Oscar Wilde's Italian Dream 1875–1900

by Renato Miracco, Philip Kennicott (Introduction)

Italy as a haven of gay liberty: a grand tour with Oscar Wilde, featuring previously unseen photographs and archival materials

In Oscar Wilde's Italian Dream 1875-1900, leading Wilde scholar Renato Miracco combines written research with previously unseen visual material ranging from Wilde's earliest heady trips to Italy as an Oxford student to recently released court documents from his trial and his final days in France and Italy in 1900, after his incarceration in Reading Gaol, and his voluntary exile from Britain. Italy, and the larger world beyond London, was essential to the sensitivity and awareness of Wilde's identity, his contributions to prison reform and his challenges to social norms and sexual stereotypes in his last years. It also offered a great deal of sexual liberty compared to the oppressive moral atmosphere of England at that time.

The previously unseen images Miracco has incorporated in this volume (including photos that Wilde received from the gay German photographer Wilhelm von Gloeden) are mainly from private collections, and together with letters, reminiscences and magazine and newspaper articles (along with derogatory articles about Wilde from the Italian press) they play a key role in placing Wilde's character, and an entire generation, in a complex context. Oscar Wilde's Italian Dream 1875-1900 is a major addition to the canon of one of the world's greatest literary figures.

Renato Miracco (born 1953) is an Italian art critic and curator. He was awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic for Cultural Achievements in 2018. He served as Cultural Attach� for the Italian Embassy in Washington from 2010 to 2018 and as advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Italy. Miracco has curated major exhibitions for Tate Modern in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and London's Estorick Collection. His passion for Wilde dates from the early 1980s when he wrote his first essay on Wilde's time in Italy. This new book on Wilde is based on new materials that Miracco has found over the last few years.

Genres: Biography, Queer, Italian Literature, LGBT

159 pages, Hardcover

Published April 7, 2020

Reviews

[Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

According to the author in order to understand Oscar Wilde’s predicament we must first understand the laws governing homosexuality through the ages. He has provided us a history lesson.

The author shares some of Oscar’s letters and they are heartbreakingly sad: Excerpt from Oscar’s letter to Leonard Smithers, December 1897 – Naples “… and as for my life, it is one ruined, unhappy, lonely and disgraced.” (Pg.111)

There are some wonderful pictures in this book but the reader must turn to the back of the book to find their references. I didn’t care for this arrangement.

All in all it’s quite a lovely book (sad as the subject may be) and I especially enjoyed it having just watched “The Happy Prince” (2018) Written by Directed by and Starring Rupert Everett as Oscar Wilde.

[Andrew H · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book appears to offer a lot, but falls short of what it claims. Original insights? Mainly a lot of second hand views from early biographies of Wilde and letters that are available elsewhere. A key aspect of Wilde's dream, after his release from Reading Gaol, relates to Sicily and his visit to Von Gloeden: Taormina, in the 1900s, was regarded as a synonym for Sodom. This is covered in one short paragraph, even though Von Gloeden's work stars on the cover and is used on eight other occasions. In other words, Von Gloeden serves as a titillating backdrop to a run-of-the-mill book. Miracco's book is also flawed by typos and errors. In 1882, at the age of 38, Wilde supposedly meets a famous chiromancer who predicts the downfall of a king. The date should be 1892, and there are syntactical errors such as this: "To enter Paradise you only have to knock once at the door, but you must not three times to get into Hell." Overall, this is a glossy book that would have benefitted from deeper analyses and accurate proofreading.

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am going to be pretty hard on this book because it is misleadingly presented as offering new insights and information on Wilde's post prison dalliance in Italy with Lord Alfred Douglas. There is no real new or important information, a few quotes from Italian newspapers of the day were new to me - but no new facts - and no new interpretation or insight about how Wilde and Douglas lived and got on during their time in Italy. Recent Wilde biographies by Mathew Sturgis or Neal McKenna would be more profitable reading on this period.

What deeply annoys me is the almost deliberate attempt to mislead by the profligate use of photographs by Baron von Gloeden, which have no connection to Wilde or Douglas (although Wilde owned Gloeden's photographs before his imprisonment as far as i know nobody knows which ones), to suggest new knowledge or revelations on the homosexual dalliances that Wilde and Douglas may have enjoyed under the Italian sun. There is nothing new, the old tale is not even well told.

It is a nicely produced book but that is the best that can be said of it.

[Jonathan Fryer · Rating 2 out of 5]

One of the most pervasive myths about the Irish playwright Oscar Wilde is that prison destroyed him and that his remaining couple of years of life after release were a sorry saga of penury and ill health, leading to an early death in Paris. But as Oscar said himself, truth is never pure and rarely simple. Behind the bare facts of this decline lies the reality of many months of enjoyable travels and hedonistic pleasures, not least in Italy. Like many Victorians, Wilde was attracted by the warm climate, classical legacy and artistic treasures of Italy, in his case supplemented by the welcoming smiles of local youths, especially in the south. Though Naples was the scene of much tension as he tried cohabitation with Lord Alfred “Bosie” Douglas for one last time, he found much delightful companionship to console himself there, as indeed in Sicily and Rome. His letters from Italy to his devoted friend, erstwhile lover and literary executor, Robbie Ross, bubble and fizz with the joy of so much adventure. These letters — quoted extensively — form the backbone of Renato Miracco’s new book, Oscar Wilde’s Italian Dream 1875-1900, the rest of the skeleton mainly provided by further Wilde letters and quotations from other writer’s books, including one of mine.

