OSCAR WILDE IN VERONA
In June 1875 Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), at the time a twenty year old student at Oxford
University, undertook his first trip to Italy, in the company of his ex-professor of Greek
at Dublin’s Trinity College, the protestant minister, John Pentland Mahaffy and a friend
called William Goulding. Italy attracted him for cultural as well as religious reasons
because in that very year his close friend, Hunter Blair, had become a Roman Catholic
convert and Wilde himself was tempted to follow in his steps, but his conversion would
take place only at the time of his death, in the great Jubilee year of 1900.
In Italy Wilde could visit all those cities and sights which had been artistically described
and transfigured by John Ruskin, whose books Wilde appreciated and avidly read.
Before the middle of June 1875, Oscar Wilde and his companions started off from
Oxford and presumably reached London where they boarded a ship that took them to
Leghorn in Italy. From Leghorn the tourists travelled to Florence where they stayed
from June 15th to the 19th.
With much regret, on the 19th the small company took a train from Florence to Venice.
They stopped in Bologna, just for a quick supper, and continued their rail trip to Venice,
where they arrived the following day. In the city of the laguna, they strolled in Piazza
San Marco, along the narrow alleys and then they went to the Lido and to the island of
Saint Lazarus, to visit the Armenian monastery where Byron had stayed. In Venice
Wilde also dedicated some of his time to the circus and to the theatre.
In the afternoon of the 22nd of June the trio had reached Padua and Wilde busied himself
in exalted admiration in front of the frescoes of Giotto in the Scrovegni chapel. A bit
later he dined in what he described as the best restaurant in Italy.
On June 23rd Oscar Wilde and his friends were in Verona. In a letter to his mother he
writes: “we went to Verona at six o’clock, and in the old Roman amphitheatre (as
perfect inside as it was in the old Roman times) saw the play of Hamlet performed – and
certainly indifferently – but you can imagine how romantic it was to sit in the old
amphitheatre on a lovely moonlight night. In the morning went to see the tombs of the
Scaligeri – good examples of rich florid Gothic work and ironwork; a good marketplace filled with the most gigantic umbrellas I ever saw – like young palm trees – under
which sat the fruit-sellers.” He also remembers Dante “who, weary of trudging up the
steep stairs, as he says, of the Scaligeri when in exile in Verona, came to stay at Padua
with Giotto in a house still to be seen there.”
It was probably during this brief stay in Verona that Wilde was inspired to write the
sonnet At Verona, published in the 1881 edition of his Poems.
After Verona Wilde goes to Milan with his friends, but, having spent almost all his
money, he must return home. Before leaving, on June 25th, he visits Arona, the town of
St. Charles Borromeo, on Lake Maggiore, and from there he goes, by coach, via the
Simplon Pass, to Lausanne. On the 28th he arrives in Paris and continues his voyage
back to his home in Ireland.
OSCAR WILDE’S OTHER ITALIAN JOURNEYS
March 1877: Wilde, Mahaffy, Goulding and another student called George Macmillan
travel from London to Genoa, passing through Paris and Turin. From Genoa they reach
Ravenna and then Brindisi where they board a ship for Greece. During their return trip,
they arrive in Naples and from there they take the train to Rome, where they remain a
few days. On the 28th or 29th Oscar Wilde is back in Oxford.
May-June 1894: Wilde, from Paris where he was staying, goes to Florence where, by
chance he meets Andrè Gide, whose acquaintance he had made in Paris, and he visits
the Anglo-Florentine writer, Vernon Lee (Violet Paget).
September 1897-February 1898: After leaving Reading Gaol in May, Wilde goes to
Dieppe, France, but, in a few month’s time, he reaches Lord Alfred Douglas in Naples.
They first go to live at the Hôtel Royal des Etrangers, then they rent Villa Giudice, in
Posillipo. Wilde and Douglas visit Capri together. Douglas leaves and Wilde, who by
now lives alone at the Palazzo Bambino, 31 Santa Lucia, goes to Taormina.
February 1899: From Nice where he was staying, Wilde goes to Genoa to pray on the
tomb of his wife, Constance, who has died the year before. He goes to Switzerland and
the, in April he is in Santa Margherita Ligure.
