Oscar Wilde
Published: 2020-04-18
Total Pages: 170
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Differentiated book- It has a historical context with research of the time-Poems, with The Ballad of Reading Gaol by Oscar Wilde, It is a poem written by Oscar Wilde during his exile in Berneval or Dieppe, France. It was written after his release from Reading prison around May 19, 1897. The poem is one of the most representative ballads of both the author and English literature. Note that the English word gaol is pronounced the same as jail, currently the most widely used form for prison. Wilde's imprisonment at the Reading Penitentiary took place after he was convicted of homosexual acts in 1895 and sentenced to two years of forced labor. During his period of imprisonment, specifically on Saturday, July 7, 1896, a hanging took place. It was Charles Thomas Wooldridge (circa 1866 - July 7, 1896) who had been a soldier in the Royal Cavalry Guard.This man had been jailed for killing, cutting his wife's throat only a year earlier in Clewer, a town near Windsor. He was only 30 years old when he was executed. This execution had a special impact on Wilde and was translated in several lines of this poem "Although all men kill what they love", for example. The complete poem was published by Leonard Smithers in 1898 under the name C.3.3.,