For the dedicated Wildean, therefore, there is very little that is new, the notable exception being translations of some interviews Oscar gave to Italian journalists, mainly in Naples. It is interesting to note how many of them reported inaccurately, or made things up. Miracco’s original commentary is by comparison slender and contains a few glaring errors, the oddest being his placing of Wilde’s arrest at the Cadogan Hotel in London after his being found guilty of gross indecency. There are, however, many attractive photographs in the book, not least the sepia neo-classical portraits by Wilhelm von Gloeden of youths on Capri (where Wilde did visit von Gloeden). The finest of these is the wrap around printed on the book’s hard binding. But it is rather sad when one has to admit that the best thing about a book is its cover.

[Caos Anemos · Rating 3 out of 5]

Il volume, scritto dal curatore d'arte Renato Mirocco, si presenta come una raccolta di lettere interviste, resoconti dei giornali, osservazioni e scritti di colleghi e amici di Oscar Wilde, incentrandosi sulla permanenza dello scrittore inglese presso Napoli, luogo in cui egli si recò a seguito della scarcerazione, tentando una riconciliazione, l'ultima con Lord Alfred Douglas. Trasferitosi in Italia in particolar modo al sud, terra più tollerante egli cambiò il suo nome in Sebastian Melmuth, dedicandosi alla scoperta di nuove bellezze e all'elaborazione di operette teatrali.
I capitoletti si alternano a fotografie vittoriane ritraenti lo scrittore stesso e ai magnifici tableaux vivents di Wilhelm von Gloden, nobile tedesco che aveva frequentato Wilde.

[Deak Wooten · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not what I expected but at times interesting. Predominantly original letters and articles interspersed with historical explanatory text. That text was often confusing. There was little effort to connect the photographs with the surrounding text. Kennicott's introduction sets a high bar that the book doesn’t deliver.

[Una (EX) precaria tra i libri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ho scoperto questo gioiellino di Colonnese Editore quasi per caso… e per fortuna. Chi mi segue da un po’ sa che amo Oscar Wilde alla follia e che ho letto praticamente tutto quello che ha scritto… lettere comprese. Non potete immaginare la mia gioia quando ho avvistato questo testo di Renato Miracco che va ad approfondire quelli che sono stati gli anni meno indagati, dopo la scarcerazione, quando ha viaggiato ‘in incognito’ alla ricerca di pace sotto lo pseudonimo di Sebastian Melmoth… e l’ha trovata in Italia.

Dalla copertina e dalla sinossi temevo il solito resoconto scandalistico delle relazioni 0m0sessuali dell’autore… invece ho trovato un interessante approfondimento della personalità di Wilde post-carcere e finalmente un approccio ben documentato ai suoi orientamenti affettivi con una corretta interpretazione dell’origine filosofico-letteraria della sua om0sessualità.

E’ un testo completo di lettere e stralci di interviste (rilasciate/carpite in Italia) e articoli di giornale, corredato da bellissime foto d’epoca di luoghi e persone che rendono l’atmosfera di quel periodo… il tutto con quelle sfumature seppia che evocano subito un effetto nostalgia, misteriose e affascinanti.

[willowdog · Rating 4 out of 5]

Who hasn't been taken in by the world of Oscar Wilde? Miracco traces the life of Oscar after his release from prison and his self-imposed exile to Italy and other places in Europe. Utilizing letters, interviews, newspaper accounts, friends' and associates' remarks and writings, one gets a picture of Wilde during this time until his death. Miracco gives background information on why Italy and what it offered to Wilde in his exile. What a character Wilde is! From his relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas to his wide ranging of comments on the beauty of the men of Italy, he never shies away from his acknowledgment of his homosexuality. The work is wonderfully illustrated and an essential bibliography is provided.

[Jamie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book leaves a lot to be desired in regards to Wildean scholarship, but I did appreciate getting to read a number of Wilde's letters that I had previously not gotten a chance to see before this reading. It made me all the more look forward to Matthew Sturgis' "Oscar Wilde: A Life" which will be coming out in October of this year.

I did enjoy my time with this book, if for no other reason than the cover photo by Wilhelm von Gloeden, "A classical scene with a view of Vesuvius from Posillipo" or "A Classical Scene, Tierra Del Fuego, South America." The ephebe with his back to the viewer has a very ripe peach.

[Chiara Niamh · Rating 4 out of 5]

The missing piece in Oscar Wilde's biography