only colleges (Oxford), 6
Plato and, 126, 127–128, 161,
Manning, Cardinal Henry, 35, 37, 44
164–166, 167
Marillier, Henry C., 6
Platonic love and, 161, 167–168, Marsyas
175, 191–192 musical challenge to Apollo,
Platonic revival and, 12, 168 238–239
on Socrates, 166–168 Mary (mother of Jesus Christ), 52–54,
Tractarian Movement and, 39 59, 63
translator as, 13, 18, 26n60, 127, Mediterranean
160, 164, 165, 168, 171, 175, landscape, 50, 51
176, 180, 182 Medusa, 222–223, 246n83
tutorial style, 39 Miller, Joaquin, 125
Moderations (exam), 4, 9
Greek and Roman literature in,
K 9–11
Keble, John Month and Catholic Review, The, 43,
‘National Apostasy’ sermon, 36 165n18
Kottabos, 31, 72n140 Montreal Star, 107
Morris, William, 82, 88, 98, 100, 101,
103, 110, 114n36, 114n37, 238,
L 252–253
Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine Morris & Co., 88, 102
1890 edition of Dorian Gray, 124 Mount Parnassus, Greece, 139
Literæ Humaniores (exam), 4, 7, 8, Muller, Max, 40
24n33. See also
Greats London
Wilde in, 5, 6, 16, 19 N
Louÿs, Pierre, 209, 215 Nero, Roman Emperor, 60
INDEX
Newdigate English Verse Prize, 1, 3–4,

P
11, 139
Paiderastia, 18, 161, 166, 169, 170,
Newman, John Henry, 33, 36–39,
171, 175, 194n12, 196n37,
42–44
199n100
Apologia Pro Vita Sua, 36
Pall Mall Gazette, 114n31, 123, 125,
conversion to Catholicism, 37
132
The Tracts for the Times, 37
Pan, 52–53, 54, 63
‘Tract XC,’ 37
Pater, Walter, 12–13, 18, 40, 139,
New Testament, The, 165
153n64, 160–161, 164, 169–173,
New York, 80–82
174, 197
Wilde in, 89
aestheticism in Dorian Gray and,
New York Evening Post, 82, 91
176
New York Tribune, 115n38
anti-Christian stance and, 171
New York World, 91, 94, 96
homosexual scandal and, 169–170
paiderastia and, 171
review of Dorian Gray, 176–177
O
Studies in the History of the
Oedipus
Renaissance, 18, 160, 170, 192
name and character of in ‘The Critic
‘Winckelmann,’ 160, 170–173
as Artist,’ 146–148, 155n102
Patience, or Bunthorne’s Bride, 16,
Oedipus and the Sphinx myth, 146
27n67, 79, 80, 84, 86, 87, 88,
Olympia, Greece, 54–55
89, 91, 110
Temple of Zeus, 54
Perseus, 56, 58, 72n134
Oriental porcelain. See Wilde, Oscar,
Philadelphia Centennial Exposition
blue-and-white china and
(1876), 82
Oxford aestheticism, 91–92, 98, 110,
Picture of Dorian Gray, The, 2, 3, 12,
126
13, 14, 18, 124, 138, 149
Oxford Hellenism, 148
Basil Hallward, character of, 159,
‘Oxford temper,’ 12, 26n56, 226
160, 177, 178
Oxford University
Basil Hallward, murder of, 190
as Athens or Classical Greece, 6
Basil Hallward’s homosexuality,
Catholics at, 36
177 Christianity in, 187, 189–190
Classical curriculum, 7–12, 17,
Dorian’s beauty, 174
126–129, 133–135, 148, 164.
Douglas’s admiration of, 209,
See also Greats
240n1
Classical education at, 6, 10, 14, 15,
homosexual desire and aestheticism,
107, 126, 127, 164, 169, 174
164
elitist culture of, 107
homosexual subtext, 160
medieval heritage, 3, 5–6
Lord Henry Wotton, character of,
1850 Royal Commission, 7
159, 178, 183
tutors, 4, 12
male desire in; see also eros; intellec-
utopia, as, 5
tual friendship; Plato
Platonic love in, 18, 160
270
portrait of Dorian Gray in,

