Pulitzer Prize Biography Winner
Oscar Wilde
by Richard Ellmann
Summary
Richard Ellmann reconstructs the dazzling and tragic career of Oscar Wilde, following the Irish wit from Dublin and Oxford through his triumphs on the London stage to his ruin after the libel trial against the Marquess of Queensberry. The biography balances Wilde's verbal brilliance and aestheticism with the harsh realities of his imprisonment and exile. Ellmann renders both the public showman and the private man with deep sympathy.
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Historical Context & Significance
Ellmann died in 1987 shortly before the book appeared, and the biography won the Pulitzer posthumously in 1989.