I See Thee With Angels

In June 1877, the short-lived Dublin magazine The Illustrated Monitor notably published a poem that Oscar Wilde had written in Rome titled: “Urbs Sacra Æterna” (Sacred and Eternal City).

However, that was not the only Italian connection. Elsewhere in the same issue there appeared a now forgotten and uncollected verse in translation provided by Oscar’s mother. It carried the auspicious title “To a Child in Heaven”.¹

Here it is as it appeared when reprinted in Donahoe’s Magazine:

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“From the Italian, by Lady Wilde”

Lady Wilde had an ill-founded fancy towards Latin ancestry, and in keeping with this illusion she adopted the pen name Speranza (Italian for “hope”). So it is no surprise that she occasionally took to recasting Italian verse.

In this selection “To a Child in Heaven”, Lady Wilde’s phraseology appears somewhat ingenuous—or perhaps she is writing intentionally to a child; it is not clear.

So to understand Speranza’s translation style better I sought the expert counsel of Wildean writer and researcher Eleanor Fitzsimons, co-author of the 2025 definitive literary work Speranza: Poems by Jane Wilde, who informed me:

“Lady Wilde took a fairly loose approach to translating, as she explains in ‘The Vision of the Vatican’, an essay included in her collection Social Studies when writing about her version of Victor Hugo’s poem ‘Le Pape’. This is her account of her process:

There is not an attempt at strict verbal accuracy in these translations. The object is simply to give an idea of the tendency and scope of the poem by a free paraphrase of some of the most striking passages. The rich cadence of Victor Hugo’s verse none can emulate, the thunder and the music of the line, but his strong thoughts are like golden sands, and may be gathered without loss of lustre. So, I have endeavoured to collect a few in this rough English casket, as they glittered by me in the stream of his eloquence.

“Free paraphrase” or not, Eleanor Fitzsimons agreed that Lady Wilde’s personal repurposing of poems rather than direct translations makes her a co-author in a sense.

And given that Lady Wilde’s spiritual theme of 1877 marked 10 years since the death of her 9-year old daughter Isola, this rendition in The Illustrated Monitor deserves to be better known—if not as literature, certainly for its poignancy in memoriam.

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Left: Frontispiece to The Illustrated Monitor (partial).
Right: Advertisement in Freeman’s Journal²

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Lady Wilde and Isola?

in 2019 there was a circuitous article in The Irish Times by Karen Ievers that featured rare photographs she had purchased online, several of which purporting to be of the Wilde family.

First there was the Hill album containing a photograph of Sir William Wilde, which has been verified to be him; and a separately acquired picture of a young Oscar which has not.

Then there are two images by Messrs. Geary Brothers³ [shown above] which have given rise to the speculation that as a pair they portray:

—Lady Wilde—based on a close resemblance with the Mulrenin watercolor (at top);

—and if so, Isola Wilde, based on the provenance that the two photographs came as a set, and are posed against the same background: identical baseboard (skirting), drapes, and rug.

This latter identification would be of great consequence because there is no other known photograph of Isola Wilde—Speranza’s child in heaven.

© John Cooper, 2025.

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With thanks to Eleanor Fitzsimons for her invaluable assistance in the preparation of this article.

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Related:

Isola Wilde Memorial, Edgeworth Society.

Oscar Wilde on Irish Poets

St. Patrick’s Day, 1882

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Footnotes:

1. Vol. IV, No. 3 (June 1877).
   Issue not found online; physical copy at the National Library of Ireland. ↩︎
2. Freeman’s Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser, Sat, June 16, 1877, p.3. ↩︎
3. An early daguerreotypist and photographer with studios at 10, Patrick Street, Kilkenny; and 5, Grafton Street, Dublin. ↩︎

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