Prison Letters
161, 176, 177, 178, 179,
long letter from HM Prison
180,
Reading, Douglas and, 212,
184–189
219–220, 222, 224, 226–32
Sibyl Vane’s death in, 176, 183–184
Christ in, 233–239
Plagiarism
short letters, 216–219, 223
accusations of against Wilde, 32, 47
Psalm, 130
Plato, 104–105, 106, 164–167, 214
Wilde’s appropriation of in letter to
Dialogues, Jowett translation of,
Douglas, 218
127, 160
Punch magazine, 32
1853 inclusion in Oxford Classical
curriculum, 102
Republic, 10, 11, 39, 82, 104,
Q
118n92
Queensberry, Marquess of, 210, 211,
Symposium, 12, 13, 160, 161, 165,
214, 231–232
166, 167, 169, 176, 177, 182,
Wilde’s libel case against, 210–211,
227
213–214
Platonic dialogue, 134, 175, 192,
214. See also ‘The Critic as Artist,’
Platonic dialogue in
R
Platonic eros, 14, 18, 164, 167–168,
Ransome, Arthur, 221, 246n73,
170, 171, 174, 182, 191, 240
246n74
Platonic ideal, 160, 174, 188, 191,
Raphael
192, 214, 233
‘Annunciation,’ 59
Platonic love, 12, 18, 160, 161, 168,
Reading Gaol (HM Prison Reading),
175, 192, 214, 217, 222, 227,
212
233. See also eros; Platonic eros
Renan, Ernest
Platonic revival at Oxford, 12, 18,
Vie de Jésus (Life of Jesus), 234
168, 178
Rennell, Rodd, 11, 26n54
Plato’s Symposium
Responsions (exam), 8
Alcibiades’s speech in, 166, 180,
Ricketts, Charles
188
deluxe edition of The Picture of
Diotima in, 166, 182 Dorian Gray and, 129
Phaedrus’s speech in, 165–166 Rome, 33, 36, 42–45, 47, 48, 50–51,
Socrates in, 166–167, 180
57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 63
Plutarch
Ross, Robert, 19, 35, 72, 111n4, 209,
On the Obsolescence of the Oracles, 52
220–221, 223
Pope, the, 35, 44–45, 47, 57–58,
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel, 98, 100
59–60, 63
Ruskin, John, 17, 40, 81, 84, 91–93,
Pope Pius IX, 44, 57–58
96–100, 101, 103, 110
Portora Royal School, 3
on art and social reform, 92–93
Pre-Raphaelite artists, 87, 98
INDEX
road-building between Upper and

university reform and, 36, 38
Lower Hinksey, 96–97. See
Trinity College, 31, 35, 53, 73n140
also Wilde Oscar, ‘Art and the
Handicraftsmen’
‘The Relation of Art to Use,’
U
92, 98
Utopian lifestyle, 142–143
Ryley, John Hanford, 84, 86f, 87
V
S
Vatican, the, 57, 61
San Francisco Daily Report, 96
Vatican Gallery, the, 58, 59
Sarony, Napoleon
Venus, 53, 54, 62
1882 photographic portrait of
Victorian-era prison system (1877–
Wilde, 84, 85f, 87, 94, 95f,
1891), 221
114n33
Virgil
Scots Observer, 162
Aeneid, 148
Semele, 58, 59
Von Berg, Fredrich, 172
Socrates, 134, 166–167, 168, 175–
176, 180, 189
Sophocles
W
Oedipus Tyrannus, 146, 147
Waifs and Strays, 50, 59
Soul of Man, The, 2, 12, 13, 15, 17,
Ward, William, 4, 36, 41, 42, 44, 48,
21, 103–106, 110, 124, 125–
57, 62, 63
126, 127, 133, 136–138, 140,
Whistler, James Abbott McNeill, 82,
142, 143, 145, 147, 148
84, 88, 113n25, 114n31, 115n39
Sphinx, the, 146, 148, 155n101
Wilde, Constance, 228
Spooner, W.H., 9
Wilde, Jane (‘Speranza’), 33, 34,
St James Gazette, 163
65n13
Swinburne, Algernon
Wilde, Oscar
‘Hymn to Proserpine,’ 53–54
aesthetic costume, 80, 87–88,
Poems and Ballads, 53
93–94, 96, 110
Symonds, John Addington, 12–
aesthetic criticism, 82, 103, 109,
13, 173, 174, 210
125–126, 134, 140, 143, 146,
148, 224, 240
aesthetic education of children, 81,
T
Tennyson, Alfred 104–108, 119n100, 126, 133,
137
In Memoriam A. H. H., 46–47
aesthetic temperament and, 141,
Tractarian Movement, 15, 33, 36–37,
145
38–39, 42, 43, 48
aesthetic utopia and, 106, 136, 143
Anglican doctrine and, 37
archaeology and, 4, 13
Oxford tutorial system and, 39
art and educational equality, 105
272
‘Art and the Handicraftsman,’ 96,

