📍1 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, Ireland
1855 – 1878“We moved to No. 1 Merrion Square when I was a year old, and it was home for twenty-three years — a tall corner house on Dublin's most fashionable square. My father, Sir William, an eminent eye and ear surgeon, saw patients in rooms he built onto the side of the house. My mother, Lady Jane Wilde, was the poet Speranza, and every Saturday her drawing room overlooking the square filled with writers, musicians, actors and wits, so many that they spilled out onto the stairs. As a small boy I carried refreshments among them, listening. That is where I learned that conversation could be an art. My little sister Isola died when I was twelve, and I kept a lock of her hair and a poem I wrote for her all my life. From here I went to Portora, Trinity College and Oxford, and on to London. I left Dublin behind, but never my mother's gift for performance. The house is now part of a university, and visitors can stand in Speranza's salon.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today