The Brooklyn Daily Eagle - Sunday, April 14, 1895

NORDAU CALLS WILDE INSANE.
An Interview With the Author of
"Degeneration."
ADVISES MENTAL EXAMINATION.
The Distinguished Medico-Literary
Expert, Whose Latest Book Has
Made a Sensation on Two Conti-
nents, Refuses to Attack or to Con-
demn the Fallen Esthetic Idol––Stig-
Mata of Mental Disease Described.

(Correspondence of the Eagle.)

Paris, April 5––Dr. Max Nordau, author of a work which has vigorously buffeted the ears of the end of the century, lives in a modest hotel at 34 Avenue de Villiers. The Eagle correspondent called this morning upon the man who has made "Degeneration"––which is the name of his powerful book––the word of words, descriptive of the malady of modernity. The object of the visit was to induce, if possible, this medico-literary expert to consent to an interview which should diagnose the case of Oscar Wilde, which should dwell, more fully than his book does, upon the mixture of ability and of diseased mentality found in the life and in the work of this moral and artistic "pervert."

The correspondent was shown by a neatly groomed servant into a room, the appearance of which clearly showed that it was the work shop of a busy man. From the books which rested upon the shelves and the magazines and pamphlets distributed upon the table and chairs it could not be discerned whether the scholar, whose tools they were, devoted himself more to literary or to scientific studies. Science and literature were honored in about even proportions. Versatility of mind and language was shown by publications, not only in French and German, but also in English, in Italian, in Norwegian and in Russian.

These observations were made in a very few minutes and then Dr. Nordau entered the room and greeted the correspondent pleasantly. He is a wholesome and rather distinguished looking man of vigorous frame and is rather above the medium size. His manners are those of a high class practicing physician––that is, a combination of suavity and of decision. His is a striking face, which shows distinctly the Jewish extraction. Hair and beard are gray. The former is bushy and combed up and back in the fashion called "pompadour." The latter is cut square and brushed away from the center. Moustache and eyebrows are dark and so are his eyes, which show a touch of humor and more than a trace of audacity. A forehead that is both broad and high and a strong yet delicately chiseled nose give Dr. Nordau’s face the outward and visible signs of intellectuality, courage, and taste. His age is probably 45.

"Yes, yes, an interview." said the author of "Degeneration," speaking French fluently and almost eloquently and with only a few distinct traces of an accent. "We have heard of the American interview, here in Europe, and it is imitated with but little distinction by the Parisian journals. I hope that you do not require one of those interviews in which the victim is made to disclose every detail of his life, all that he knows and much that he dreams."

Dr. Nordau was assured that the Eagle wished only to obtain his views upon one matter. The singular coincidence of the publication of his book in America simultaneously with the developments of the Wilde case in London had attracted considerable attention. The result of the suit against the Marquis of Queensberry had proven the wonderful manner the accuracy of the position he had taken in "Degeneration." If the author of that work would amplify and reinforce that position in regard to Wilde and his school in life, literature and art, it would not only be of great interest, but would also assist in the revolution toward serenity and sanity.

"Yes, yes; I understand, and I appreciate the compliment conveyed in your request," was the reply. "I would be willing––even glad––if I could do anything to oblige you. My lips, however, are closed by considerations of taste and charity. Mr. Wilde’s case is before the court. How can I say anything in condemnation now? I attacked him, his teachings, his theories, when he was standing, triumphantly, as the most brilliant of English literary men. Then he was the vogue. He was the leader of the aesthetic school. He was hailed as the apostle of a dew dispensation––the gospel of the ‘joy of life.' I attacked him because I believed that his doctrines, his teachings, and his literature were pernicious. It is different now. How can I kick a man who is down so low?"

"At least you can say whether or not the developments in this case prove your assertion that Wilde, like many other leaders in the modern world of arts, is mentally unsound."

"This much I will say––that I believe that it would be wise to have the man’s mental state carefully examined. In case he is proven guilty this certainly should be done before sentence is pronounced. I am convinced that such an examination would show extenuating circumstances. It would show partial and perhaps total moral irresponsibility. In his essays, in his plays and in his poems Wilde exhibits many of the ‘stigmata’ of degeneracy, which, mentally as well as physically, is a morbid deviation from an original type. His former predilection for strange costume was a pathological aberration for a racial instinct. It was purely antisocial, ego-maniacal recklessness. It stamped him as a ‘pervert.' He is an ego-maniac. His essay on Wainwright shows him to be a ‘diabolist’––one naturally preferring evil to good. He is an emotionalist, and, as is shown in his poems and stories, a mystic. These are the ‘stigmata’ of a degenerate. If to these shall be added this other and more revolting pathological aberration which has caused such a stir in London, it seems to me that an examination by competent alienists will show that the thin and almost wholly conventional line which separates vice from madness has been passed in the case of this brilliant and unfortunate man."

Dr. Nordau would say no more than this concerning Wilde’s case. "Perhaps I have already spoken too freely," he added, when pressed. He expressed himself well pleased with interest which his book is creating in America. The Appletons’ translation, he said, was very well done. "However," he added, "you do not yet require so severe a lesson in your healthy-minded country, although you have given Edgar Poe to Baudelaire and Whitman to Maeterlinck. Your degenerates seem to have had more influence upon the morbin and diseased minds of Europe than in their fatherland."