DOWSON, Ernest (1867-1900) - photo 1

DOWSON, Ernest (1867-1900)

Lot 100
13.02.2025 00:00UTC +00:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
Buyer Premiumsee on Website%
ID 1362896
Lot 100 | DOWSON, Ernest (1867-1900)
Estimate value
£ 4 000 – 6 000
DOWSON, Ernest (1867-1900)
19 autograph letters signed ('Ernest Dowson') to Conal [O'Riordan], Paris, Catford and elsewhere, [November 1895 - 20 February 1900], mostly undated
Together approx. 52 pages, various sizes, three written in pencil; with a letter by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos and three by R.H. Sherard, describing Dowson's last illness and death. Half green morocco box. Provenance: Sotheby's, 11 March 1968, lot 773; Barry Humphries (1934-2023; bookplate).

The last years of a decadent poet, including a meeting with Oscar Wilde and Charles Conder. Writing from Arques-la-Bataille in Normandy, [c.10 June 1897], Dowson describes a meeting with Wilde (only a month after his release from prison: Wilde was living at nearby Berneval): 'The other day I met Oscar & dined with him at his seaside retreat; I had some difficulty in suppressing my own sourness & attuning myself to his enormous joy in life just at this moment – but I hope I left him with the impression that I had not a care in the world. He was in wonderful form, but has changed a good deal – he seems of much broader sympathies, much more human & simple. And his delight in the country, in walking, in the simplicities of life is enchanting. When [Charles] Conder had left he described ... Conder's delightfully inconsequential mind & manner of conversation ... "Conder's conversation", he said, "is like a beautiful sea-mist"'. In another letter in the same month he describes an afternoon with Wilde, 'His gorgeous spirits cheered me mightily. I was amused by the unconscious contrast between his present talk about his changed position & his notions of economy, & his practice, which is perversely extravagant...'. The letters give a vivid picture of Dowson's rootless existence in the last years of his life, chiefly in France amongst English acquaintances also including Leonard Smithers, and struggling against financial constraints and physical ill-health.

The recipient is the Irish writer Conal O'Riordan (1874-1948): published in the Letters, ed. Flower and Maas. The last two letters, from the house of the author Robert Harborough Sherard in Catford, are written in pencil only days before Dowson's death, and are thought to be his last letters. Sherard's letters describe Dowson's arrival, and the second, written on the day of his death, begins 'You will not be able to be kind to Ernest any more. You will be very glad you were the last friend to be good to him'.
Auction house category:Books and manuscripts
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
8 King Street, St. James's
SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
Preview
13.02.2025 – 13.02.2025
Phone +44 (0)20 7839 9060
Email
4FQ.AYGKAGLUQ@FO3G@
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