Oscar Wilde

Pages 313-315 in the original text are printed in two columns. For purposes of more accessible display on electronic devices, in this plain-text version of the book, the text from the columns has been placed one following the other instead of side-by-side.

Inconsistencies in the author's use of hyphens and accent marks have been left unchanged, as in the original text. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected without comment. One example of a typographical error is on page 144 where the word "miuutes" was corrected to "minutes". In cases other than obvious typographical errors, the author's spelling has been left unchanged from the original text with the following three exceptions:

1. Page 126 the word "worldings" was changed to "worldlings" in the phrase: "... guests are all mere worldlings...."

2. Page 262 the quoted phrase from the original: "Fait vour quelle sera votre votre maturité" was changed to: "Fait voir quelle sera votre maturité" which is the correct wording from the poem "À Théodore de Banville" by Charles Baudelaire.

3. Page 317 the name "Bazil" was changed to "Basil" in the phrase: "... Basil Hallward's studio...." to correspond with the author's other spellings of the name Basil Hallward.

Two items in the index, which were out of alphabetical order ("De Profundis--Biblical influence" and "Shaw, G. B.") were placed in correct alphabetical order in this version.

OSCAR WILDE

::THIRD EDITION::

THE LIFE OF OSCAR WILDE

WITH A CHAPTER CONTRIBUTED BY THE PRISON WARDER WHO HELD THIS UNHAPPY MAN IN GAOL

Very fully Illustrated and with Photogravure Frontispiece, and a Biography

By

ROBERT HARBOROUGH SHERARD

Demy 8vo, Cloth gilt

Also a limited edition de luxe

[Illustration]

OSCAR WILDE,

From a Crayon Portrait by S. WRAY.

OSCAR WILDE

BY

LEONARD CRESSWELL INGLEBY

LONDON T. WERNER LAURIE

NEW YORK MITCHELL KENNERLEY

MCMVII

CONTENTS

PAGE

PART I

OSCAR WILDE: THE MAN 3

PART II

THE MODERN PLAYWRIGHT The Dramatist 95 "Lady Windermere's Fan" 104 "A Woman Of No Importance" 119 "The Ideal Husband" 129 "The Importance Of Being Earnest" 149

PART III

THE ROMANTIC DRAMAS "Salomé" 161 "The Duchess of Padua" 199 "Vera, or the Nihilists" 207 "The Florentine Tragedy" 215 "The Woman Covered With Jewels" 220

PART IV

THE WRITER OF FAIRY STORIES The Fairy Stories 227

PART V

THE POET Poems 245

PART VI

THE FICTION WRITER Fiction 301

PART VII

THE PHILOSOPHY OF BEAUTY 331

PART VIII

"DE PROFUNDIS" 359

INDEX 397

PART I

OSCAR WILDE: THE MAN

OSCAR WILDE

THE MAN

The [Greek: synetoi], the connoisseurs, always recognised the genius of Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde from the very first moment when he began to write. For many years ordinary people to whom literature and literary affairs were not of, at anyrate, absorbing interest only knew of Oscar Wilde by his extravagances and poses.

Then it happened that Wilde turned his powers in the direction of the stage and achieved a swift and brilliant success. The English public then began to realise that here was an unusually brilliant man, and the extraordinary genius of the subject of this work would have certainly been universally recognised in a few more years, when the shocking scandals associated with his name occurred and Oscar Wilde disappeared into oblivion.