Every historian has a different answer to the question, “why does history matter,” and their answer shapes the way in which they contextualize the past. I am a history major, so I spend a lot of time–probably most of my day while school is in session–thinking about events of the past and the way in which we try to understand them in the present. This conversation felt like a good representation of a point that has been brought up throughout the semester: we project onto the past using what we know about the present. It felt as if we were so tied to what we know of Wilde’s life that we see it in all that he does, regardless of whether or not we should. I was somewhat surprised by the way in which, even after we learned the chronology of their meeting–something I did not previously know–Bosie continued to be central to our conversation. Second, the fact that Oscar Wilde did not meet Lord Alfred Douglas until the year after Dorian Gray was published would indicate that Bosie could not have been in the story in any intentional way. First, the way in which Lord Alfred Douglas (Bosie) kept coming up in conversation felt notable because so many people saw him in the story. "He got it and was consumed by it.As we discussed the first third of The Picture of Dorian Gray in class on Wednesday, I found myself struck by two details. "Wilde wanted a consuming passion," Ellman wrote. His head told him the cost of Bosie's love was too expensive, his heart considered it a bargain.
He lusted for Lord Alfred, but knew that Bosie would only hurt him. In the end, Wilde sacrificed himself to protect Lord Alfred, who remained a loyal, yet manipulative, friend.įor Wilde, who was much more low-key about his sexuality, it was a love-hate relationship, almost akin to the moth and flame. For the length of their relationship, Lord Alfred used Oscar's love for him as a means to get what he wanted. He relied on Wilde's money when his own ran out and would pout and threaten self-injury when Wilde complained of his behavior or criticized his literary skills. He had his family's temper, which flared when he didn't get his way.īosie knew of Wilde's affection for him early on and succeeded in using it to his advantage. He was a dropout at Oxford, a ne'er-do-well who was as loose with his morals as he was with his purse. "Your slim gilt soul walks between passion and poetry."īosie was flagrantly and openly homosexual, a spendthrift and gambler, according to Wilde's biographer, Richard Ellman. "It is a marvel that those red-roseleaf lips of yours should be made no less for the madness of music and song than for the madness of kissing," Wilde wrote to Lord Alfred in 1893. They exchanged letters, with some of Wilde's containing what could be interpreted as expressions of passionate love. Oscar immediately became enamored with Bosie who was thrilled that such a literary genius was interested in him.īosie referred to Wilde as "the most chivalrous friend in the world" and was willing to forsake his birthright for the friendship.
Oscar and Bosie, as his friends called Lord Alfred Douglas, met in Chelsea when Bosie was 22 and Wilde 15 years his elder.
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