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The reading gaol5/10/2023 ![]() ![]() Wilde was assigned to cell block C, landing 3, cell 3. ![]() ![]() After having already served time at three different prisons, on NovemWilde was sent to Reading Gaol where he served the rest of his sentence. On May 25, 1895, Oscar Wilde was found guilty of gross indecency (meaning homosexual acts) and sentenced to two years hard labor. The Ballad of Reading Gaol is dedicated to "C.T.W." Wilde was a prisoner at Reading Gaol (now HM Prison Reading) when Charles Thomas Wooldridge was executed there on Jfor the murder of Laura Ellen Glendell. The poem centers around a prisoner who has been condemned to death for the murder of the woman he loved and deals with the effect that his execution has on other prisoners. It was not until the seventh edition of The Ballad of Reading Gaol was published on Jthat Wilde was acknowledged as the work's true author. The poet is only identified by the pseudonym C.3.3. Oscar Wilde's name does not appear in the first edition of The Ballad of Reading Gaol. It was first published, in the form of a book which contained no other poems, on February 13, 1898. ![]() It was written in 1897, shortly after Wilde had been released from prison and while he was living in exile in France. The poem is divided into six sections which are simply numbered I to VI. The Ballad of Reading Gaol is a narrative poem by the Irish writer Oscar Wilde. Title page of a 1904 edition of The Ballad of Reading Gaol. ![]()
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