Editing Oscar Wilde (section)

=== Death ===
[[File:Oscar Wilde on his Deathbed 1900 by Maurice Gilbert.jpg|thumb|right|Oscar Wilde on his deathbed in 1900. Photograph by Maurice Gilbert.]]
By 25 November 1900, Wilde had developed [[meningitis]], then called "cerebral meningitis". Robbie Ross arrived on 29 November, sent for a priest, and Wilde was [[Conditional baptism|conditionally baptised]] into the Catholic Church by Fr Cuthbert Dunne, a [[Passionists|Passionist]] priest from Dublin,{{sfn|Holland|Hart-Davis|2000|p=1224}}<ref>Cavill, Paul, Heather Ward, Matthew Baynham, and Andrew Swinford, [https://books.google.com/books?id=X2HG2SyNkaoC The Christian tradition in English literature: poetry, plays, and shorter prose] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160516172554/https://books.google.com/books?id=X2HG2SyNkaoC&dq |date=16 May 2016}}, p.&nbsp;337, Zondervan 2007.</ref> Fr Dunne recorded the baptism:

<blockquote> As the ''voiture'' rolled through the dark streets that wintry night, the sad story of Oscar Wilde was in part repeated to me... Robert Ross knelt by the bedside, assisting me as best he could while I administered conditional baptism, and afterwards answering the responses while I gave [[Anointing of the Sick in the Catholic Church|Extreme Unction]] to the prostrate man and recited the prayers for the dying. As the man was in a semi-comatose condition, I did not venture to administer the [[Holy Viaticum]]; still I must add that he could be roused and was roused from this state in my presence. When roused, he gave signs of being inwardly conscious... Indeed I was fully satisfied that he understood me when told that I was about to receive him into the Catholic Church and gave him the [[Last rites|Last Sacraments]]... And when I repeated close to his ear the Holy Names, the [[Act of Contrition|Acts of Contrition]], Faith, Hope and Charity, with acts of humble resignation to the Will of God, he tried all through to say the words after me.{{sfn|Holland|Hart-Davis|2000|p=1223}}{{efn|Robert Ross, in his letter to [[More Adey]] (dated 14 December 1900), described a similar scene: "(Wilde) was conscious that people were in the room, and raised his hand when I asked him whether he understood. He pressed our hands. I then went in search of a priest and with great difficulty found Fr Cuthbert Dunne, of the Passionists, who came with me at once and administered Baptism and [[Anointing of the Sick (Catholic Church)|Extreme Unction]] – Oscar could not take the [[Eucharist]]".{{sfn|Holland|Hart-Davis|2000|pp=1219–1220}}}}</blockquote>

Wilde died of meningitis on 30 November 1900.<ref name="OWNYTObit1900">{{Cite news |date=1 December 1900 |title=Death of Oscar Wilde |pages=1 |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1900/12/01/archives/death-of-oscar-wilde-he-expires-at-an-obscure-hotel-in-the-latin.html |url-status=live |url-access=subscription |access-date=1 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180917215406/https://www.nytimes.com/1900/12/01/archives/death-of-oscar-wilde-he-expires-at-an-obscure-hotel-in-the-latin.html |archive-date=17 September 2018 |issn=0362-4331 |id={{ProQuest|96020365}}}}</ref> Different opinions are given as to the cause of the disease: Richard Ellmann judged it was [[syphilis|syphilitic]]; [[Merlin Holland]], Wilde's grandson, thought this to be a misconception, noting that Wilde's meningitis followed a surgical intervention, perhaps a [[mastoidectomy]]; Wilde's physicians, Paul Cleiss and A'Court Tucker, reported that the condition stemmed from an old [[suppuration]] of the right ear (from the prison injury, see above) treated for several years (''{{lang|fr|une ancienne suppuration de l'oreille droite d'ailleurs en traitement depuis plusieurs années}}'') and made no allusion to syphilis.{{sfn|Ellmann|1988|pp=92, 582}}