The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde by Neil McKenna

The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde by Neil McKenna

Author:Neil McKenna [McKenna, Neil]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2008-09-08T21:47:00+00:00


On a gilded barge

`I don't think England should be represented abroad by an unmarried man ... it might lead to complications.'

Colonel Dansey's decision, taken very reluctantly, not to prosecute Robbie and Bosie was not quite the end of the Bruges affair. There were repercussions. Towards the end of October, Robbie wrote to Bosie from Davos in Switzerland where he was in exile in consequence of the scandal at Bruges. `I am not allowed to live in London for two years,' he told Bosie. As `the purse strings' were in the hands of his family, `and a stoppage is threatened, I have to submit'. More Adey had successfully managed to conceal the worst of the scandal from his family, Robbie said:

but the worthy Rev Mr Squeers wrote a full and particular account of how things were to my brother. It was news to him, as [Adey] had hitherto concealed everything, but the trouble with the noisy military gentleman. My elder brother here gets letters about the disgrace of the family, the social outcast, the son and brother unfit for society of any kind, from people at home. I am sure you will be amused to hear this.

Wackford Squeers was the corrupt and bullying headmaster of Dotheboys Hall in Charles Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby. The `worthy Rev Mr Squeers' had to be a reference to the Reverend Biscoe Wortham, who clearly had taken it upon himself to inform Robbie's older brother, Alec - and presumably their mother, Mrs Ross - of all the sordid details of the Bruges affair. It is clear from Robbie's letter that Colonel Dansey - `the noisy military gentleman' - had already been in some kind of contact with Robbie's family. Was Robbie's sojourn in Switzerland the result of a decision taken by his family, or was it part of the settlement of the scandal? Had Biscoe Wortham and Colonel Dansey demanded that Robbie leave London and live in exile abroad for a time as some kind of punishment? This may have been what Max Beerbohm meant when he told Reggie Turner that Biscoe Wortham was now `blackmailing' Ross.

Rumours of Bosie's part in the suppressed scandal were beginning to seep out. Will Rothenstein told Max Beerbohm that Bosie had been `going in for the wildest folly in London, and, I imagine, will shortly have to take a tour round the world, or something of the kind'. George Ives, who was dazzled by Bosie and more than a little in love with him, continued to fret over his troubles. On 28 October, three days after the affair had been finally resolved, Ives confided to his diary that he had `a long chat with O.W. about private matters'. These private matters principally concerned Bosie, whom Ives with his mania for secrecy referred to simply as `X', only inserting Bosie's name into the manuscript in parenthesis many years later as `Lord A.D. afterwards a traitor':

Was up very late last night, partly working out an attempt to save poor dear X from the



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