April 1900: Wilde is in Palermo where he spends eight unforgettable days. He then goes
to Naples for a short stay and moves on to Rome. On the 15th of April, Easter Sunday of
that Jubilee year, Wilde receives the benediction from Pope Leo XIII.
On November 30th 1900 Oscar Wilde dies in Paris at the Hôtel d’Alsace in rue des
Beaux-Arts.
Verona for Wilde is the town of Dante’s exile, an exile of hardships and sufferings that
must be remembered by echoing the Biblical imprecation of Job. But Wilde is certainly
exaggerating when he evokes the image of Dante in jail. This never happened and only
poetical license can justify such a false representation of the real events. Probably the
idea of the jailed poet was suggested to him by the romantic picture of Tasso in the
prison of Ferrara, of which there’s a hint in The Soul of Man under Socialism. Perhaps
when he was in prison, from 1895 to 1897, Wilde thought about this early prophetic
poem and the meaning of being an imprisoned poet. Then he was fully conscious, as he
says in his long letter, De Profundis (1897), addressed to Lord Alfred Douglas, that “At
all costs I must keep Love in my heart. If I go into prison without Love what will
become of my Soul?” “ I must keep Love in my heart today, else how shall I live
through the day?” And throughout the epistle he repeats like a refrain: “Shallowness is
the supreme vice.”
The sonnet At Verona is directly linked to the long poem Ravenna (1878), through the
inspiring influence of Dante, and also to The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), in which
the poet invokes forgiveness for the prisoners by refusing the hellish conditions of the
prison itself and the very idea of revenge exercised by society when it decrees the death
penalty for criminals.
BEFORE WILDE
Although Verona was not always included in the classical itinerary of the Grand Tour, it
soon became the chosen destination for all those travellers who were keen on a place
full of cultural allure. For English speaking travellers the city was identified with the
Shakespearean settings: it’s the scene of The Two Gentlemen of Verona, of the two
world-renowned lovers, Romeo and Juliet, it’s always “fair Verona”, where young,
infinite love never dies. It’s also the city that welcomed Dante Alighieri who dedicated
his Divine Comedy to Cangrande della Scala; a place where every enthusiastic scholar
of Dante of the nineteenth century wanted to be.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824), was in Verona in 1816 when he
appreciated the medieval town which saw Dante in exile, but he also stopped at Juliet’s
tomb and greatly admired the Arena. Whoever has eyes trained to see the marvels of the
past can only rejoice at the wealth of architectural stratifications – Roman, Medieval,
Renaissance – openly displayed by Verona in all its panoramic glory and rarely
experienced by the tourist, even in other Italian cities.
Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873) was in Italy in 1833 and under the Neapolitan
sun he exclaimed: “Italy, Italy, while I write, your skies are over me – your seas flow
beneath my feet.” The acclaimed author of The Last Days of Pompeii dedicated an essay
to Juliet’s tomb in 1840, which he had visited in Verona.
John Ruskin (1819-1900) used his immense talent to praise Verona with his pencil and
his pen. He first visited the city in 1835 and then he returned many times, in 1841, in
1846, in 1849, in 1869, and every visit was for him an occasion to study with
painstaking accuracy and loving dedication a particular monument or palazzo, or
church: Arche Scaligere, Piazza dei Signori, Piazza Erbe, Sant’Anastasia. For the artist
who understood the greatness of the stones of Venice, Verona was nonetheless
“exquisite”.
Charles Dickens (1812-1870) went on his Grand Tour in 1844-45. He was afraid that
the real Verona would disappoint him, instead everything reminded him of Romeo and
Juliet. “Pleasant Verona!” For its old, noble palazzi and for its enviable position: the
most beautiful city in Italy.
Robert Browning (1812-1889) and Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861), both
visited Verona, but did not include remembrances in their poems. Elizabeth, though,
compares the Italian nation of the Risorgimento, captive of the Austrian Empire, to the
unfortunate Juliet: “Juliet of Nations”.
Sir Frederick Leighton (1830-1896), painter, friend of the Brownings, he came to
Verona in 1852. He describes it vividly in his diaries. In 1853 he painted “The
reconciliation of the Montagues and Capulets after the death of Romeo and Juliet” and,
with a clear allusion to the Italian situation, in 1864, he completed an imposing picture
of “Dante in exile”.
