Ragged Hand is proudly republishing this classic poem now complete with a specially-commissioned new biography of the author. Other notable works by this author include: “Picture of Dorian Gray” (1890), “Salome” (1891), and “The Importance of Being Earnest” (1895). He was famously imprisoned for homosexual acts from 1895 to 1897 and died at the age of 46, just three years after his release. Well-known for his sharp wit and extravagant attire, Wilde was a proponent of aestheticism and wrote in a variety of forms including poetry, fiction, and drama. Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (1854–1900) was an Irish poet and playwright who became one of the most popular in London during the 1880s and 1890s. Wilde wrote what ended up being his final published poem during his lifetime, titled The Ballad of Reading Gaol, while in exile in Berneval-Le-Grand. In Reading Gaol he became prisoner C.3.3 - the occupant of the third cell on the third floor of C wing.

In 1895, he was convicted of ‘acts of gross indecency with another male person' and sentenced to two years with hard labour. Within the poem, Wilde narrates the execution in full and explores the brutal nature of the punishment that all inmates must endure. Oscar Wilde, the poet and playwright, was the most famous inmate of Reading Gaol. Wildes THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL It is surprising that the influence of Dantes Inferno on Wildes The. Composed after his release from the titular prison whilst he was in exile in Berneval-le-Grand, the poem deals with the hanging at Reading Goal of Charles Thomas Wooldridge, a 30-year-old man who was imprisoned for cutting his wife's throat. was actually Wilde.Originally published in 1898, “The Ballad of Reading Gaol” is a poem written by Oscar Wilde. It was not commonly known, until the 7th printing in June 1899, that C.3.3. This ensured that Wilde's name – by then notorious – did not appear on the poem's front cover.

It relates the story of an execution of a man who murdered his wife. The charges stemmed from his affair with Lord Alfred Douglas, the son of the Marquis of Queensberry. The finished poem was published by Leonard Smithers in 1898 under the name C.3.3., which stood for cell block C, landing 3, cell 3. Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900) Wilde’s meditation on capital punishment, the Ballad of Reading Gaol comes after he was convicted and imprisoned under charges of gross indecency.

This had a profound effect on Wilde, inspiring the line 'Yet each man kills the thing he loves.' He was convicted of cutting the throat of his wife, Laura Ellen, earlier that year at Clewer, near Windsor. 1866 – 7 July 1896) had been a trooper in the Royal Horse Guards. Wilde had been incarcerated in Reading, after being convicted of homosexual offences in 1895 and sentenced to two years' hard labour in prison.ĭuring his imprisonment, on Saturday 7 July 1896, a hanging took place. The Ballad of Reading Gaol is a poem by Oscar Wilde, written in exile either in Berneval or in Dieppe, France, after his release from Reading Gaol on or about.

The reading gaol