The pseudonym “Dorian Hope” first appeared in a collection of poetry published in New York in 1920. Mackie posits that a better fit is a man called Brett Holland. Although Lloyd was involved in spurious accounts of his famous uncle’s life and works (even claiming that Wilde had not, in fact, died in 1900!) he disappeared off the coast of Mexico in 1918, never to be seen again. Fabian Lloyd’s colourful life story makes him an attractive suspect for the 1920s forgeries, but Mackie argues against him. After some sleuthing in the 1920s, Millard identified the Wilde forger as Fabian Lloyd (aka Arthur Cravan), the son of Oscar Wilde’s brother-in-law. In one sense, the person calling himself Dorian Hope is the more likely culprit for the reason outlined below.ĭorian Hope, as Mackie demonstrates, is a slippery character. The discrepancy between the identity of the forger identified by Millard in his letter to Ledger and in the proof copy in Los Angeles has not so far been explained. Mackie’s book goes into fascinating detail about the misdeeds of both Mrs Chan Toon and the person (or, more correctly, people) using the name Dorian Hope. In this case, however, someone has written in blue pencil across the poem: “Mrs Chan Toon forgery”. Like that belonging to Ledger, it contains a copy (in typescript) of the forged poem. Curiously, a proof copy of The poems, probably Millard’s own, has ended up in the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library in Los Angeles. This might explain why he did not remove the transcription from his copy of The poems. So, although Ledger acknowledges Millard’s error regarding some of the manuscripts, he fails to include this particular poem within the forged material. In the transcription below, dated 26 July, Millard admits his error: In fact, Ledger appears to have gone to his grave believing the poem to be genuine, even though Millard shamefacedly wrote admitting that he had been deceived. At the foot of the page Ledger notes that the poem, from an unpublished manuscript by Wilde, was sent to him by Christopher Millard on 24 July 1922.Īlthough it is now accepted that Oscar Wilde did not write this poem, both Walter Ledger and his friend Millard were at one point fooled by the forgery. Slipped into Walter Ledger’s copy of The poems of Oscar Wilde (Methuen, 1908) is a hand-written transcript of a poem titled “After: for Horace Reckett”. Gregory Mackie’s book, Beautiful untrue things, examines the period during the early 20th century when Wilde’s reputation had been rehabilitated to such an extent that some enterprising rogues began to see the benefit in producing forgeries of his works. A recent discovery in the Robert Ross Memorial Collection has coincided, by happy chance, with the publication of an excellent book about the phenomenon of Oscar Wilde forgeries in the 1920s.
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