In 1895, Oscar Wilde was sentenced to two years of hard labor as punishment for having engaged in homosexual acts. While serving out his sentence at Reading Gaol in Berkshire, Wilde witnessed the execution by hanging of a young soldier who had murdered his wife by slashing her throat. Profoundly shaken by the execution and the crime that preceded it, Wilde composed this elegiac poem centered on the haunting refrain, "Yet each man kills the thing he loves."
- New kids additions
- New teen additions
- Available now
- Book Club Picks
- Series Starters
- Most popular
- Try something different
- Learn Something New By Reading Something True!
- New Book Arrivals
- Most Popular eBooks
- Improve Yourself!
- Get Clean & Organized!
- April is National Poetry Month!
- See all ebooks collections
- Available now
- New audiobook additions
- Audiobooks for your Commute
- Popular Audiobook Narrators
- New kids additions
- New teen additions
- Most popular
- Try something different
- Presidential Lives
- I Heard It On The Radio
- New Audiobook Arrivals
- Women Making a Difference
- A Listening Buffet
- See all audiobooks collections