Revealing Oscar Wilde letters sold at auction

LONDON - A group of letters by the renowned playwright Oscar Wilde recently went under the hammer in Derby.

The five letters, sold as separate lots, reached a total of 33,900 pounds and were all bought by one bidder.

Auctioneers, Bamfords of Derby, noted the letters appear to reveal Wilde’s sentiments towards a magazine editor at a time when homosexuality was illegal.

They were written to Alsager Vian, during the Society Magazine era, and were sold off by his descendants and it is considered that it was family tradition to keep them under lock in a bureau until Vian’s death in 1924.

In the letters, Wilde continually invited the magazine editor to visit him. In the final letter he went to great lengths to encourage a naked meeting over a flask of wine.

“The letters are very important as they help to fill in pieces of Oscar Wilde’s tempestuous jigsaw,” the BBC quoted Alan Judd from Bamfords, as saying.

Wilde wrote for and edited Society Magazines from 1886-89. (ANI)