journalism and, 123, 125–126, 133,
105
140
‘Ave Maria Gratia Plena,’ 58–59,
letters to Douglas, 211, 212, 214,
61, 63, 72n140
216, 217, 218–220, 224, 233.
bankruptcy and, 231
See also prison letters
baptism, 34, 65n15, 65n16
libel case against Marquess
blue-and-white china and, 88
of
as ‘Bunthorne,’ 16, 80, 83, 88–89
Queensberry, 210–211, 214
Catholicism and, 3, 15, 16, 20,
London in, 4, 5–6, 16, 19
33–36, 42, 44, 45, 48–49, 58,
machinery, attitude towards, 81,
60, 63
142
Classical culture and, 170, 173, 174
Magdalen College at, 2–5, 13, 15,
conversion to Catholicism and, 35,
31, 33, 35, 39
37, 42, 45, 47
Newdigate prize. See Newdigate
early poetry, 42, 47, 48. See also
English Verse Prize
travel poetry
Oxford letters, 31, 33, 42, 63. See
‘Easter Day,’ 59–61, 63
also Ward, William
entry in Oxford ‘Confessions
Oxford temper and. See Oxford
Album,’ 4, 22n1
temper
Epistola: in Carcere et Vinculis. See
Philosophy Notebook, 10–11
De Profundis
The Picture of Dorian Gray. See
fashion and, 92, 93–94
Picture of Dorian Gray, The
fellowships and, 3, 4, 31, 169
Platonic love and, 12, 18, 19, 29
finding of gross indecency against,
Poems (1881), 32–33, 52–53, 55,
210
59, 62
‘Graffiti d’Italia’, 43–47, 54, 59,
‘Pontos Atrugetos,’ 61
63, 69n73
prison, in, 212, 218, 221, 223–224,
Greece, travel to, 31, 48, 49–50, 51,
240
52, 57, 59, 63
prison reform, perspective on, 223
House of Pomegranates, A, 145
‘Santa Decca,’ 52, 54–56, 61, 63
‘Hyacinthus’ letter, 214–216, 227
The Soul of Man. See Soul of Man,
imperialism and, 126, 135, 148
The
‘Impression de Voyage’, 55, 57, 63,
‘The Critic as Artist’. See ‘Critic as
72n125
Artist, The’
‘Impressions of America’, 137, 142
’The Decorative Arts,’ 80, 81, 98,
indecency trials against, 210, 213,
102, 104, 105, 106, 107
215
’The English Renaissance of Art,’
Inspector of Schools, application for,
80, 81, 88, 99, 101, 104, 140
7, 131–133
‘The House Beautiful,’ 16, 80, 81,
Intentions, 124, 145–146, 177
88, 99, 101, 102, 104
Ireland and, 31, 33–35, 43
‘The Theatre at Argos,’ 55, 56, 57,
63
INDEX
travel poetry, 2, 16, 31, 32, 47–48,

