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AS OF JUNE 1 - 2001 CONTRIBUTIONS ARE ONLY BEING SOLICITED FROM PEOPLE IN
AS OF JUNE 1 - 2001 CONTRIBUTIONS ARE ONLY BEING SOLICITED FROM PEOPLE IN ARKANSAS Oscar Wilde His Life and Confessions Volume 1
by Frank Harris
CONTENTS
VOLUME I
Introduction
Chapter I--Oscar's Father and Mother on Trial
Chapter II--Oscar Wilde as a Schoolboy
Chapter III--Trinity Dublin: Magdalen Oxford
Chapter IV--Formative Influences: Oscar's Poems
Chapter V--Oscar's Quarrel with Whistler and Marriage
Chapter VI--Oscar Wilde's Faith and Practice
Chapter VII--Oscar's Reputation and Supporters
Chapter VIII--Oscar's Growth to Originality About 1890
Chapter IX--The Summer of Success: Oscar's First Play
Chapter X--The First Meeting with Lord Alfred Douglas
Chapter XI--The Threatening Cloud Draws Nearer
Chapter XII--Danger Signals: the Challenge
Chapter XIII--Oscar Attacks Queensberry and is Worsted
Chapter XIV--How Genius is Persecuted in England
Chapter XV--The Queen vs. Wilde: The First Trial
Chapter XVI--Escape Rejected: The Second Trial and Sentence
VOLUME II
Chapter XVII--Prison and the Effects of Punishment
Chapter XVIII--Mitigation of Punishment; but not Release
Chapter XIX--His St. Martin's Summer: His Best Work
Chapter XX--The Results of His Second Fall: His Genius
Chapter XXI--His Sense of Rivalry; His Love of Life and Laziness
Chapter XXII--"A Great Romantic Passion!"
Chapter XXIII--His Judgments of Writers and of Women
Chapter XXIV--We Argue About His "Pet Vice" and Punishment
Chapter XXV--The Last Hope Lost
Chapter XXVI--The End
Chapter XXVII--A Last Word
Shaw's "Memories"
The Appendix
The crucifixion of the guilty is still more awe-inspiring than the crucifixion
of the innocent; what do we men know of innocence?
INTRODUCTION
I was advised on all hands not to write this book and some English friends
who have read it urge me not to publish it.
"You will be accused of selecting the subject" they say "because sexual
viciousness appeals to you and your method of treatment lays you open
to attack.
"You criticise and condemn the English conception of justice and English
legal methods: you even question the impartiality of English judges and throw
an unpleasant light on English juries and the English public--all of which is
not only unpopular but will convince the unthinking that you are a presumptuous
or at least an outlandish person with too good a conceit of himself and
altogether too free a tongue."
I should be more than human or less if these arguments did not give me pause.
I would do nothing willingly to alienate the few who are still friendly to me.
But the motives driving me are too strong for such personal considerations.
I might say with the Latin:
"Non me tua fervida terrent
Dicta ferox: Di me terrent et Jupiter hostis."
Even this would be only a part of the truth. Youth it seems to me should always
be prudent for youth has much to lose: but I am come to that time of life when
a man can afford to be bold may even dare to be himself and write the best
in him heedless of knaves and fools or of anything this world may do. The
voyage for me is almost over: I am in sight of port: like a good shipman I have
already sent down the lofty spars and housed the captious canvas in preparation
for the long anchorage: I have little now to fear.
And the immortals are with me in my design. Greek tragedy treated of far more
horrible and revolting themes such as the banquet of Thyestes: and Dante did
not shrink from describing the unnatural meal of Ugolino. The best modern
critics approve my choice. "All depends on the subject" says Matthew Arnold
talking of great literature: "choose a fitting action--a great and significant
action--penetrate yourself with the feeling of the situation: this done
...
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Unpublished Work 
