The Ballad of Reading Gaol

By Oscar Wilde

Classic poem, written in jail. According to Wikipedia: "Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (1854 - 1900) was an Irish playwright, novelist, poet, and author of short stories. Known for his barbed wit, he was one of the most successful playwrights of late Victorian London, and one of the greatest celebrities of his day. As the result of a famous trial, he suffered a dramatic downfall and was imprisoned for two years of hard labour after being convicted of the offence of 'gross indecency.'"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Seltzer Books
• Release date: Mar 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781455358229

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) was a Dublin-born poet and playwright who studied at the Portora Royal School, before attending Trinity College and Magdalen College, Oxford. The son of two writers, Wilde grew up in an intellectual environment. As a young man, his poetry appeared in various periodicals including Dublin University Magazine. In 1881, he published his first book Poems, an expansive collection of his earlier works. His only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, was released in 1890 followed by the acclaimed plays Lady Windermere’s Fan (1893) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895).

Book preview

THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL BY OSCAR WILDE

published by Samizdat Express, Orange, CT, USA

established in 1974, offering over 14,000 books

Books by Oscar Wilde available from us:

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories

Shorter Prose Pieces

A Critic in Pall Mall

Essays and Lectures

Intentions

The Soul of Man

Miscellanies

Reviews

Selected Prose

The Happy Prince and Other Tales

A House of Pomegranates

The Duchess of Padua

An Ideal Husband

The Importance of Being Earnest

Lady Windermere's Fan

Salome

Vera or The Nihilists

A Woman of No Importance

The Ballad of Reading Gaol

Charmides and Other Poems

feedback welcome: [e-mail]

visit us at samizdat.com

In Memoriam

C.T.W.

Sometime Trooper of the Royal Horse Guards.

Obiit H.M. Prison, Reading, Berkshire,

July 7th, 1896

two versions in a single file

__________

FIRST VERSION

The Ballad of Reading Gaol

I.

He did not wear his scarlet coat,

  For blood and wine are red,

And blood and wine were on his hands

  When they found him with the dead,

The poor dead woman whom he loved,

  And murdered in her bed.

He walked amongst the Trial Men

  In a suit of shabby grey;

A cricket cap was on his head,

  And his step seemed light and gay;

But I never saw a man who looked

  So wistfully at the day.

I never saw a man who looked

  With such a wistful eye

Upon that little tent of blue

  Which prisoners call the sky,

And at every drifting cloud that went

  With sails of silver by.

I walked, with other souls in pain,

  Within another ring,

And was wondering if the man had done

  A great or little thing,

When a voice behind me whispered low,

  That fellows got to swing.

Dear Christ! the very prison walls

  Suddenly seemed to reel,

And the sky above my head became

  Like a casque of scorching steel;

And, though I was a soul in pain,

  My pain I could not feel.

I only knew what hunted thought

  Quickened his step, and why

He looked upon the garish day

  With such a wistful eye;

The man had killed the thing he loved

  And so he had to die.

___

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!

Reviews for The Ballad of Reading Gaol

[duck2ducks · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This beautifully-written six-chapter poem movingly portrays the monstrous inhumanity of prison life, and the stark-white hypocrisy of capital punishment. It also reminded me of Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner at several times, in the rhythm of its language (though the meter and rhyme scheme are different), as well as in the themes of guilt and imprisonment, the despair-induced visions of devils, and the metaphor of fate as a game of dice. First Oscar Wilde I've read, and I definitely want to read more.

[jhudsui_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It was really, really good though. Five stars good. I almost cried. I don't have a whole lot else to say about it. Apparently Reading was specifically designed to implement the separate system, so I expect Wilde probably experienced it.Bosie's testimony is what sent him to Reading in the first place, so... the obvious interpretation is a combination of that, and maybe whatever was wrong with their relationship in the other direction that led Bosie to do that. It's possible that being in Reading under those circumstances and witnessing an execution like the one described in the poem (which he did, the poem was inspired by an execution that happened while he was there), could have combined by resonating so strongly with each other to make him feel that he was seeing a great universal truth of some kind.

[millsge_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The pain of the author is almost too much to bear - even more so given who is suffering and why he is suffering. The injustice defies belief.

[pharmacdon · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

From personal experience, Oscar Wilde writes his final work. While imprisoned at Reading jail for his homosexual acts, he witnesses a man executed for killing his wife. Thus he writes
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!
This poem is even sadder after reading about the circumstances in which it was written.