The 'other' Wilde. His heart opens to Andre Gide following his imprisonment; we discover a Wilde diametrically opposite to the one we had been used to: out are the witticisms and aphorism, in is the immense, poignant suffering of a man who sees not just his life, but his literary legacy, his position in the pantheon of letters, his opus transformed and trampled on by prejudice, a legal system that institutionalised homophobia, and, even more, his having believed on his own delusion that he was untouchable. Oddly enough, Fama here uses her Medieval wheel on him, but the modern reader, or any human being whose soul is not corroded by the acid poison of prejudice, sides with him, but also feels incapable of helping. It's a painful read. It changes one's perception of Wilde as much as Reading Kenneth Williams's diaries opens up the abyss of pain behind his humour. The horror of this text is that his feelings and emotions sound definitive; they will echo like scorn laughing at my beloved Wilde along the grey and cold ward of the prison that was his short survival to this horrific crime society has perpetrated against him, and still does, in countries around the world, in towns in England, on a bench by by Embankment Station, in classrooms turned prisons. I would suggest every homophobe gave it a read and asked him/herself, 'Is this what I want for others?'
The 'other' Wilde. His heart opens to Andre Gide following his imprisonment; we discover a Wilde diametrically opposite to the one we had been used to: out are the witticisms and aphorism, in is the immense, poignant suffering of a man who sees not just his life, but his literary legacy, his position in the pantheon of letters, his opus transformed and trampled on by prejudice, a legal system that institutionalised homophobia, and, even more, his having believed on his own delusion that he was untouchable. Oddly enough, Fama here uses her Medieval wheel on him, but the modern reader, or any human being whose soul is not corroded by the acid poison of prejudice, sides with him, but also feels incapable of helping. It's a painful read. It changes one's perception of Wilde as much as Reading Kenneth Williams's diaries opens up the abyss of pain behind his humour. The horror of this text is that his feelings and emotions sound definitive; they will echo like scorn laughing at my beloved Wilde along the grey and cold ward of the prison that was his short survival to this horrific crime society has perpetrated against him, and still does, in countries around the world, in towns in England, on a bench by by Embankment Station, in classrooms turned prisons. I would suggest every homophobe gave it a read and asked him/herself, 'Is this what I want for others?'