Christa Giles

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considered as a potential mother she loses that quality that
rendered her desirable.
It is interesting, then, that the idea of writing Salomé
supposedly came to Wilde when he and his friend
Raynaud were looking into a jeweler’s window. The
thought was conceived and came to him ˝wearing a helmet
of gold, in a shower of precious stones.˝ 310 It is not
surprising that gems should have helped to inspire the play
for they seem to embody many of the decadent’s thematic
preoccupations. The very crystalline quality of jewels
suggests that they escape the vicissitudes of natural things.
Further, despite the fact that gems are found in nature, it is
man who transforms them and turns them into things of
beauty. Des Esseintes identifies jewels with makeup,
considering them both to be attempts to ˝correct and
improve on Nature.˝ 311 It is telling, then, that the tortoise
which Des Esseintes encrusted with rare and precious
stones dies, unable to live under the aegis of artifice. The
sense of excess, luxury, and supreme indulgence is evoked
by Verlaine when he says that the word ˝decadent˝ ˝emits
the brilliance of flames and the gleams of precious
stones.˝ 312 Wilde’s and Huysmans’ beloved Moreau’s
paintings reflect this opulence, as well as the concern for
form in their jewel-like surface and ornamentation. In A