The Plays of Oscar Wilde (Wordsworth Classics)

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Later on, I think everyone will recognise his achievements; his plays and essays will endure. Of course, you may think with others that his personality and conversation were far more wonderful than anything he wrote, so that his written works give only a pale reflection of his power. Perhaps that is so, and of course, it will be impossible to reproduce what is gone forever. Queensberry was arrested for criminal libel, a charge carrying a possible sentence of up to two years in prison. Under the 1843 Libel Act, Queensberry could avoid conviction for libel only by demonstrating that his accusation was in fact true, and furthermore that there was some "public benefit" to having made the accusation openly. [169] Queensberry's lawyers thus hired private detectives to find evidence of Wilde's homosexual liaisons. [170] The Philosophy of Dress" First published in The New-York Tribune (1885), published for the first time in book form in Oscar Wilde On Dress (2013). His flair, having previously been put mainly into socialising, suited journalism and rapidly attracted notice. With his youth nearly over, and a family to support, in mid-1887 Wilde became the editor of The Lady's World magazine, his name prominently appearing on the cover. [92] He promptly renamed it as The Woman's World and raised its tone, adding serious articles on parenting, culture, and politics, while keeping discussions of fashion and arts. Two pieces of fiction were usually included, one to be read to children, the other for the women themselves. Wilde worked hard to solicit good contributions from his wide artistic acquaintance, including those of Lady Wilde and his wife Constance, while his own "Literary and Other Notes" were themselves popular and amusing. [93]

On 18 February 1895, the Marquess of Queensberry left his calling card at Wilde's club, the Albemarle, inscribed: "For Oscar Wilde, posing somdomite[ sic]". [167] [e] Wilde, encouraged by Douglas and against the advice of his friends, initiated a private prosecution against Queensberry for libel, since the note amounted to a public accusation that Wilde had committed the crime of sodomy. [168] Kiberd, Declan (1996). Inventing Ireland: The Literature of a Modern Nation. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-46363-9. The First Collected Edition (Methuen & Co., 14 volumes) appeared in 1908 and contained many previously unpublished works. Having been convicted in "one of the first celebrity trials", Wilde was incarcerated from 25 May 1895 to 18 May 1897. [168] Vallet, Odon (1995). L'affaire Oscar Wilde ou Du danger de laisser la justice mettre le nez dans nos draps. Paris: Editions Albin Michel. ISBN 978-2-226-07952-7.

Holland, Merlin; Hart-Davis, Rupert (2000). The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde. New York: Henry Holt and Company. ISBN 978-0-8050-5915-1.

In 2017, Wilde was among an estimated 50,000 men who were pardoned for homosexual acts that were no longer considered offences under the Policing and Crime Act 2017 (homosexuality was decriminalised in England and Wales in 1967). The 2017 Act implements what is known informally as the Alan Turing law. [237] Honours Wilde is commemorated in this stained glass window at Westminster Abbey, London The final trial was presided over by Mr Justice Wills. On 25 May 1895, Wilde and Alfred Taylor were convicted of gross indecency and sentenced to two years' hard labour. [191] The judge described the sentence, the maximum allowed, as "totally inadequate for a case such as this", and that the case was "the worst case I have ever tried". [193] Wilde's response of "And I? May I say nothing, my Lord?" was drowned out in cries of "Shame" in the courtroom. [194] Linder, Douglas O. "Testimony of Oscar Wilde on Direct Examination (April 3,1895)". Famous Trials. University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law. Archived from the original on 17 August 2021 . Retrieved 29 November 2020. 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 Extreme Unction – Oscar could not take the Eucharist". [230]A few months later he was moved to Wandsworth Prison in London. Inmates there also followed the regimen of "hard labour, hard fare and a hard bed", which wore harshly on Wilde's delicate health. [197] In November he collapsed during chapel from illness and hunger. His right ear drum was ruptured in the fall, an injury that later contributed to his death. [198] [199] He spent two months in the infirmary. [43] [198] Main article: Biographies of Oscar Wilde A Conversation with Oscar Wilde– a civic monument to Wilde by Maggi Hambling, on Adelaide Street, near Trafalgar Square, London. It contains the inscription, "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars". [245] Burdett, Carolyn (15 March 2014). "Aestheticism and decadence". British Library. Archived from the original on 21 October 2020 . Retrieved 19 January 2021.

Lezard, Nicholas (29 March 2003). "Oscar Wilde's other portrait". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 29 June 2013 . Retrieved 14 April 2010. Holland, Merlin; Rupert Hart-Davis (2000) The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde. New York City: Henry Holt and Company (US edition). ISBN 0805059156. London: Fourth Estate (UK edition). ISBN 978-1-85702-781-5. Mulraney, Frances (25 May 2022). "On This Day: Oscar Wilde was convicted of gross indecency for homosexual acts". IrishCentral.com . Retrieved 16 June 2022. Reviewers immediately criticised the novel's decadence and homosexual allusions; The Daily Chronicle for example, called it "unclean", "poisonous", and "heavy with the mephitic odours of moral and spiritual putrefaction". [126] Wilde vigorously responded, writing to the editor of the Scots Observer, in which he clarified his stance on ethics and aesthetics in art – "If a work of art is rich and vital and complete, those who have artistic instincts will see its beauty and those to whom ethics appeal more strongly will see its moral lesson." [127] He nevertheless revised it extensively for book publication in 1891: six new chapters were added, some overtly decadent passages and homo-eroticism excised, and a preface was included consisting of twenty-two epigrams, such as "Books are well written, or badly written. That is all." [128] [129] Foldy, Michael S. (1997). The Trials of Oscar Wilde: Deviance, Morality and Late-Victorian Society. Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-07112-4.

All Past National Book Critics Circle Award Winners and Finalists: 1988 Awards". National Book Critics Circle. Archived from the original on 4 June 2019 . Retrieved 22 February 2010. . Aquien, Pascal (2006). Oscar Wilde: Les mots et les songes: Biographie (in French). Croissy-Beaubourg: Aden. p.30. ISBN 9782848400808 . Retrieved 26 June 2022. Books and Manuscripts: A Summer Miscellany, Lot 150, Wilde, 'Confessions of Tastes, Habits and Convictions' ". Sothebys.com . Retrieved 27 February 2023. a b Wheatcroft, Geoffrey (May 2003). "Not Green, Not Red, Not Pink". The Atlantic Monthly. Archived from the original on 22 May 2013 . Retrieved 10 March 2017. 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 conditionally baptised into the Catholic Church by Fr Cuthbert Dunne, a Passionist priest from Dublin, [226] [227] Wilde having been baptised in the Church of Ireland and having moreover a recollection of Catholic baptism as a child, a fact later attested to by the minister of the sacrament, Fr Lawrence Fox. [228] Fr Dunne recorded the baptism: