Oscar Wilde: 'Confessions of Tastes, Habits and Convictions'
This week Sotheby’s is to offer a questionnaire completed by Oscar Wilde as he sat on the cusp of stardom in 1877.
It is a fascinating recording of the young writer's passions and preferences across thirty-nine questions..
Wilde was in his early twenties when he contributed to the album of “Mental Photographs” in 1877. He was still at Oxford and yet to publish a book, but had already established a keen following. Signed grandiosely with his full name, ‘Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde’, here he answers thirty-nine personal questions recording a myriad of different preferences from his favourite colour, flower, season, tree and perfume, to gems, first names, painters, musicians, poets and more.
Sotheby’s Dr Philip Errington said: “Wilde’s responses sparkle with the author’s characteristic ebullience and many are perfect Wildean epigrams. Knowing what we do about Wilde’s sharp wit and lofty world-view, his replies are exactly what one would expect to see from this bold intellectual young writer, still in his early twenties but already experiencing his first taste of fame. This questionnaire - likely filled in for an admiring fan - freezes the young Oscar in a moment in time, but also provides a chilling prophecy of what was to come. His answer to the final question ‘What is your aim in life?’ reads ‘fame, or even notoriety’.”
Here are some of his responses:
What is your favourite object in nature? The sea (when there are no bathing machines)
Book to take up for an hour? I never take up books for an hour
What is your favourite amusement? Writing sonnets and reading
What is your favourite occupation? Reading my own sonnets
If not yourself, who would you rather be? A Cardinal of the Catholic Church
Gem? Sapphire in winter, diamond in summer
Names, male and female? Eucharis, Florence, Cecil
What trait of character do you most admire in man? The power of attracting friends
What trait of character do you most admire in woman? The power of becoming either a cleopatra or a St Catherine
What trait of character do you most detest in each? Vanity: self-esteem: conceitedness
What are the sweetest words in the world? Well done!
What are the saddest words? Failure
This album comes to sale from the collection of actor and director Steven Berkoff (b.1937), famed for his villainous on-screen roles including General Orlov in the James Bond classic, Octopussy (1983). Berkoff began collecting Oscar Wilde material around the time he directed Wilde’s great tragedy, Salome, in the late 1980s. The show opened to acclaim at The Gate Theatre, Dublin, on the sixtieth anniversary of Salome’s first controversial public viewing there in 1928, and went on sell out at London’s National Theatre, before travelling to Japan, Germany and beyond.
This provenance perfectly mirrors another former owner of the album - Adderley Millar Howard (c. 1863 - 1827), who was also an actor, a touring theatrical impresario and, later, a theatrical manager. He is believed to be an early, or perhaps even the first owner of this album.
View Auction Details > “Tastes and Confessions”