[WILDE]. William Ernest HENLEY. Letter addressed... - Lot 103 - Pierre Bergé & Associés

Lot 103
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[WILDE]. William Ernest HENLEY. Letter addressed... - Lot 103 - Pierre Bergé & Associés
[WILDE]. William Ernest HENLEY. Letter addressed to Oscar Wilde. Autograph letter signed "W. E. H.", 1 page 2/3 in-8. Important letter of W.E. Henley addressed to Oscar Wilde in which the critic underlines, with relevance but to criticize it, the influence of Flaubert in The Happy Prince. The collection of short stories of Oscar Wilde was published in 1888: Henley addressed his letter on November 27th of the same year. My dear Oscar, Many thanks for the young Prince. I have read it with singular pleasure. It reminds me too much of the Flaubert of the Temptation; but there are things in it that are well enough invented for even him. Things, I mean, that are touched with real imagination: things that leap at the heart & live in the memory. Things (finally) like the three strokes of Death. I haven't time to write of your prose generally. It is admirably clever; it is full of colour & light & life: it has a real quality of music; but it does remind me of the Temptation & Salammbô. I should not have believed it possible - I never did believe it possible - that that style could be so perfectly mimed [? Imitated?] in English. You, though, have done the feat, & I esteem it an invention. Here & there (I might to add) I find that you've lapsed from your ideal: that you, too, have your "momentary unrequited aridness" (I thank thee, Jew!), & that I almost like'em. But of all this another time. Especially as, by this, you are livid with fury, & cursing the gods for that I am out of work. Ever yours, W. E. H. In these stories you have found - or are finding - your vocation. They are worth doing, & doing well. In his hilarious reply to the critic, Oscar Wilde explained: "To learn how to write English prose I have studied the prose of France. I am charmed that you recognise it - that shows I have succeeded - I am also charmed that no one else does - that shows I have succeeded also. Yes! Flaubert is my master, and when I get on my translation of the Temptation I shall be Flaubert II. Roi par grace de Dieu - and I hope something else beyond. Where do you think I am not so good? I want very much to know - Of course it is, to me, a new genre."
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