![WILDE, Oscar (1854-1900). Autograph letter signed (‘Oscar’) to Louis Wilkinson (‘My Dear Boy’), Paris [Hôtel d’Alsace], n.d. [November 1899].](https://www.christies.com.cn/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_17706_0250_002(wilde_oscar_autograph_letter_signed_to_louis_wilkinson_paris_hotel_dal051641).jpg?w=1)
![WILDE, Oscar (1854-1900). Autograph letter signed (‘Oscar’) to Louis Wilkinson (‘My Dear Boy’), Paris [Hôtel d’Alsace], n.d. [November 1899].](https://www.christies.com.cn/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_17706_0250_000(wilde_oscar_autograph_letter_signed_to_louis_wilkinson_paris_hotel_dal051617).jpg?w=1)
细节
WILDE, Oscar (1854-1900). Autograph letter signed (‘Oscar’) to Louis Wilkinson (‘My Dear Boy’), Paris [Hôtel d’Alsace], n.d. [November 1899].
Two pages, 273 x 210mm, printed letterpaper from the Grand Café Capucines. Envelope (partial). [With:] handwritten and typed transcripts of the correspondence between Wilde and Wilkinson. Provenance: by descent to the present owner.
‘I am afraid you are going to be a poet: how tragic! how terribly tragic! In the waters of Helicon there is death – the only death worth dying’. Wilde sends his address at the Hôtel d’Alsace, asking ‘Did you ever receive a copy of my last play – "An Ideal Husband"? I told my publisher to send you one to Radley – I wrote your name on the title-page'. He appreciated Wilkinson’s latest work greatly – ‘I think your poem ‘Hyacinthe’ – (I don’t like the longer title) – very beautiful indeed: a most delicate work of art’ – its beauty inspires him to pronounce Wilkinson doomed to be a poet.
The letters exchanged between Wilde and Louis Wilkinson date from the final years of the poet’s life: cast out of English society and abandoned by most of his friends, Wilde was living in near-destitution in the dilapidated surroundings of Paris’s Hôtel d’Alsace. Yet the correspondence with Wilkinson is illuminated, nonetheless, by his joy in a shared love of poetry and art, and his affection for the younger man; here, Wilde asks whether Wilkinson has received the copy of An Ideal Husband promised in his letter of 3 February 1899 [see previous lot]. Wilde died in Paris on 30 November 1900; later, during his university days and beyond, Wilkinson would attract criticism for his public support of Wilde and his legacy, advocating against the repressive laws against homosexuality in England.
Two pages, 273 x 210mm, printed letterpaper from the Grand Café Capucines. Envelope (partial). [With:] handwritten and typed transcripts of the correspondence between Wilde and Wilkinson. Provenance: by descent to the present owner.
‘I am afraid you are going to be a poet: how tragic! how terribly tragic! In the waters of Helicon there is death – the only death worth dying’. Wilde sends his address at the Hôtel d’Alsace, asking ‘Did you ever receive a copy of my last play – "An Ideal Husband"? I told my publisher to send you one to Radley – I wrote your name on the title-page'. He appreciated Wilkinson’s latest work greatly – ‘I think your poem ‘Hyacinthe’ – (I don’t like the longer title) – very beautiful indeed: a most delicate work of art’ – its beauty inspires him to pronounce Wilkinson doomed to be a poet.
The letters exchanged between Wilde and Louis Wilkinson date from the final years of the poet’s life: cast out of English society and abandoned by most of his friends, Wilde was living in near-destitution in the dilapidated surroundings of Paris’s Hôtel d’Alsace. Yet the correspondence with Wilkinson is illuminated, nonetheless, by his joy in a shared love of poetry and art, and his affection for the younger man; here, Wilde asks whether Wilkinson has received the copy of An Ideal Husband promised in his letter of 3 February 1899 [see previous lot]. Wilde died in Paris on 30 November 1900; later, during his university days and beyond, Wilkinson would attract criticism for his public support of Wilde and his legacy, advocating against the repressive laws against homosexuality in England.
荣誉呈献
Eugenio Donadoni