A newly-discovered photograph of Oscar Wilde at the University of Oxford was recently sold for more than £5,300 at an auction.
The photograph was discovered in a Victorian photo album, containing 90 miscellaneous photographs. Dating from 1876, the photograph was taken during Wilde’s time at Oxford, depicting the author amongst his peers in the cloisters of Magdalen College. The photograph was found accidentally: the seller had purchased the photo album due to interest in a group of small photographs of rural Scandinavia, before realising Oscar Wilde’s appearance.
The photograph shows 50 men arranged in three rows, with Wilde appearing fifth from the left in the middle row, in the centre of a group of eight friends. Chris Albury, director at Dominic Winter Auctioneers, told Cherwell: “I may be imagining it, but I feel the group dynamic of Oscar Wilde and his friends sets them apart from everyone else.” A few of Wilde’s inner circle have also been identified in the image, including his then best friend and fellow Classicist, William ‘Bouncer’ Ward, in the dark bowler hat directly to Wilde’s left.
The image was sold for £5,308.80 at Dominic Winter Auctioneers on 20th May, surpassing an estimate of between £3,000 and £5,000. The only other copy of the photograph is held in the Library of Congress in Washington DC – the auction marked the first time the image was offered for sale.
Most interest around the image came from private Oscar Wilde collectors. Albury told Cherwell: “The winning bidder turned out to be one of our regular Oscar Wilde collectors, who we have known for a very long time”. This auction comes after a photograph of Wilde on his deathbed was sold for £279,800, at Bonham’s auction in February earlier this year. Taken on the day Wilde died, November 30th, the photograph had sold for 100 times its original estimate.
Wilde matriculated from Magdalen College in 1874, before graduating in 1878 with first-class honours in both his final examinations, and moderations. During his time at Oxford, he won the University’s Newdigate Prize for English Verse for his poem ‘Ravenna’. Besides academic achievements, the author developed a reputation for stylish dress and joined the University Masonic Lodge, as well as appearing before the University’s Chancellor’s Court in 1877 for non-payment of debts.
