![]() Wilde had originally written Salomé in French and in 1893 he commissioned Douglas to translate it into English - probably just in order to give him something to do. They often argued and broke up, but would also always reconcile.ĭouglas had praised Wilde's play Salomé in the Oxford magazine, The Spirit Lamp, of which he was editor (and used as a covert means of gaining acceptance for homosexuality). He would spend money on boys and gambling and expected Wilde to contribute to his tastes. Douglas, known to his friends as 'Bosie', has been described as spoiled, reckless, insolent and extravagant. Said to be a roman a clef based on the relationship of Wilde and Douglas, it would be one of the texts used against Wilde during his trials in 1895. In 1894, the Robert Hichens novel The Green Carnation was published. In 1891, Douglas met Oscar Wilde and, although the playwright was married with two sons, they soon began an affair. The character l'Estrange is clearly based on Oscar Wilde. ![]() In 1890, she published a novel, Gloriana, or the Revolution of 1900, in which women's suffrage is achieved after a woman posing as a man named Hector l'Estrange is elected to the House of Commons. (Douglas's only child was in turn to go mad, and died in a mental hospital.)Īlfred Douglas's aunt, Lord James's twin Lady Florence Douglas (1855–1905), was an author, war correspondent for the Morning Post during the First Boer War, and a feminist. Another of his uncles, Lord Francis Douglas (1847–1865) had died in a climbing accident on the Matterhorn, while his uncle Lord Archibald Edward Douglas (1850–1938) became a clergyman. Separated from Florrie, James drank himself into a deep depression, and in 1891 committed suicide by cutting his throat. In 1888, Lord James married, but this proved disastrous. In 1885, he tried to abduct a young girl, and after that became ever more manic. One of his uncles, Lord James Douglas, was deeply attached to his twin sister 'Florrie' and was heartbroken when she married. Īpart from the violent death of his grandfather, there were other tragedies in Douglas's family. In 1862, his widowed grandmother, Lady Queensberry, converted to Roman Catholicism and took her children to live in Paris. In 1860, Douglas's grandfather, the 8th Marquess of Queensberry, had died in what was reported as a shooting accident, but his death was widely believed to have been suicide. In 1893, Douglas had a brief affair with George Ives. Their relationship had always been a strained one and during the Queensberry-Wilde feud, Douglas sided with Wilde, even encouraging him to prosecute his own father for libel. At Oxford, Douglas edited an undergraduate journal The Spirit Lamp (1892-3), an activity that intensified the constant conflict between him and his father. He was his mother's favourite child she called him Bosie (a derivative of Boysie), a nickname which stuck for the rest of his life.ĭouglas was educated at Winchester College (1884–88) and at Magdalen College, Oxford (1889–93), which he left without obtaining a degree. Douglas was imprisoned for libeling Winston Churchill and eventually died of heart failure.The third son of the 9th Marquess of Queensberry and his first wife, the former Sibyl Montgomery, Douglas was born at Ham Hill House in Worcestershire. Through the magazine, he would glorify Wilde's homosexuality and express views anti-semitic views. Douglas had started the High-Catholic magazine 'Plain English,' after his separation. The marriage was struck by his conversion to Roman Catholicism. After Wilde's death, Douglas married Olive Custance in 1902 and had a son. ![]() ![]() Following Wilde’s release, Douglas had a brief reunion with him. One such incident led his father and Wilde into a legal feud, which left the latter bankrupt and imprisoned. Douglas's father began humiliating Wilde publicly in an attempt to keep him away. However, Douglas's relationship with Wilde was a tumultuous one due to the former's deviant behavior. Douglas rebelled against his father to maintain the relationship. The relationship started when he was studying at 'Oxford.' When Douglas's father learned about it, he forced him to drop out, which hampered his career in turn. Alfred Douglas was a British poet and journalist who was known for his controversial homosexual relationship with Irish poet and playwright Oscar Wilde. ![]()
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