Wilde, Sir William Robert (father of
50, 57, 63, 64n9. See also early
Wilde), 3, 35, 64n13, 65n22
poetry
Winckelmann, 18, 160, 170–173,
1877 travel to Greece and Rome,
174, 182, 190, 192
16. See also Greece; Rome
homosexuality and, 172
Trinity College scholarship, 3
Wise, Henry, 42–43
‘Two Loves,’ 213, 220
‘Urbs Sacra Æterna,’ 57, 58, 63
Vera; or, The Nihilists,
Y
108 ‘Vita Nuova,’ 62
Yeats, William Butler, 213
working poor of England, attitude
to, 92, 108, 136–138, 142,
145
Z
Wilde, William (elder brother of
Zeus, 51, 54, 56, 58, 59, 63, 72n134
Wilde), 34, 65n13, 66n23

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Oscar Wilde’s

More information about this series at

Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019933874

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019

I would like to begin by acknowledging the many people who have

I thank my Ph.D. examiners, Stefano Evangelista and Joseph Bristow.

1 Introduction: Greek Forms and Gothic Cloisters 1

2 Popery and Paganism: Divided Loyalties in the Travel

3 American Beauty: Aestheticism Across the Atlantic 79

4 Civilizing England: Oxford, Empire, and Aesthetic

5 Fervent Friendships: Oxford Platonism and The Picture

6 Wilde and Douglas: Redefining the Beloved 209

Epilogue: Some Thoughts on Aesthetic Education 257

Appendix: Notes from Oscar Wilde’s Copy of the Symposium 261

When Oscar Wilde was in his third year at Oxford, in 1877, he

© The Author(s) 2019 1

1 OSCAR WILDE AND OXFORD

Harris’s reconstructed Wildean dialogue responds to the intellectual cul-

The medieval heritage of the university fuses with its history as

In Oxford, as in Athens, the realities of sordid life were kept at a distance.

The reference to the aristocratic atmosphere of the university is perti-

2 THE OXFORD CLASSICAL CURRICULUM

necessary to ensure that students had a rudimentary grasp of the subject

with the examiner, W. H. Spooner, he offered a nonchalant apology:

no Roman authors were included on the list. 41 Wilde wrote a paper on

mentioned source in the notebook is Aristotle’s Ethics, and, according to

When commenting on Wilde’s letter, Dowling recognizes the signs of

3 WILDE SCHOLARSHIP AND THE CLASSICS

Dowling’s research has generated a new wave of scholarship which

A further notable area of research relates to the process of gender

scholars and readers to move beyond the traditional impulse to inter-

teacher. After addressing Wilde’s Oxford letters, my analysis moves to a

of the social and personal benefits of introducing aesthetic decoration

be embraced as a vehicle for social change. This message was somewhat

21. Oscar Wilde, ‘To H. C. Marillier’, 27 November 1885, in Complete

37. Richard Jenkyns, ‘The Beginnings of Greats, 1800–1872: Classical

Examination Statute, 1878, 54–58; as quoted by Ross, Oscar Wilde and

63. Ross, Oscar Wilde and Ancient Greece, 8.

Holland, Merlin. The Wilde Album. London: Fourth Estate, 1997.

Popery and Paganism: Divided Loyalties

© The Author(s) 2019 31

Catholicism. Where possible, my analysis will refer to the earliest ver-

1 ROMAN CATHOLICISM IN CONTEXT

Protestant family, and some of his maternal relatives were ordained

I am sure … that if I had become a Catholic at that time [while at Trinity]

became a Benedictine monk three years later. Hunter-Blair and Wilde

[W] hen I was a Public Tutor of my college at Oxford, I maintained, even

The Tractarians were not so concerned with their students’ academic

as a key tenant of the Tractarian education philosophy: “[we] do not

2 GOING OVER TO ROME

Round the fire gathered Wilde, W. Ward – known to us all as “Bouncer” –

Hunter-Blair captures how joyous it was to be with Wilde, as he played

[W]e were a little dazzled by his directness and surprised by the

It is so fitting that Wilde, himself a foreigner in England, should

with young men through correspondence and personal interaction:

And here I set my face towards home,

Wilde’s opening stanza captures the tragedy of being so close to Rome,

When bright with purple and with gold