Oscar Wilde

Abstract

All San Francisco will remember when Oscar Wilde aired his aesthetic views to crowded houses some ten years ago in this city. I saw the lion in his lair — saw him stirred up, poetically speaking — and an interesting process it was. It took place at the Palace Hotel, where the young poet resided during his stay here. Without further preliminaries, I will endeavor to picture Oscar Wilde’s at-home manner, and how he existed in so unaesthetic a caravansary as the Palace Hotel. Fortunately, there was plenty of time to get a good look at the room, and to peer about without transgressing any social rules; for when I arrived, as per appointment, there was no one but his servant at home, and there was opportunity to get an uninterrupted few minutes, and jot down whatever was remarkable. Between the fear of not seeing everything and of his sudden arrival, I could only get cursory glimpses of the peculiarities the room afforded, and had but little time to think of what I had to ask him when he did make his appearance. At any rate all the questions I had in my mind in reference to Mr. Wilde flew from me when he entered the room a few moments after I did. His lazy manner and my hard effort to explain in a depressed sort of way, occasioned by my feeling of strangeness, soon made matters rather one-sided.

People I have Met (San Francisco: Francis, Valentine, 1890) pp. 48–52.