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?

INTRODUCTION

I was advised on all hands not to write this book, and some English
friends who have read it urge me not to publish it.

"You will be accused of selecting the subject," they say, "because
sexual viciousness appeals to you, and your method of treatment lays
you open to attack.

"You criticise and condemn the English conception of justice, and
English legal methods: you even question the impartiality of English
judges, and throw an unpleasant light on English juries and the
English public--all of which is not only unpopular but will convince
the unthinking that you are a presumptuous, or at least an outlandish,
person with too good a conceit of himself and altogether too free a
tongue."

I should be more than human or less if these arguments did not give me
pause. I would do nothing willingly to alienate the few who are still
friendly to