assumed that "Mr. W.H." was meant for Lord William Herbert, it was
only because that seemed the easiest way out of the maze. In fine, I
pointed out to Oscar that his theory had very little that was new in
it, and more that was untrue, and advised him not to publish the
paper. My conviction that Shakespeare was not abnormally vicious, and
that the first series of Sonnets proved snobbishness and toadying and
not corrupt passion, seemed to Oscar the very madness of partisanship.
He smiled away my arguments, and sent his paper to the _Fortnightly_
office when I happened to be abroad. Much to my chagrin, my assistant
rejected it rudely, whereupon Oscar sent it to Blackwoods, who
published it in their magazine. It set everyone talking and arguing.
To judge by the discussion it created, the wind of hatred and of
praise it caused, one would have thought that the paper was a
masterpiece, though in truth it was nothing out of the common. Had it
been written by anybody else it would have passed unnoticed. But
already Oscar Wilde had a prodigious notoriety, and all his sayings
and doings were eagerly canvassed from one end of society to the
other.
"The Portrait of Mr. W.H." did Oscar incalculable injury. It gave his
enemies for the first time the very weapon they wanted, and they used
it unscrupulously and untiringly with the fierce delight of hatred.
Oscar seemed to revel in the storm of conflicting opinions which the
paper called forth. He understood better than most men that notoriety
is often the forerunner of fame and is always commercially more
valuable. He rubbed his hands with delight as the discussion grew
bitter, and enjoyed even the sneering of the envious. A wind that
blows out a little fire, he knew, plays bellows to a big one. So long
as people talked about him, he didn't much care what they said, and
they certainly talked interminably about everything he wrote.
The inordinate popular success increased his self-confidence, and with
time his assurance took on a touch of defiance. The first startling
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