The Adelaide Observer - Saturday, April 13, 1895

GENERAL NEWS.
THE FALL OF OSCAR WILDE.

The brilliant public career of Oscar Wilde has closed abruptly, in circumstances inexpressibly sad, as well as sensational to a degree probably without a precedent in the darker annals of English society. The man who has thus fallen from a high position to be the scorn of the most degraded of his fellows has not yet reached his fortieth year, but his name has been almost world-known since a short time after he attained his majority. The observer will first be profoundly impressed with the startling contradiction between the opening and the close of his active life. Mr. Wilde first rose into celebrity as the leading exponent of "A new cult of culture," and surely no other reputation than that could be in more shocking antithesis to his present infamy. Not the least remarkable feature of the judicial proceedings which have disclosed his evil courses is supplied by the fact that the modern champion of grace, beauty, and culture has been unmasked through the instrumentality of the Marquis of Queensberry. That noble Lord would hardly have been chosen by popular suffrage as a doughty Cavalier of the White Flower, but in bringing Oscar Wilde to justice he seems to have acted a thoroughly manly part. His persistency in withdrawing his son from the contaminating companionship of Wilde fully entitled him to the high praise which the presiding Judge has pronounced upon him. The Marquis had not only to submit at at the instance of Wilde to the ordeal of arrest on warrant for libel, and to subsequent legal proceedings, but at every step he took he was opposed both by his wife and by the son whom he was attempting to rescue; and he was even forsaken by his lawyer in the preliminary stages of the case. Though young Lord Alfred Douglas is apparently still under the glamour of the magnetic influence of the brilliant Oscar, there is abundant evidence that the Marquis knew a great deal more than most people suspected of the truth concerning the life of the prominent man whom he attacked. Yet there is little wonder that the Marchioness, for instance, disbelieved her husband's accusations when Wilde's own lawyer was so befooled by his client as to remain his advocate almost to the end of the case.

Though the disgraced man has not yet been finally brought to account, there seems, unfortunately, to be no ground for doubt regarding his culpability. "The case is proved up to the hilt." And, whether the law impose a heavy penalty or whether the accused man should escape from its clutches, there can be no social restoration of his position. Oscar Wilde has fallen never to rise again. His offence and its consequences will furnish themes for many homilies and controversies. Some advanced students of criminology will doubtless seek to uphold by the case of Wilde their teaching that no wholly sane and responsible man has ever been or ever could be guilty of the crime for which he has to answer. Their conclusion is charitable, and old-fashioned folk will deride it, but only a bold man would say that it is entirely unjustified. The whole recorded history of Oscar Wilde is that of a man of curious moods and conspicuous eccentricities. Certainly at times he proved that he was more than a mere dilettante, and some of his work as poet, art lecturer, and literary critic represented a vigorous expression of [?]ust and wholesome sentiments. But, as throughout his earlier life he was unquestionably erratic or unconventional in his views, so latterly he has become peculiarly pronounced in his exposition of his opinions. After having distinguished himself at Trinity College, Dublin, and spent a term at Oxford, and acted as a humble disciple of the irascible artist Whistler, he appeared in 1879 — then only twenty-three years of age — at the head of the "Cult of the Sunflower and the Lily" as the self-styled and long-haired Apostle of Modern Culture, with a livery of knee-breeches, black silk stockings, and silver-buckled shoes. The extravagances of the famous æsthetic movement, which Gilbert so mercilessly satirised and so promptly stopped a dozen years ago by "Patience," with its burlesque of Oscar Wilde as "Bunthorne," seem to have been indicative of the mental and moral defects of the man chiefly responsible for them. Still, when the Wildean school of æstheticism became a laughing-stock its "too utterly intense" examplar showed that he was better than a light-brained fop. He had his hair cut and discarded his uniform, and as lecturer, critic, poet, playwright, and editor he proved himself to be the possessor of ability which has not unreasonably been characterized as genius.

The theory of aberration finds support in the distinct decadence in the moral tone of some of its subject's later writings. The realistic nature of certain of his dramatic dialogues may, however, have been deemed by his friends not to furnish any clue to his own life practice. They probably regarded it in the way in which he has described it in Court — as the exposition of a theory rather than as the outlining of a chart of personal conduct. Besides, he was rarely taken quite seriously; else his critics might have made fine fun out of such peculiarities of remark as occur, for instance, in his sparkling essay on "Criticism, or the Importance of Doing Nothing," where in he laid down such dicta as this — "All the arts are immoral, for action of every kind belongs to the sphere of ethics... An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all." In his play "Salome," written for Sara Bernhardt, and published in France, some of his outre theories were expressed in a manner which aroused the protests of staid British censors. In fact, their complaints were so loud that Oscar Wilde withdrew for a time to Paris, declaring in his wrath — at least, so it is said — that he would never write another drama for an English audience. After such a declaration it is somewhat curious that one of the first consequences of his downfall should be the removal of his name from the playbills of English and United States theatres in which works of his are now being produced. This act of the managers seems curiously inconsequential, but probably the inherent merit of the plays saves them from withdrawal. Dramatic art would be the poorer if it were deprived of Wilde's works. With all their defects, such plays as "Lady Windermere's Fan" and "A Woman of No Importance" abound in brilliant epigrams and sparkling satires on modern society. Altogether the world of culture loses through the disgrace of Oscar Wilde, and the degeneration of the man himself may well form a theme of philosophical study. He should be pitied, too, as well as blamed, because the suggestion of extreme eccentricity is undoubtedly supported by such things as his grotesque posturings before the Court, and even his very hardihood in bringing his action for libel against the Marquis of Queensberry when he knew what damnatory testimony had accumulated against him. But, whatever Oscar Wilde's degree of moral culpability may be, the shock inflicted upon London society by his misdeeds will be severe. The misguided man was not only celebrated for his own attainments, but he was the brilliant son of brilliant parents. His father was an eminent surgeon and archæologist. His mother, who still lives, is that famous Lady Wilde, prominent now as a society dame of great influence, who endeared herself as "Speranza" to the Irish nation as the bard of the Young Ireland Party. Lady Wilde was extremely proud of the success of her gifted son, and her anguish on account of his disgrace will be proportionate to her admiration.