Summary
From St. Louis in February 1882 Wilde thanks Joaquin Miller for his letter about the behaviour of part of the audience at his Rochester lecture. He will not judge a great people by one or two towns, and he pours scorn on the provincial papers and the 'scribbling anonymuncule' of Massachusetts who attacked him. Three notes to the World follow the friendship and rivalry with Whistler: a telegram about Punch, a warning that painters who lecture on art explain themselves away, and a jibe that 'vulgarity begins at home.' In 1890, in Truth, he answers Whistler's charge of plagiarism, calling it untrue and offensive and Whistler ill-bred and ignorant.
In 1891 Wilde tells the Times he never called Anglo-Indians vulgar, only the ones Rudyard Kipling writes about, and adds that art need not mirror society at all. From Paris he writes twice about A House of Pomegranates. The Speaker has swapped the illustrators: Mr. Shannon drew the pictures and Mr. Ricketts designed the book and its cover. When the critic says the cover suggests Indian clubs and a chimney-pot hat, Wilde argues that such resemblances have nothing to do with the beauty of coral-red lines on ivory. To the Pall Mall Gazette he says he no more wrote to please the British child than the British public.
In February 1892 he denies altering Lady Windermere's Fan because of the critics: the change in the moment when Mrs. Erlynne's relation to Lady Windermere is revealed came from his friends at supper after the first night, and from Mr. Alexander. In 1893 he tells the Times that he is proud Mme. Bernhardt wished to play Salome, but that he never writes a play for any actor. In 1894 he declines the Thirteen Club's invitation, because he loves superstitions and its aim is dreadful.
The last letters deal with journalism. T. P. O'Connor printed some doggerel called 'The Shamrock' in the Sunday Sun under Wilde's name, then accused him of plagiarising it. When the paper's assistant editor explains that the verses might have been an early work, Wilde replies that 'Only mediocrities progress.' Finally he denies writing The Green Carnation: he invented the flower, but the book is not a work of art.
Chapter by chapter
SummaryWriting from St. Louis during his 1882 tour, Wilde thanks the poet Joaquin Miller for writing after part of his audience at Rochester misbehaved. He refuses to judge a great people by one or two towns. He then turns with elaborate scorn on the provincial newspapers and the New England lecturer who attacked him, calling their writers 'Narcissuses of imbecility' who will see nothing under the microscope.
Three short notes printed in the World between 1883 and 1886 show the friendship with Whistler turning sharp. A telegram jokes that when the two men meet they talk only of themselves. A second warns Whistler that painters who lectured on art explained themselves away. The third, addressed to Atlas, says that with Whistler vulgarity begins at home.
Wilde answers a letter in Truth in which Whistler accused him of plagiarism. He calls Whistler's assertions deliberately untrue and deliberately offensive. The only original ideas he has heard Whistler express, he says, concern Whistler's own superiority to greater painters, and he regrets having to notice so ill-bred and ignorant a person at all.
Wilde tells the Times that he never called Anglo-Indians vulgar; those he has met were scholars and brilliant talkers. What he said was that vulgarity marks the Anglo-Indians Rudyard Kipling writes about, a fine subject for a realist. Whether Kipling's stories mirror real society does not interest him, since he was describing puppets in a prose-play.
From Paris, after praising the city's kiosks, Wilde corrects the Speaker: Mr. Shannon drew the pictures in A House of Pomegranates and Mr. Ricketts designed the book. The critic saw Indian clubs and a chimney-pot hat on the cover, and Wilde argues that resemblance has nothing to do with its beauty. A second letter tells the Pall Mall Gazette he did not write to please the British child.
Wilde denies that he altered Lady Windermere's Fan because of the critics. After the first night, he says, friends at supper urged that the relationship between Lady Windermere and Mrs. Erlynne be disclosed in the second act, as Mr. Alexander had already advised. He made the change long before reading the papers, whose criticism he dismisses as Bœotianism.
Wilde writes to the Times to correct its review of Salome. He is proud that the greatest tragic actress living wished to play the heroine, and looks forward to seeing Mme. Bernhardt present the play in Paris. But he did not write it for her: he has never written a play for any actor or actress, and never will.
The chairman of the Thirteen Club reads out Wilde's refusal of its dinner invitation. Wilde thanks the members but says he loves superstitions, 'the colour element of thought and imagination', and cannot dine with a society whose aim is to abolish them. He begs them to leave some unreality, though 13 is a lucky number.
Wilde complains that T. P. O'Connor printed doggerel verses called 'The Shamrock' in the Sunday Sun under his name and then accused him of plagiarising them. In a second letter he answers the assistant editor's explanation: no respectable editor prints a man's work without his consent. The idea that the verses might be early work shows ignorance of the artistic temperament, since only mediocrities progress.
Wilde denies, emphatically, that he wrote The Green Carnation, which the Pall Mall Gazette had suggested and other papers had copied. He claims to have invented the flower itself. The middle-class and mediocre book that borrows its name has nothing to do with him: the flower is a work of art, and the book is not.