AMERICAN TRAVELLERS
Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908), scholar, polymath, particularly interested in Italian
culture, he completed a very successful prose translation of the Divine Comedy. He
corresponded with John Ruskin with whom he exchanged views on the attractions of
Verona.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882), poet, deeply steeped in European culture,
translator of Dante, sympathetic to the Italian cause, he was in Verona with his daughter
on June 13, 1869. He saw John Ruskin who was sketching in Piazza dei Signori. He
approached him and then they all went for a stroll.
William Dean Howells (1837-1920) American Consul in Venice, effective and talented
writer of novels and of his Italian experience, in 1867 he published his Italian Journeys,
where he narrates the wonderful discovery of the ruins of the Roman Theatre.
Henry James (1843-1916) was in Verona in 1870, coming from Munich which,
compared to the Italian city, he found ugly. He walked all around the city and, at the end
of his visit, he declared that it was enough to stay in Verona to acquire a classical
education. “Nowhere else is such wealth of artistic achievement crowded in so narrow a
space; nowhere else are the daily comings and goings of men blessed by the presence of
manlier art.”
Edith Wharton (1862-1937) came to Italy almost every year after her marriage to
Teddy in 1885. She was completely captivated by the landscape around Lake Garda.
She actually used this setting for the very romantic escape of the lovers in her first
novel, The Valley of Decision (1902), which deals with the situation of the Italian states
just before the advent of Napoleon.
Ezra Pound (1885-1972) in 1910 wrote to his parents that Verona was probably the
most beautiful city in Northern Italy, that the church of San Zeno represented
architectural perfection and that, if there was a heaven on earth, that was to be found in
Sirmione on Lake Garda.
OSCAR WILDE’S CONTEMPORARIES
George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans, 1819-1880), the genial novelist of Middlemarch and
Romola, visited Verona with her husband John Cross, who was twenty years her junior,
in 1880, just after their wedding. The couple, enjoying their honeymoon, found the city
picturesque and endearing and they had some innocent fun imitating Dante and Beatrice
and Romeo and Juliet.
John Addington Symonds (1840-1893) preferred to live in Italy for its mild climate
and because everything reminded him of the historical period that he loved and studied,
the Renaissance. With the vigil eye of the trained aesthete he visited many cities in the
North of Italy, such as Venice, Verona, Milan, narrated their history and described their
treasures in The Renaissance in Italy (7 vols. 1875-1886), which after Walter Pater’s
epoch-making oeuvre, became a classic. Wilde, who had carefully read Symonds, found
some descriptions invaluable for the composition of his novel, The Picture of Dorian
Gray (1891).
Arthur Symons (1865-1945), writer, critic of the Decadent movement in England,
knowledgeable about all things Italian, in accordance with his fin de siècle sensibility,
he said that he preferred Mantua, in particular the ruins of the Gonzaga castle, to
splendid Verona. When he arrived in Verona on May 6, 1894, he spent a lovely
morning in a beautiful garden (Giardino Giusti?); but, just the same, he considered
Verona too perfect, too smart, unreal.
Herbert Horne (1864-1916) was a poet, biographer and sharp critic of Sandro
Botticelli and his philosophical paintings. In 1894, after a chance meeting with Henry
James in Venice, he decided to accompany Arthur Symons to Mantua and Verona. Both
would have liked to stay on in Italy and in Verona they started thinking of buying a
palazzo, possibly in Venice. Horne actually realized his dream because he went to live
in Florence in 1912. He became a very active collector of antiques and paintings and
when he died he left his palazzo with all its precious collections to the city of Florence,
the present Museo Horne.
AFTER WILDE
Israel Zangwill (1864-1926) was in Italy with his wife Edith. On February 21, 1909
they were both in Mantua and, shortly after, they arrived in Verona. In 1910 Zangwill
published his travel narrative, Italian Fantasies, which reproduced on the book cover
the “Madonna of the rosewood” , painted by Stefano da Zevio and on display at the
Castelvecchio Museum in Verona. Walking around town he admired San Zeno with its
bronze portals, the Museum of Natural Science, the great palaces, of which he
particularly appreciated Palazzo Canossa, which he toured with its owner. Zangwill also
reminds us that Dante mentions his exile in Canto XVII, v. 58 of Paradise in his
Comedy, as if Verona could only be mentioned in heaven.
