He was benkrupt, his wife had taken their children and left because Oscar wasn´t able to forget Alfred and none of his friend would speak to him. One of his only friends, Robert Ross, net him in France and Wilde fave Ross an eighty-page letter to Lord Douglas where his explained why he could never see him again. Wilde moved to Paris and changed his name to „Sebastian melmoth“. He died of alcohol-poisoning, drugs and meningitis in November 1900. His final consolation was that on his deathbed he was received into the Roman catholic church.







HIS CHARACTER


He is often quoted and copied, but there can only be one man with the wit, charm and fashion-sense of Oscar Wilde.
Oscar Wilde was a writer who set out to be controversial. He deliberately chose a flamboyant style of dress, including velvet knee-britches, silk stockings and a flowing
bow-tie, in order to set himself apart from the dark suits of his late Victorian contemporaries. Such extravagance made him the centre of attention in fashionable London society where he became particularly famous for his brilliant conversation.
He liked to show off his wit by expressing ideas in amusing, clever and original ways. His opinions were often otrageous, flaunting contemporary social attitudes and norms.
He had a phenomenal mind. One of the things he could do was read a novel very, very fast – unbelievably fast. He used to be able to read a book in 20 minutes and tell you the plot and then he could recite huge passages from a novel the size of Middlemarch. He read in German, Italian, French and Russian. He really had a quite extraordinary mind, he had read more than anybody else. He was an extraordinary critic because nothing passed him by. He knew popular culture as well as anybody. At the time he ws taken for a poseur but he was a great literary mind, a philosopher and a wonderful political essayist.
Oscar was a great listener, not somebody who dominated. He made everybody around the room feel more intelligent for being there and he didn´t weigh them down with the speed of his mind. He opened his mind to things around him. He had the very rare blend of a faultless verbal, ear and a beautiful colour sense – they don´t usually go together. When he toured America he gave lectures on interior decoration.
Wilde himself was a man determined to follow his nature despite the almost universal opposition of Victorian society. Oscar´s work thrived on the realisation that he was gay, but his private life flew of the decidedly anti-homosexual conventions of late Victorian society.