CIII 3 : Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900

Prisoner C.3.3

Irish poet, playwright, author, arbiter of taste and culture, from the highest acclaim for his plays on the London stage to imprisonment at hard labour and death all within ten years.

His crime – to misjudge the anger and hostility of a known bigot and bully who could not accept the open relationship between Wilde and his son.

His lawsuit against Queensberry based on the misspelling of the word sodomite opened Wilde to the court of justice and public opinion for his relationships, not Lord Alfred Douglas, but common clerks and stable lads.

His conviction for the crime that dare not speak its name brought a two-year sentence, and his name into infamy. Forced out of England on release, he lived in poverty in Italy and France until his death. His final resting place in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris bears the inscription:

And alien tears will fill for him

Pity’s long-broken urn,

For his mourners will be outcast men,

And outcasts will always mourn.

Ballad of Reading Gaol

An angel depicted on his tomb was quickly relieved of its male genitals until 2000 when artist Leon Johnson replaced the originals with silver ones.

In January 2010, Dublin City Council, proprietors of the Archbishop Ryan park in Merrion Square, decided unanimously to rename it. A campaign has been started to rename the park "The Oscar Wilde Park".