Wilde at Heart!

An edition of The Importance of Being Earnest was sold at auction late last month for the princely sum of £55,000 - i.e. -  nearly seventy European big ones to you and to me!  Ample loot for sure ... but I reckon it was paid by someone who, rightly, figured it was worth acknowledging the generosity of its author, Oscar Wilde, who had it in his mind to say thank you to someone for simply being kind. The person in question was  Major James Nelson, the Governor of Reading Gaol when Wilde was incarcerated there and the reason Wilde sent him the gift was because Major Nelson had allowed Wilde access to books while he'd served out his sentence.

The edition was inscribed with these words: "To Major Nelson from the author. A trivial recognition of a great and noble kindness." 

Were I Major Nelson and had I received such a gift, I think I would have written back to Wilde and rather than offer something in return or say anything new, I would have simply repeated those same words back to him, given that little if any kindness at all was shown to him when he needed it most. I often wonder had he lived longer, how much more Wilde would have gifted to literature and to the world. Lots, I'd wager. He died, a devastated man, aged only 46.

The Earnesty of Oscar!