Vyvyan was educated abroad, separated from his elder brother, Cyril (who was killed in the first world war), had his surname changed and spent 40 years trying to embrace the memory of his father.Įventually, marriage late in life to Merlin's mother and the need to earn money after he was declared bankrupt in 1950 allowed (or compelled) him to acknowledge Oscar, and he wrote several books about his father, including the highly regarded Son of Oscar Wilde. Vyvyan's mother, Constance, died in 1898, and her family tried to obliterate the memory of Oscar and his homosexuality. Vyvyan had been a child when Wilde was imprisoned and never saw him again after 1895. His father, Vyvyan, had gone through a similar process of denial and, late in life, accommodation with Wilde's legacy. Only in the mid-80s, when he began to help his mother to administer the Wilde estate, and then in 1987 when he fell out with Richard Ellmann over aspects of his biography of Wilde (in particular, whether he had died from syphilis), did he begin seriously to study his grandfather's life. When he left university he wanted to write, but worried that people would compare his efforts unfavourably with Oscar's, so he went to work in the Middle East for five years before disappearing in the deserts of academic publishing. Being the grandson of Oscar Wilde has not been an easy role, and only in the past few years has he worked out how to play it. He frequently flips back his fringe with his hand, wears multi-coloured slippers and smokes a lot considering it is nine in the morning, but otherwise the bohemianism is kept in check. Holland is 54, fleshy (I would say like Oscar, but he would hate that), and shaggy-haired. So I must first put on record that his airy, spacious, book-lined flat overlooking Tooting Common is actually very nice, despite the leak. A reporter called on him recently to discuss the letters but spent most of her article describing the shabby gentility of his circumstances or more precisely the leaking ceiling of his flat in Tooting, south London. ![]() There was a moment of hesitation before Holland would agree to this interview. ![]() For Holland, it is the culmination of a gradual coming to terms with his grandfather's legacy. ![]() It is his grandson Merlin Holland's moment too: his new edition of Wilde's letters has just been published, he co-curated the exhibition at the British Library, and he is dashing between the UK, France, Ireland and the US, co-ordinating the Wilde commemoration and appearing at conferences and seminars to discuss his fabled forebear. It is a long way from Wilde's ignominious and self-pitying death in Paris in 1900. Ireland is taking the occasion even more seriously: issuing Wilde stamps and devoting three weeks of programmes, including productions of all the plays, to one of Dublin's great literary sons. Next Thursday is the centenary of his death, and it is being marked by a themed set of programmes this evening on the BBC's Knowledge channel, by exhibitions at the British Library, the Barbican and the Geffrye Museum in east London, and by a welter of books on Oscariana - his trials, tabletalk, wit, sexuality, even his wallpaper.
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