Galignani Messenger - Friday, April 12, 1895
This report was originally published in English. Machine translations may be available in other languages.
PARIS, APRIL 12, 1895.
In a London contemporary we read that "the Chief Librarian of the British Museum has issued an order prohibiting Oscar Wilde's novels being given out in the reading-room even for purposes of reference.
LONDON, April 11.-The Echo states that the chief librarian of the British Museum has issued an order prohibiting Oscar Wilde's novels being given out in the reading-room, even for purposes of reference.
The Chief Librarian of the British Museum has issued an order prohibting Oscar Wilde's books being issued in the reading-room, even for purposes of references.
"That the Executive Council of Paddington Free Library have also decided to withdraw from circulation the whole of Oscar Wilde's works."
The executive council of Paddington free library have also decided to withdraw from circulation the whole of Wilde's works.
The executive council of the Paddington Free Library have decided to withdraw from circulation the whole of the same author's works.
We have only one question to put and that is asked in one word, and that word is "Why?"
Did not the chief librarian of the British Museum and the Executive Council of the Paddington Free Library read Oscar Wilde's books before buying them for public use?
Of course they did, and found them some of the cleverest and most entertaining literature ever put before the public, and as such were reviewed by the leading critics of the day.
Then why, because this man is discovered to be a monomaniac, should his works, which contain no vice, suddenly assume hideous features to the librarian of the British Museum, and the Executive Council of Paddington, which they never discovered till now?
Oscar Wilde, let it be remembered, who, as a literary man, earned his spurs by gaining scholarships at Oxford, has written plays which have been enjoyed, laughed at, and applauded to the echo by crowded houses of the noblest, the greatest, and the purest of both sexes in the land; and his success was not the result of a happy hit, but through the acknowledgement by the public of undoubted genius of a high order.
Why should these plays now be stopped? and, above all, why should the author's name be removed from the bills? For goodness sake do not let our French neighbours be justified in applying the word "cant" to English people, which they seem to think describes many of our actions.
Far be it from us to any way defend, or even appear to defend, the poor dethroned and disgraced man who is waiting for his trial in England; but our love of fair play and hatred of mawkish pharisaical humbug revolts at these petty, silly acts, that are not meant for the general good, but simply to pander to the present excited state of public opinion.