It sounds rather conceited, I know, but I have often thought that part of my father’s distorted grievance in all this business was caused by jealousy. It never occurred to me at the time, but I believe my father really was fond of me, and I think he sensed somehow that, with the horrible heartlessness of youth I did not appreciate him as he really was, or felt himself to be. I probably showed him (God forgive me) that I thought him rather stupid in comparison with my brilliant friend. I was a spoilt and selfish beast in those days, I know only too well. Did I perhaps unconsciously wound the feelings of my poor ‘Papa’?

The thought which has only recently occurred to me is a terrible one. Did my father really love me all the time, as I certainly loved him before he turned against me, and was he only doing what Oscar says in his great Ballad all men always do, killing the thing he loved? Didn’t we all three, Wilde, my father, and I, do it, more or less?