![]() ![]() He was further recognized for his contributions as a naturalist, archeologist, and Celticist. In addition to his accomplishments in the fields of ophthalmology and otology, he played a major role in the Irish Census from 1851 through 1871, developing important statistical methods for presenting and analyzing the results. William Wilde was a man of serious purpose who wore many hats. It is well worth dwelling on the life and career of Oscar Wilde’s father, Sir William Robert Wilde (1815 – 1876). 2 The authors find further irony in the fact that eight weeks after Oscar Wilde died, his fourteen-year-old son Vyvyan underwent a mastoidectomy for acute mastoiditis and was left with a permanent loss of hearing in his left ear. Reviewing the status of mastoidectomy surgery at the time, the authors propose that the operation was a radical mastoidectomy as developed in Germany during the last quarter of the nineteenth century. ![]() ![]() 1,i They do not believe that his terminal illness was due to syphilis as was so often claimed in the literature. Sellars in their contribution to “Department of Medical History” in The Lancet, believe that Wilde suffered from a cholesteatoma with secondary infection of the middle ear and mastoiditis that led to a fatal meningoencephalitis. He was given the Last Rites of the Catholic Church thirty-six hours before his demise and may have been aphasic at that time.Īshley H. Oscar Wilde had serious cerebral disturbances resulting from long-standing suppuration of the right ear and made a diagnosis of “meningoencephalitis.” The absence of localizing signs made “surgical intervention” untenable. The two physicians signed a joint statement that Mr. Paul Claisse, who had an academic background in medicine. Tucker called in a Parisian physician, Dr. His condition worsened during the first three weeks of November when he became delirious and unable to get out of bed. A dressing attendant, daily dressing changes and open wound packings, and frequent morphine injections were required. The surgery was major and expensive, £60, which would be about £3000 in today’s currency. A surgeon was called in and on Octoan operation was performed under chloroform in Wilde’s hotel room. Maurice a’Court Tucker, the British Embassy doctor, for headaches and a flareup of his chronic ear infection. In early October 1900, he was seen by Dr. He resumed many of the bad living habits he had acquired prior to his imprisonment a lack of exercise, over-eating, and abuse of alcohol. The petition brought an outside practitioner who certified the presence of a perforated left tympanic membrane and a foul discharge.Īfter serving his two-year sentence, Wilde left England and resided in Dieppe on the Normandy coast, Italy, Switzerland, the Riviera, and Paris. He stated that the symptoms had been present during the entire time of his imprisonment, and beyond irrigation with water on three occasions he had received little attention. In July of 1896 he submitted a petition to the Home Secretary from Reading Gaol stating that he was suffering from total deafness in the right ear and an abscess that had perforated the ear drum. He was sentenced to two years imprisonment and hard labor from to May 18, 1897. After an initial trial in which the jury was unable to reach a verdict, Wilde was again tried and found guilty on May 25, 1895. That Oscar Wilde’s father, Sir William Robert Wilde (1815 – 1876), was a distinguished Irish eye surgeon and pioneer in the field of otology in the nineteenth century has been cited as the first in several ironical facts in the biographies of both men.įollowing an unsuccessful libel suit brought by Oscar Wilde against the Marquess of Queensberry, Wilde was arrested on Apfor “gross indecency” under Section 11 of the Criminal Law Amendment of 1885. The cause of his fatal illness was meningoencephalitis, a complication of a chronic middle ear infection manifested by otorrhea and unilateral deafness. His assumed name eluded few as to his true identity, Oscar Wilde. ![]() A bit of irony: Sir William Wilde and Oscar Wilde February 11, 2019Įarly in the afternoon of November 30, 1900, thirty-six hours after he had lapsed into a coma, a man named Sebastian Melmoth died at the Hotel d’Alsace in the Rue des Beaux Art. ![]()
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