Oscar Wilde trial transcript to go on display

The original transcript of the Oscar Wilde libel trial is to go on public display for the first time, after lying undiscovered for more than 100 years.

The British Library has acquired the complete transcript of the 1895 Old Bailey court case, which led to the celebrated playwright’s ruin.

It is the first definitive account of the events which took Wilde from the pinnacle of London’s high society to Reading Jail.

An anonymous benefactor approached the Library two and a half years ago with a bundle of papers stuffed into carrier bags.

They turned out to be the original stenographer’s shorthand reports of the libel trial, which historians never even knew existed.

The transcript, on loan to the Library, reproduces previously unknown exchanges between Wilde and barrister Edward Carson QC.

Until now, only heavily abbreviated accounts of the case have been available.

Wilde sowed the seeds of his own downfall when he instigated the court case in April 1895 to sue the Marquess of Queensberry for libel.

The Marquess was incensed that his son, Lord Alfred ‘Bosie’ Douglas, was having an affair with the writer and left him an obscene message at his club accusing him of homosexuality.

Wilde, one of the most celebrated writers of the time for such classic works as The Importance Of Being Earnest and Lady Windermere’s Fan, took the Marquess to court.

But the trial went terribly wrong when Carson uncovered evidence of Wilde’s association with rent boys.

The case collapsed and immediately afterwards, Wilde was arrested and taken to criminal trial for gross indecency. He was convicted and sentenced to two years’ hard labour in Reading Jail on May 25 1895. He died five years later in self-imposed exile in France.

His story was turned into the film Wilde in 1997, with Stephen Fry as the playwright and Jude Law as Bosie.

The transcript has been turned into a book, Irish Peacock and Scarlet Marquess: The Real Trial of Oscar Wilde.

It has an introduction and notes by Merlin Holland, Oscar Wilde’s grandson and sole executor of his estate.

Mr Holland said: “There have been a number of ‘so-called’ verbatim accounts published over the past 100 years, all of which have been heavily abbreviated and even bowdlerized.

“This new edition has been taken directly from the shorthand reports made in court at the time and is nearly three times as long as anything hitherto published.”

He added: “If I could ask my grandfather one single question, it would have to be, ‘Why on earth did you do it?”’

The transcript will be amongst two cases of Oscar Wilde items to be displayed in the Library’s Treasures Gallery from April 12 to June 1.

Items include the manuscript of De Profundis, a lengthy monologue which Wilde wrote to Bosie from Reading Jail.

A Library spokeswoman said: “This newly-discovered transcript tells the true story of the trial which led to his imprisonment and tragic downfall. The items grouped together in these two cases chart this process, making a dramatic and compelling display.”

Actors Corin Redgrave and Steven Berkoff will stage a reading from the transcript tonight in the Library’s Conference Centre.

Redgrave will play Wilde and Berkoff will take the role of Carson in an hour-long re-enactment of the trial.