The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde said of himself, ÒI put all my genius into my life; I put only my talent into my work.Ó Now, for the first time, Neil McKenna focuses on the tormented genius of WildeÕs personal life, reproducing remarkable love letters and detailing WildeÕs until-now unknown relationships with other men.McKenna has spent years researching WildeÕs life, drawing on extensive new material, including never-before published poems as well as recently discovered trial statements made by male prostitutes and blackmailers about Wilde. McKenna provides explosive evidence of the political machinations behind WildeÕs trials for sodomy, as well as his central role in the burgeoning gay world of Victorian London. Dazzlingly written and meticulously researched, The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde fully charts WildeÕs astonishing odyssey through LondonÕs sexual underworld and paints a frank and vivid psychological portrait of a troubled genius.