Oscar Wilde Trial Cartoons

Artifact: Newspaper Cover Cartoon from 1895

“The Illustrated Police News” was a newspaper published in England from 1864 to 1938. It reported on crimes and proceedings in the legal system. People were interested in such proceedings so naturally a tabloid, one of the first of it’s kind developed. It was considered very sensationalist. It was known to contain overdramatic reports of the incidents it reported on which were meant to entertain readers. It also had very graphically drawn  images of cases and their aftermaths.

Homosexual activity was illegal/criminalized and considered mostly improper and not something high society or Britain should be associated with. The general attitude was generally more lenient than some eras in some history but there were still many men persecuted and eventually sent to prison. Many convicts committed suicide which led to many trying to “protect” their sons from corrupting influences. There were many studies of human sexuality during this era but people were just beginning to understand its complexities.

Oscar Wilde was an Irish writer and playwright who was well respected in England. Wilde sued the Marquess of Queensberry who was the father of Lord Alfred Douglas, a lover of Wilde’s, on the charges of “criminal libel” after he left a note for Wilde claiming he had been “posing as a sodomite". Queensberry was acquitted as his claim was not false since Douglas had been arranging Wilde several meetings with male prostitutes. Wilde was soon after charged with “gross indecency” with men following the Queensberry case. Wilde was convicted and sentenced to two years of hard manual labor. He was in prison between May 25, 1895 and May 18, 1897. Prison life was not kind to him and his failing health. He left England forever upon his release and died 3 years later in France.Wilde was eventually pardoned in 2017. Despite Wilde's reputation, when people began to see him as "other" his popularity meant nothing since Britain's government was obsessed with keeping the nation "pure". Wilde's homosexuality cast him out of regular society. 


Seeing how horribly his friend and college was treated, Bram Stoker used Dracula to safely express his frustration with society as a whole as it had allowed this to happen to Wilde. It is highly suspected that Stoker personally related to Wilde's plight and feared for himself as well as other writers. He was frustrated with his own internal struggles with sexuality. Dracula reflects this in it's many rejections of modern society and it's parody of how people view any form of other, particularly sexual others. 


Quotes From Dracula:

“It is nineteenth century up-to-date with a vengeance. And yet, unless my senses deceive me, the old centuries had, and have, powers of their own which mere "modernity" cannot kill.” (63)

“A year ago which of us would have received such a possibility, in the midst of our scientific, matter-of-fact nineteenth century?” (278)

“There was something about them that made me uneasy, some longing and at the same time some deadly fear. I felt in my heart a wicked, burning desire that they would kiss me with those red lips. It is not good to note this down, lest some day it should meet Mina's eyes and cause her pain; but it is the truth.” (69)

The fair girl went on her knees, and bent over me, fairly gloating. There was a deliberate voluptuousness which was both thrilling and repulsive, and as she arched her neck she actually licked her lips like an animal, till I could see in the moonlight the moisture shining on the scarlet lips and on the red tongue as it lapped the white sharp teeth. (71)

Stoker is almost parodying the way the British Empire was so set on being straight laced and British. The novel reflects how Stoker would have seen people being afraid of the status quo being challenged and those who were not like them gaining power over them.  Even upstanding citizens were at risk if they did not conform. Stoker didn’t want modern society to take over if it was going to hurt people he respected like Wilde.

'”This man belongs to me! Beware how you meddle with him, or you'll have to deal with me.' The fair girl, with a laugh of ribald coquetry, turned to answer him:-
'You yourself never loved; you never love!' On this the other women joined, and... a mirthless, hard, soulless laughter rang through the room... Then the Count turned, after looking at my face attentively, and said in a soft whisper:-
'Yes, I too can love; you yourselves can tell it from the past. Is it not so?' " (70-71)

This is often referred to as so called “homoerotic subtext”. Weather or not this is necessarily a reflection of Stoker’s internal issues it is almost certainly a critique of the strange ways society viewed gender and sexuality as the measure of a person. All portrayal of sexuality in the novel would be considered strange and excessive to assist in this critique.

Discussion Questions:

How do you think images in such publications influenced public opinion of criminal investigations?

How does Wilde’s treatment reflect how anyone who did not fit the mold of what was “properly British”, even if they had once been respected?

How to Bram Stoker’s portrayals of vampires reflect people’s perception of sexuality in modern society? Does Stoker’s portrayal of sexual other reflect an internal struggle with himself as well as with society?

Works Cited:

Archive, The British Newspaper.  Register | British Newspaper Archive. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Nov. 2017.

Beckson, Karl. "Oscar Wilde." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 21 Aug. 2017. Web. 21 Nov. 2017.

The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. "Bram Stoker." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 12 Apr. 2017. Web. 21 Nov. 2017.

Schaffer, Talia. ""A Wilde Desire Took Me": The Homoerotic History of Dracula." ELH. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 01 June 1994. Web. 21 Nov. 2017.

Stoker, Bram. Dracula. Edited by Glennis Byron, Broadview Press, 2000