oscar wilde letter to alfred douglas de profundis

He became deaf and the ear would bleed intermittently. The first indication of his fatal illness is when in Reading gaol he fainted in the chapel and injured his ear, though which side is unknown. To avoid public attention he adopted the name Sebastian Melmoth, and his wife, Constance (née Lloyd) changed her surname, and those of their sons to Holland.įollowing his release and self-ordained exile his literary skill waned and he wrote only the maudlin ballad, The Ballad of Reading Gaol: a recognition of a universal human paradox. He was released on and sailed that evening for Dieppe, where he lived in self-imposed exile, never to return to England. Terrible as was what the world did to me, what I did to myself was far more terrible still.… There is only one thing for me now, absolute humility.

Wilde confessed his own “pit of shame” and vainglorious behaviour he sought redemption. Whilst in Reading his letter to Lord Alfred Douglas, De Profundis (published 1905), records a man fallen from the throne of social and literary glory to the dungeon of public degradation. Three days later he was arrested for “gross indecency” and after two further trials was sentenced to two years’ penal servitude with hard labour in Newgate then Wandsworth prisons, and finally to Reading gaol. Oscar Wilde foolishly initiated a private prosecution against Queensberry for libel, held on 3rd April 1895. On it was inscribed: “For Oscar Wilde, posing somdomite*”. Wilde’s well-publicised affair with Lord Alfred Douglas caused his father, the Marquess of Queensberry to leave his calling card at Wilde’s club, the Albemarle, on 18 February 1895. The literary output of the comic genius Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde (1854-1900) (Figure 1), his elegant, entertaining plays, magical children’s stories, and wonderful witticisms need no reprise.

“ Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.” Oscar Wilde Had he lived in the 21st century Oscar Wilde would not have been so cruelly punished, may have received effective treatment, and thus been spared to provide much more of his wit and elegant plays, stories and poetry. The claims for neurosyphilis are wholly inadequate a chronic middle ear infection with cholesteatoma and intracranial suppuration is here suggested as the basis of his fatal illness. After release he developed what was certified as “cerebral meningitis” in November 1900, from which he died. The literary genius of Oscar Wilde has been sullied and besmirched by his infamous entanglement with Lord Alfred Douglas for “gross indecency” leading to his subsequent imprisonment for two years.

Oscar wilde letter to alfred douglas de profundis