"Yet each man kills the thing he loves."
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL
by OSCAR WILDE
Conceptions by Jon Vassos
Published by E. P. Dutton & Company, New York, 1928. First Edition thus, first printing. Very good hardcover, in good dustjacket in mylar wrapper. Tight binding, solid spine, small tears to ffep & page 101, clean unmarked text, tears & edgewear to dj repaired and reinforced with archival tape. Illustrated, 4to, 124 pages, 16 full page tissue guarded plates by Jon Vassos.
Wilde's last work, based on his two years imprisonment of hard labor at Reading Gaol for "gross indecency." Published under the pseudonym "C. 3. 3." (his cell block number while imprisoned there) because the publisher feared having his name on the work would adversely affect sales. The Ballad of Reading Gaol would be Wilde’s last published work - he died on November 30, 1900.
The poem is based on a fellow inmate convicted of murdering his wife and generated one of the great lines from Wilde, "Yet each man kills the thing he loves." Wilde continued to revise his plays until his death in 1900, but said that he had lost the joy of writing and would write no other new works.
Loc: E15
"Yet each man kills the thing he loves."
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL
by OSCAR WILDE
Conceptions by Jon Vassos
Published by E. P. Dutton & Company, New York, 1928. First Edition thus, first printing. Very good hardcover, in good dustjacket in mylar wrapper. Tight binding, solid spine, small tears to ffep & page 101, clean unmarked text, tears & edgewear to dj repaired and reinforced with archival tape. Illustrated, 4to, 124 pages, 16 full page tissue guarded plates by Jon Vassos.
Wilde's last work, based on his two years imprisonment of hard labor at Reading Gaol for "gross indecency." Published under the pseudonym "C. 3. 3." (his cell block number while imprisoned there) because the publisher feared having his name on the work would adversely affect sales. The Ballad of Reading Gaol would be Wilde’s last published work - he died on November 30, 1900.
The poem is based on a fellow inmate convicted of murdering his wife and generated one of the great lines from Wilde, "Yet each man kills the thing he loves." Wilde continued to revise his plays until his death in 1900, but said that he had lost the joy of writing and would write no other new works.
Loc: E15
