- Paperback: 240 pages
- Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks; New edition edition (Feb 18 2003)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0192835262
- ISBN-13: 978-0192835260
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.7 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 181 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,960,072 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Description
Product Description
`Yet each man kills the thing he loves, By each let this be heard, Some do it with a bitter look, Some with a flattering word, The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword!' A powerful poem of universal guilt and a protest against capital punishment, The Ballad of Reading Gaol is Wilde's best-known poem, yet it is quite unlike the rest of his poetry. At Oxford Wilde discarded the passion and politics of his mother's Irish nationalistic anti-famine poetry and optedto follow an English Romantic tradition, paying tribute to Keats, Swinburne, and the Pre-Raphaelites. Admiration of French masters gradually led to his writing Impressionist, even decadent poems and his collection Poems (1881) brought accusations of obscenity and plagiarism as well as scathing reviews. Unabashed, Wilde revised and reprinted his final `Author's Edition' in 1892, by which time he was the successful author of fiction, criticism, and Lady Windermere's Fan. This volume follows as closely as possible the chronological order of composition, highlighting autobiographical elements including the young Wilde's conflicting attitudes to Greece and Rome, pagan and Christian, and his fluctuating attraction to Roman Catholicism. The Appendix shows Wilde's original ordering, constructed with great care around a `musical' arrangement of themes. The poems reveal unexpected aspects of a literary chameleon usually identified with sparkling wit and social comedy.
About the Author
Isobel Murray is Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Aberdeen. She has edited four previous editions of Wilde's work for OUP, including Oxford Authors, Oscar Wilde, and published mant articles on his work.
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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5.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review)
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Slim Evocation to the Muse of Poesy, Jan 9 2010
By W. H. Pugmire "I never can be tied to raw, ne... - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Complete Poetry (Paperback)
Oscar Wilde's first book was a collection of his poetry, and perhaps it was as a poet that Wilde thought of himself at the end of life. His last published work during his life time was "The Ballad of Reading Gaol," and in DE PROFUNDIS -- the letter he wrote in prison -- he seems to identify himself more with poets than martyrs (despite his statement that "...the secret of life is suffering..."). His early poetry was condemned as the work of a plagiarist, and yet it contains much beauty -- but (strangely?) little if any of his famous wit. He wrote several sonnets, including the following, one of my favourites:"Helas!"
To drift with every passion till my soul
Is a stringed lute on which all winds can play,
Is it for this that I have given away
Mine ancient wisdom, and austere control?
Methinks my life is a twice-written scroll
Scrawled over on some boyish holiday
With idle songs for pipe and virelay,
Which do but mar the secret of the whole.
Surely there was a time I might have trod
The sunlit heights, and from life's dissonance
Struck one clear chord to reach the ears of God:
Is that time dead? lo! with a little rod
I did but touch the honey of romance --
And must I lose a soul's inheritance?
Micheal MacLiammoir recited this in his one-man show concerning Wilde's Life and Work, THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING OSCAR, and he recited it as smooth poetic prose, and as such it sounded like natural language, despite its strict poetic form.
Perhaps my favourite poem of all time is "The Harlot's House," a work that is strange and evocative. There are many audio/visual renditions of the poem on YouTube, some of which are quite wonderful. I am less impressed with "The Ballad of Reading Gaol," which seems to me too long; yet one cannot doubt the sincerity of its source and message. This is a great wee book. Editor Isobel Murray has included a fascinating introduction and copious notes.
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