BBC R3 Documentary - 'Oscar In America'
Broadcast in the 'Sunday Feature' slot
Presented by Owen Dudley Edwards
Produced by Chris Spurr
Broadcast December 30, 2007
Coded from tape at 128/44.1

In 1881 Gilbert & Sullivan's caricature of the aesthetics' movement
'Patience , or Bunthorne's Bride' was on in New York. It was due to
go on tour, but Richard D'Oyly Carte, G&S's producer, was concerned
that US audiences away from the east coast would not get the joke.

He employed Oscar Wilde to prime the potential audience through his
aesthetics' lectures. Oscar arrived in New York on January 3, 1882,
he travelled west, and gave 140 lectures in 260 days

This is the story of Oscar's tour.

Contributors:
Mary Warner Blanchard
Merlin Holland
Declan Kiberd
John Cooper
__________________________

Bunthorne's song

If you're anxious for to shine in the high aesthetic line as a
    man of culture rare,
You must get up all the germs of the transcendental terms, and
    plant them ev'rywhere.
You must lie upon the daisies and discourse in novel phrases of
    your complicated state of mind,
The meaning doesn't matter if it's only idle chatter of a
    transcendental kind.

              And ev'ry one will say,
              As you walk your mystic way,
"If this young man expresses himself in terms too deep for me,
Why, what a very singularly deep young man this deep young man
    must be!"

Be eloquent in praise of the very dull old days which have long
    since passed away,
And convince 'em, if you can, that the reign of good Queen Anne
    was Culture's palmiest day.
Of course you will pooh-pooh whatever's fresh and new, and
    declare it's crude and mean,
For Art stopped short in the cultivated court of the Empress
    Josephine.

              And ev'ryone will say,
              As you walk your mystic way,
"If that's not good enough for him which is good enough for me,
Why, what a very cultivated kind of youth this kind of youth must
    be!"

Then a sentimental passion of a vegetable fashion must excite
    your languid spleen,
An attachment a la Plato for a bashful young potato, or a not-
    too-French French bean!
Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle in
    the high aesthetic band,
If you walk down Piccadilly with a poppy or a lily in your
    medieval hand.

              And ev'ryone will say,
              As you walk your flow'ry way,
"If he's content with a vegetable love which would certainly not
    suit me,
Why, what a most particularly pure young man this pure young man
    must be!"