Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-09-10
WHO IS oscAR WILDE ?

fever. 1t has not to dangerously marked
degree been apparent in this country.
though there are signs of it's increasing
temperature even here. But in England
it is a raging fever, feticism, and has
there one chief and grand high priest,
whose mission is to elevate this worship to
its Hottest standard.
| He is the second son of the late Sir VIM.
Wilde of Dublin, and his name is Oscar.
! His father was a distinguished oculist
and devoted archeologist; an antiquarian
widely known as such in his own country.
But he was wild fellow in fact as in
name, eccentric in personal manner and
appearance, rakish in habit, and had
enough of scandal attached to him con-
corning women to make him famous in
society His wife, beautiful and talented
woman, wrote volumes OF poetry and tic-
| ton. OF such pair was born Oscar, who
has attained to the title "The Apostle of
the Esthetes." Now, what is it that he
| au'OSdIes, aAu why 10 IL Iudt HIS Haino Is
in all mouths in England, and that the
sentimental and horidly artistic people of
America are reading and signing over every
line that flows from his pen?
In the first place, Oscar wears his hair
at great length, and it sweeps broad and
furred collar that well. dressed men cannot
afford to wear. These speak doubtless of
the poetry and romance of his mother and
the eccentricity of his father. In the next
place, though not yet 80, he has taken
warning by the follies of his sire, and is
reasonably correct, which SO surprises the
aristocracy that they are lost in admiration
at his exceptionally virtuous example.
In the next place he has real talent, is
good classical scholar, was close student
at Trinity and Enniskillen, and has been
successful without being brilliant as
writer in London papers. He is of a
poetical temperament, and wen the New.
degate prize for English verse. But he
has creed, wherein his weakness resides,
The esthetic has its place, but too much
of it Is like too much water in soup, and
Wilde is an exponent of too much water.
That the people should be cultivated to
higher and better views of art should be
brought into closer communion with the
beautiful in nature and art and to clearer
appreciation of the best there is in both, is
desirable but it is better that they should
know nothing of either than to grow maud
lin over it. Wilde and his followers wor-
ship the old the ancient is the idol OF the
esthetes the modern is to them an of
tense they seek for the beautiful in that
longing, mystical and mysterious way that
results in nothing and leaves the searcher
wholly unsatisfed. They live upon hopes,
aspirations and desires, and dwell upon the
border land of realm not to be approached
by common mortals. They talk of art
with wealth OF language, and famine of
thought. They are of those who are filled
with "searchings after the infinite, longings
latter the unfathomable, but who regard it
"as vulgar to pay their debts" They go into
raptures over an ancient vase, quaint bit |
of table ware, or the harsh and angular
outlines of Japanese tracery, but are blind |
to the beauty and worth that reside in the
master strokes of the strong arm of the |
marine engine, or the wondrous grandeur
of the modern triphammer, which may
Craze feather or fashion a rail to bear the |
wheels of commerce.
Oscar Wilde and his followers bend in
esthetic rapture over human and heather
production which to them it would be pro-
fame to criticise in language that the aver.
age people of the age can understand and
concerning which their critics wander away
in the may mists of expression that is
pitiful cropping in the dark for something
they know not what. They are the
{" too too" the utterly "too too" the
very very kind of people, who dream
over the impossible, and are altogether
too fragile for strong thoughts, Wig
orous ideas and hearty expression.
OF this class OF people are the
young men whose locks polish their coat.
collars, and maidens whose waists approach
their arm-pits in the effort to appear arts.
tic. OF this class of people are those who
cannot find in homely English fit medium
for the expression of their thoughts. Of
this class of beings are those who are ever
searching for the beautiful, but who never
find it; who have their eyes set so far
above the common things of life that they
stumble over the desirable realities and
necessities of the present.
And of these Oscar Wilde is one of the
leaders indeed, the head aud front. In
such as he, and those of his school, the
esthetic taste is perverted, the true love
Of art profaned and the aspirations for the
beautiful reduced to sickly sentimentality.
The teachings of his school have invaded
hearth into curiosity shop; have
driven out IN many cases the cultured ;
taste for adornment. and substituted {
an abnormal desire for the strange
and fanciful. And so the esthetic have
come to be real stumbling. blocks {
to art progress, and a recent critical jour- {
nal, The Hour. is led to question whether {
this, their chief apostle. is most knave or
most fool, I" for ii he does not believe in
the tenets of his creed he must be
knave, and if he does, people of healthy
minds and bodies can scarcely under {
stand strong or strapping young man
lusciously lunching upon lank, lean 1
lilly, or finding his greatest delight in the {
contemplation of ten-mark teapot" {
We would not be understood as depre. I