Son of Oscar Wilde (Oxford paperbacks - Oxford letters & memoirs)

by Merlin Holland (Foreword), Merlin Holland (Foreword), Vyvyan Holland (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1988

  $14.23

  First published in 1954, this account of Oscar Wilde's life written by his son tells of his childhood, and the Oscar Wilde affair and its aftermath, revealing Wilde to have been the scapegoat of puritan hypocrisy. As the public interest in Wilde grew, and the lies about him multiplied, Vyvyan Holland decided to write his own account of the Oscar Wilde affair and its aftermath. It is not a very amusing or entertaining story he says, but it dramatically reveals what family life was actually like for the Wildes as Oscar was being persecuted, and then later, after his death, when most of his relations did their best to deny that he had ever lived, even going to the extent of changing his sons' names from Wilde to Holland. This edition also contains 33 of Oscar Wilde's letters to friends, an Oxford reminiscence of Wilde by W.W. Ward, some prose poems by Wilde, letters from Lord Alfred Douglas to Vyvyan Holland and several contemporary newspaper reports of events during and after the Oscar Wilde affair. The foreword was written by Merlin Holland, Oscar Wilde's grandson.