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May 1882 147 audience I had was in Salt Lake. The Mormons are the most unintellectual people I have met in America, because they have the worst physiques I have seen; and a people must have good physiques in order even to comprehend art. I found President Taylor charming. I went to his house, and he and his three wives occupied a stage box at my lecture. The Mormons’ tabernacle is the shape of a teakettle and is decorated with the ornaments of a jail.” “In Chicago I had delightful audiences. I was particularly struck with the courtesy of the western audiences, which the tone of the press did not lead me to expect. In every city where I have been I have either found an art school—crude, to be sure—or, if they had not one, they started one on the occasion of my visit, so that I cannot doubt that my coming to America has had an effect. In the smaller cities most of the people have never seen any art whatever, and the idea of design is bad. The idea I had of America when I landed has been very strongly confirmed; it is that what this country needs principally is not the higher imaginative art but the simple decorative art that can make beautiful for us the commonest vessel of the house. If an article is beautiful, it must have been made by a good workman, because only a good workman can make a beautiful thing.” Mr. Wilde said that his costumes described in the World of Thursday were an experiment. They were very beautiful; so simple, yet so artistic.2 The age of Francis I, the era when the costumes such as he had ordered were worn, was an era of simplicity. He did not know whether he would wear them in public, but he would if he wore them at all. On Thursday afternoon next he will deliver a lecture at Wallack’s Theater on “the practical application of aesthetics to house decoration, dress, and morals.” He thinks it probable that he will go to Australia, as a strong pressure has been brought on him to do so. If he concludes to go he will sail from San Francisco on June 31 [sic], after having first visited Canada. He will remain in and about New York until he leaves for Canada. 1. Wilde mishears the question. 2. See “The New Costume,” New York World, 4 May 1882, 5. 39. “Oscar Wilde in Montreal,” Montreal Witness, 15 May 1882, 8 Few men, at least of his age, have been so much talked about, and certainly none so much laughed at, as Oscar Wilde. Curiosity as to his personal appearance has been by no means abated by the many descriptions published, for i-xii_1-196_Wild.indd 147 8/4/09 9:11:57 AM 148 May 1882 readers at once recognize the fact that in some cases the most vivid language is useless to convey a correct impression, and Oscar Wilde has been considered a sufficiently unique personage to be one of those cases. Consequently, when a Witness reporter was ushered into the poet’s room at the Windsor Hotel this morning, his personal as well as professional curiosity was somewhat disappointed to find no poet visible. He was there, however, and his apparent absence was only due to the tobacco smoke which hovered ethereally about his poetic form, and through which his countenance was presently revealed. Reclining in an armchair in the midst of anything but artistic, not to speak of aesthetic, surroundings was the apostle of art and aestheticism. Mr. Wilde, as he rose and extended a large, gentle hand to the visitor, showed to full advantage. Tall and well proportioned, his large figure was clad in graceful garments of soft homespun.1 The absence of knee-breeches and hose was at first a painful shock, but the effect was partly removed by a glance at the massive throat; the broad turned-down collar was decidedly “all but,” while the aesthetic dull red necktie, baffling comprehension as to the manner of its putting on, can only be described as “quite consummately too.” But attention could not remain long fixed on the attire. Mr. Wilde’s face, surrounded and framed by a mass of long, untamed, tawny hair, is massive, almost colossal, and at the same time very pleasant in feature and expression, especially so far as the poetic eyes are concerned. But mere...

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