Chapter I: Introduction: iii

I. Oscar's Father and Mother on Trial 1

II. Oscar Wilde as a Schoolboy 23

III. Trinity, Dublin: Magdalen, Oxford 37

IV. Formative Influences: Oscar's Poems 50

V. Oscar's Quarrel with Whistler and Marriage 73

VI. Oscar Wilde's Faith and Practice 91

VII. Oscar's Reputation and Supporters 102

VIII. Oscar's Growth to Originality About 1890 112

IX. The Summer of Success: Oscar's First Play 133

X. The First Meeting with Lord Alfred Douglas 144

XI. The Threatening Cloud Draws Nearer 156

XII. Danger Signals: the Challenge 175

XIII. Oscar Attacks Queensberry and is Worsted 202

XIV. How Genius is Persecuted in England 229

XV. The Queen _vs._ Wilde: The First Trial 261

XVI. Escape Rejected: The Second Trial and Sentence 292

VOLUME II

[Transcriber's Note: Volume II is also available on Project Gutenberg.]

XVII. Prison and the Effects of Punishment 321

XVIII. Mitigation of Punishment; but not Release 345

XIX. His St. Martin's Summer: His Best Work 363

XX. The Results of His Second Fall: His Genius 406

XXI. His Sense of Rivalry; His Love of Life and Laziness 433

XXII. "A Great Romantic Passion!" 450

XXIII. His Judgments of Writers and of Women 469

XXIV. We Argue About His "Pet Vice" and Punishment 488

XXV. The Last Hope Lost 509

XXVI. The End 532

XXVII. A Last Word 542

Shaw's "Memories" 1-32

THE APPENDIX, 549

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME I

Oscar Wilde at About Thirty Frontispiece

FACING PAGE
Dr. Sir William Wilde 22

Oscar Wilde at Twenty-Seven, as He First Appeared in America 75

Oscar Wilde 90 [Transcriber's Note: This illustration is not in the original list.]

VOLUME II

Oscar Wilde and Lord Alfred Douglas About 1893 321

"Speranza": Lady Wilde as a Young Woman 358

Note to Warder Martin 576

THE CRUCIFIXION OF THE GUILTY IS STILL MORE AWE-INSPIRING
THAN THE CRUCIFIXION OF THE INNOCENT; WHAT DO WE MEN KNOW OF
INNOCENCE?