Micheál Mac Liammóir premiered his play about Oscar Wilde in Dublin in 1960, a fitting place as Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854. This play, a monologue, delivered brilliantly by Alastair Whatley not only captured the story of Oscar Wilde’s life but also of his character, spirit and wit.
Oscar Wilde
Oscar’s father, Wiliam Wilde, was a surgeon. His mother, Francesca was a poet. Wilde was a brilliant student both at Trinity College Dublin where he was awarded the Berkeley Gold Medal for Greek, and at Magdalen College Oxford.
Oscar Fingal O’Flaherty Wills Wilde wrote poems and was noted for his interest in the aesthetic movement. He gave lectures. In 1886, in his lecture on Art in relation to dress he reportedly said that “fashion is a form of ugliness so unbearable, that we have to alter it every six months.” He also likened the modern bonnet to, ‘a stuffed bird alighting on a piece of lace.” These statements capture the wit of Oscar Wilde which certainly came out in different occasions in the monologue.
Alastair Whatley cleverly spent some time describing the flamboyance of Wilde’s style, including a clever dialogue about a buttonhole between Phipps the valet and Lord Goring. This introduces Wilde’s own wearing of a green carnation. The carnation was dipped in dye becoming what some considered to be an ‘arsenical verdigris green’ which at night assumed the hue of a harsh, crude, metallic blue. However, the wearing of a green carnation did become a fashion item for some. Whatley also reminded us of Wilde’s ‘lily worship’, not only the flower but also of his devotion to Lily Langtry.
Newspapers at the time commented on Wilde’s appearance one reporting that he was ‘a young man, tall and well formed, with a pleasant face and heavy head of dark curling hair.’ Whatley fitted this bill and with his flamboyant orange suit, he captured the image.
Wilde was reported in his lecture in Newcastle as having a “clear, expressive voice, which is pleasant to listen to, which he uses with excellent effect”. This too was true of Whately. In a rendering of the ‘handbag scene’ from The Importance of Being Earnest, Whately captured Lady Bracknell’s interrogation of Worthing exactly with voice changes in tone, manner and emphasis. The reference to smoking as being a fitting occupation for a young man brought laughter from the audience as did Lady Bracknell saying:
“Mr Worthing! You can hardly imagine that I and Lord Bracknell would allow our only daughter to marry into a cloakroom, and form an alliance with a parcel? Goodbye, Mr Worthing!”
How things changed
Everything was going well for Oscar Wilde. As well as successful plays he had written fairy stories, the Happy Prince being woven into the monologue and Whateley’s exposition on Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray was fascinating. Wilde had also fallen in love and married Constance Lloyd in 1884, and they had sons, Cyril and Vyvyan.
After Vyvyan was born, Wilde’s friend and lover Robbie Ross moved into the house. All was going well until he met Bosie, Lord Alfred Douglas, son of the Marquis of Queensbury.
The Marquis left a calling card for ‘Oscar Wilde Posing Somdomite’, not even spelling sodomite correctly. Wilde disastrously sued the Marquis for libel, but this decision ruined his life as the Marquis used working class witnesses, love letters Wilde had sent to Lord Douglas and supposedly homoerotic passages from his literary work in the ensuing court case brought against Wilde.
The court case was expertly delivered by Whatley. The pimp Taylor is being cross-examined as well as Wilde. Taylor admitted his room had women’s clothes and wigs, with scents and incense. He also gave evidence of young men and visits by Wilde. Whatley changed voices and expressions as if the court case was played by different actors. The effect was compelling. Wilde was sentenced to two years hard labour for, “inciting other persons to commit crime, with committing offences against decency, and with offences under the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885 (Clause 11)”. A Newspaper gave the Marquess credit for “getting rid of a pest”.
The mood changes. Wilde is no longer popular. His wife changes her and the children’s surnames to Holland and flees abroad. Lord Douglas never contacts him. His friend Robbie remains true, as does Ada Leverson whom Wilde nicknamed ‘The Sphinx’.
Wilde wrote letters to Ada, which she treasured as a true friend. He wrote a letter, now known as De Profundis between January and March1897 to Lord Alfred Douglas. In 1897 the more progressive Major Nelson replaced Colonel Isaacson as warden of Reading Gaol. He allowed Wilde books and prison paper, pens and ink but he could not send the letter. After his release Wilde entrusted the letter to Robbie who sent a copy to Lord Douglas. He promptly burnt it without even looking at it. Whatley delivered part of this letter with great effect showing how Wilde had arrived at self-realisation and how he felt that the law had convicted him unjustly.
On his release Wilde fled abroad ending up in Paris. During this time, he wrote The Ballad of Reading Gaol. Again, excepts from the long poem were movingly performed with downlights illuminating only the upper half of Whatley’s body. The poem is a tribute to the hanging of a soldier who had murdered his wife. The telling lines begin and end with:
Each man kills the thing he loves
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword.”
The poem mainly covers the hanging of the soldier with lines like:
‘And the Governor all in shiny black
With the yellow face of Doom
The most poignant part is the disposal of the dead body in lime where boots are covered in quicklime and even ‘The Chaplain would not kneel down to pray,’ even though the dead man was ‘one of those whom Christ had gone to save.’
No human voice
Wilde had faced hardship in prison. There was isolation, ‘no human voice’ came near ‘to speak a gentle word.’ He refers to drinking, ‘brackish water’ and the ‘bitter bread they weigh in scales’ being ‘full of chalk and lime.’ Hard labour is gruelling. But from his writings Wilde suffered shame and degradation.
On leaving prison he wanted to be admitted to a Catholic Retreat, but this was not allowed. He travelled abroad, ending up in Paris. Impoverished, he died, disconnected from his family and his audience and feeling that the law had unjustly convicted him, Wilde died, aged 46, from meningitis in the Hotel d’Alsace in Paris where he had been kindly treated by the owners.
At the end of the performance, one really felt that this was a sad, untimely man who rightly had proclaimed himself a genius which as Peter Tatchell in 1994 said:
“Had Wilde not been prosecuted and imprisoned, he may have lived longer and produced further works of literary brilliance. His imprisonment was both a monstrous persecution of a gay man and an act of cultural vandalism which robbed our country and the world of a truly creative genius.”,
The monologue and the way it was performed achieved this feeling in perfection.
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