Alethea Wiel, aware of the continuous interest that the city held for the English
traveller, published The Story of Verona, London, Dent, 1907.
Nora Duff, stayed in Mantua then in Verona where she was in touch with the Marquis
Luigi Canossa for her scholarly work on the great Countess Matilda of Canossa, which
she published with the title, Matilda of Tuscany, la gran donna d’Italia, London,
Methuen, 1910.
Alice Maude Allen published A History of Verona, London, Methuen, 1910.
David Herbert Lawrence (1885-1937) in 1912 he was in Verona with Frieda who,
exhausted from a long walk through the city, went to sit at the base of Dante’s statue in
the Piazza dei Signori. In 1929 the couple returned to Verona, but David, who was very
ill, instead of enjoying the sights, dedicated himself to revising the poem, filled with
forebodings of death, Bavarian Gentians. David and Frieda lived on the shores of Lake
Garda from 1912 to 1913. In that period, at Gargnano, Lawrence wrote the preface to
Sons and Lovers, and he also composed a series of seven literary sketches dedicated to
the genius loci, the spirit of place. Like Wilde, he also attended a very lively
performance of Hamlet, with Enrico Persevalli in the role of the protagonist.
James Joyce (1882-1941) was invited by Ezra Pound to visit him in Sirmione in 1920,
when, undergoing a period of great economic difficulty, he was, besides his regular job
as a teacher, dedicating himself to the writing of Ulysses (1922) He was at the time
actually revising the episode of Nausicaa. Joyce met Pound on June 8th and the
American poet, who also noticed that his friend was not in good health, tried to
convince him to go and live near him in Sirmione.
GUIDES
Travellers in general relied on guides in order to visit the city according to their own
pace. This meant that at times they could find an expert available who would show them
all the main sights, a cicerone, or, as was more often the case in the nineteenth century,
they could stroll through the centre of the city or take a carriage and admire the most
important monuments by reading all the information packed in their very scholarly
guides, books that specialized in detailed descriptions of everything that could be of any
interest or use for the tourist. There was a rather varied choice of English and Italian
guides.
For instance, John Ruskin’s tour of Verona in 1846 was clearly organized by consulting
his Murray, a guidebook edited by Sir Francis Palgrave in 1842, whose authority the art
critic directly quoted concerning the church of San Zeno. The Handbook for Travellers
in Northern Italy: States of Sardinia, Lombardy and Venice, Parma and Piacenza,
Modena, Lucca, Massa-Carrara, and Tuscany, as far as Val d’Arno became an
indispensable travelling aid for the Victorian tourist in Northern Italy. Charles Dickens,
during his Italian Grand Tour in 1844-45 was often bored by Palgrave’s pedantic style
and often went off to visit a town without the assistance of his vade-mecum. When
Dickens arrives in Verona he thinks that the best thing to do is to go directly to Juliet’s
house and then to walk to Juliet’s tomb, which is simply an empty, marble trough, and
to meditate on her unfortunate fate. Once back in his hotel room, Dickens in a facetious
mood, tells his readers that he will read Shakespeare’s play like no one has ever done
before in Verona.
There were other means that inspired travellers to travel abroad. Printed illustrations, in
many cases, were largely responsible for enticing people to face the hardships of a long
trip. Quite famous were the printed drawings of the main sights of Verona by Samuel
Prout. And, of course, travel diaries, narratives, chronicles, memoirs and the many
accounts of the Grand Tour that circulated from the eighteenth century onwards, offered
a great deal of information and encouraged a trips abroad in order to broaden the mind
and learn the principal rules of social living. Literature also dealt a great deal with
travel. Ruskin’s generation was influenced in a very positive way by Byron’s poems, in
particular by Childe Harold’s Pilgimage (1809-18, the fourth Canto is entirely
dedicated to Italy) and by Samuel Rogers’ Italy (1822).