Abstract
Yeats remembered “little of childhood but its pain”, “… that toil of growing up;/ The ignominy of boyhood; the distress of boyhood changing into man”.1 Shy and painfully self-aware, he envied the graceful yet despaired of attaining their ease. Childhood and adolescence were also intellectually unrewarding; he was “bored by an Irish Protestant point of view that suggested by its blank abstraction chloride of lime”.2 Against this uninspiring background, Oscar Wilde entered his life. Their first intersection was in 1883, five years before their first meeting at W.E. Henley’s house when Wilde invited Yeats for Christmas dinner:
On November 20, 1883, Oscar Wilde was scheduled to appear in Dublin to speak on poetry, and Willie, even though he wasn’t feeling well, wanted to hear him … despite his illness, [he] caught the return train to Dublin and attended the lecture.3
Although Wilde’s lecture was either “Impressions of America” or “The House Beautiful”, Yeats was interested in Wilde, perhaps the man more than his text.4
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
William Martin Murphy, Prodigal Father: The Life of John Butler Yeats (1839–1922) (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell U.P., 1979) 133; refer to letters from JBY to Matthew Yeats, 20 and 22 Nov. 1883.
Rupert Hart-Davis, ed., The Letters of Oscar Wilde (London: Hart-Davis, 1962) 152n.
George W. Russell, Letters from AE, selected and ed. by Alan Denson (London: Abelard-Schuman, 1961) 109–10, to George A. Moore, c. 6 Apr. 1916.
Coulson Kernahan, In Good Company: Some Personal Recollections of Swinburne, Lord Roberts Watts-Dunton, Oscar Wilde, Edward Whymper, S.f. Stone, Stephen Phillips (1917; rpt. 1968, Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press) 211.
Yeats, Letters to the New Island, ed. Horace Reynolds (Cambridge: Harvard U.P., 1934, rpt. 1970) 76–7.
Hesketh Pearson, Oscar Wilde: His Life and Wit (London: Methuen, 1954) 305, 318; see also Yeats, 116–7.
For Maud Gonne’s tale, see Conrad A. Balliet, “Micheal MacLiammoir Recalls Maud Gonne MacBride,” (Journal of Irish Literature, VI, 2, May 1977, 48.)
Allan Wade, ed., A Bibliography of the Writings of W. B. Yeats (London: Hart-Davis, 1951; 2nd edn., rev., 1958) 30. The play ran from 29 Mar. to 12 May, 1894.
Richard Ellmann, Golden Codgers: Biographical Speculations (New York: Oxford U.P., 1973) 40n.
Charles S. Ricketts, Self-Portrait: Taken from the Letters and Journals of Charles Ricketts, R.A., collected and compiled by T. Sturge Moore, ed. by Cecil Lewis (London: Peter Davies, 1939) 195–6, Journal of 29 May, 1914.
Vincent O’Sullivan, Aspects of Wilde (New York: Holt, 1936) 21.
Yeats, A Vision (New York: Collier, 1966, rpt. 1975) 98.
Yeats, ed., The Oxford Book of Modern Verse: 1892–1935 (New York: Oxford U.P., 1936, rpt. 1947) vi - viii.
Copyright information
© 1983 Michael Steinman
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Steinman, M. (1983). Wilde: “… Oscar ruled the table”. In: Yeats’s Heroic Figures. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-06555-4_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-06555-4_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-06557-8
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-06555-4
eBook Packages: Palgrave Literature & Performing Arts CollectionLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)