The thief of reason
Subtitle: Oscar Wilde and modern Ireland
By: Richard Pine.
Publisher: St. Martin's Press; Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 1995
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 478
Subjects: Wilde, Oscar, 1854-1900 -- Homes and haunts -- Ireland.; Wilde, Oscar, 1854-1900 -- Influence.; English literature -- Irish authors -- History and criticism.; Authors, Irish -- 19th century -- Biography.; Modernism (Literature) -- Ireland.; Ireland -- Intellectual life -- 19th century.; Ireland -- Intellectual life -- 20th century.
Description: This new study of one of Ireland's greatest writers lays particular stress upon his Irish background.

Pine is interested in Wilde the outsider. He was an outsider not simply because of his homosexuality but also because of the particular nature of his Irish background. The Wildes were not only Protestants in a country which was growing more aggressively Catholic: they were also Protestant supporters of Irish nationalism. Thus they were in one sense outsiders by religion while in another outsiders within their own religious community.

Wilde was profoundly influenced by this ambiguous inheritance and Pine argues that it was this, as much as his homosexuality, which placed him at such an awkward angle to late Victorian society.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [420-461) and index.