The Chicago Chronicle - Sunday, December 15, 1895

CURRENT GOSSIP OF PARIS.
French Authors Have Little Sympathy
for Oscar Wilde.
NO SYMPATHY FOR WILDE.

For the last few days a movement has been on hand to present a petition to Queen Victoria praying for the release of Oscar Wilde. The idea seems to have been originated by a young American, who thought that an address presented to her majesty and signed by the leading French and English poets and authors might result in the prisoner obtaining a remission of his sentence. In order to ascertain how far the proposition had been taken up here a representative of the Matin has had an interview with several of the most prominent literary men. M. Alphonse Daudet, who is the first on the list, declines to express a decided opinion. The eminent author has met Oscar Wilde, and although he owns him to be a man of talent cannot look upon his life with any other feeling than repugnance. At the same time M. Daudet considers that any interference on the part of himself and his confreres may only lead to the present situation of the prisoner being aggravated. Victorien Sardou is much more positive. He declares that he will have nothing at all to do with the matter. He says: "The subject is too revolting for me to meddle with it in any matter whatever. It has simply arisen out of pity for the unhappy man. But the loathsome vices, the development of which we see around us, disgust me. I am not going to trouble myself about the subject for one minute. It does not concern us in the least." Another writer, M. Barres, declines to commit himself on the matter. He also came in contact with Wilde, having been introduced to him in London by a well-known painter. While admitting the justice of the sentence dealt out to Wilde he does not approve of the punishment of hard labor, which is looked upon in this country as a form of torture. But if the petition be submitted to members of the literary world of Paris M. Barres does not see his way to appending his signature to it. Maurice Donnay, on the contrary, declares that if the address should be presented to him he would sign his name with the greatest pleasure, not so much for the sake of Oscar Wilde himself, to whom he shows but little partiality, but because he considers him as one who is unjustly suffering, M. Donnay’s theory being that everybody should be at liberty to do as he pleases, so long as he does not interfere with other people's liberty. It must be remembered that the crime for which Oscar Wilde was condemned is not a criminal offense in France unless committed in a public place.