Customer Reviews

Oscar Wilde: A Collection of Critical Essays (Twentieth Century Views)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I loved Mr. Ellmann's full biography of Oscar Wilde, but was not aware of this book until I saw it offered here at Amazon. I was immediately struck by Stanley Wyatt's macabre jacket illustrating the climax of THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY in a work that resembled a black & deep mauve woodcut. The book is really excellent. The Contents:

Introduction, by Richard Ellmann

My First Meeting with Oscar Wilde, by William Butler Yeats

The Catastrophe, by William Butler Yeats

Wilde in Phase 19, by William Butlet Yeats

In Memoriam, by Andre Gide

A Novel by Mr. Oscar Wilde, by Walter Pater

In Honorem Doriani Creatorrisque Eius, by Lionel Johnson

The Destroyer of a Soul, by Lionel Johnson

The Arrest of Oscar Wilde at the Cadogan Hotel, by John Betjeman

The Dead Poet, by Alfred Douglas

Sonnet on Wilde, by Alfred Douglas

C33, by Hart Crane

Fiction as Allegory: THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY, by Edouard Roditi

Wilde as Dramatist, by St. John Hankin

Overture to SALOME, by Richard Ellmann

My Memories of Oscar Wilde, by George Bernard Shaw

The Unimportance of Being Oscar, by Mary McCarthy

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING ERNEST, by Eric Bentley

An Improbable Life, by W. H. Auden

Christ and Wilde, by G. Wilson Knight

The Social Rebel, by George Woodcock

Wilde and Nietzsche, by Thomas Mann

About Oscar Wilde, by Jorge Luis Borges

Oscar Wilde, by Brendon Behan

Quite an impressive list, shewing the amazing amount of interest that Wilde generated in his lifetime and afterward -- truly, an Immortal. The symbolic nature of his Rise and Tragick Fall has been endlessly debated. Some almost seem to praise him for the horror he brought to those who loved him by his staying in England to face trial rather than flee to France. He seems, himself, to have decided it was his only choice, and perhaps we would not have the many books we love concerning his Life and Art had it been otherwise--and yet, I cannot help wishing that he had thumbed his nose to his critics, retired to Paris where he had a second brilliant career and was joined by his wife and children, keeping poisonous Bosie at bay.

I love everything about this brilliant book. I love its ideas and passions. I love reading Auden's review of LETTERS OF OSCAR WILDE. It is a huge question--is the publication of a writer's private papers ever justified? I know only that my little life would be so much the poorer without Wilde's correspondence, of Virginia Woolf's diaries, or Henry James's Notebooks.

I love how Wilde continues to confront people while he rests beneath his lipstick-tarnished tomb. Msry McCarthy almost scolds, at the beginning of her piece, "One of Oscar Wilde's acquaintances wrote of him that he could never be quite a gentleman because he dressed too well and his manners were too polished. The same criticism can be made of his art. There is something outre in all of Wilde's work that makes one sympathize to a degree with the Marquess of Queensbury; this fellow is really insufferable." I find this a shocking and alien idea--only a monster could sympathize with that devil Queensberry! (I see I misspelled his name above--I shall NOT correct it!)

G. Wilson Knight's classic studies of Shakespeare have long been among my favourite books. It is intriguing to see him here, an intellectual Christian wrestling with the perverse angel of Wilde's sexuality. He does so brilliantly, almost sympathetically. I love this man and scholar and wish I knew more about his life. I think, after I type this review, I shall search Amazon for a biography of G. Wilson Knight.

Our superb editor is well-represented with his beguiling essay on the poet's poisonous play, SALOME. I did not remember, as Ellmann writes, "Mallarme was not merely flattering when he congratulated Wilde on the 'definitive evocation' of Salome, or when he took care to avoid seeming to copy Wilde when he returned to work on his own HERODIADE." Ellmann's is a fascinating essay.

I love this book! Writing about it here makes me want to read it once again. And I will, for its richness is of the eternal kind.