Don’t miss Professor
Eibhear Walshe, author The Diary of Mary Travers.
It is April 1895 and Oscar Wilde is on trial in London at the Old
Bailey, following his libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry, and
faces ruin, public disgrace and imprisonment. In County Cork, a woman
called Mary Travers is following the Wilde Trials in the newspapers,
increasingly troubled by the growing public outcry. Mary Travers has her
own secret, her hidden connection with Oscar Wilde and his parents,
William and Jane, and dreads discovery and exposure. Unknown to those
around her, in 1864, as a young woman, she had been the key figure in a
notorious court case in Dublin, in which she sued Jane Wilde for libel,
and the resulting scandal filled the newspapers for weeks. In this new
novel,
The Diary of Mary Travers
, this controversial case is re-imagined
for the first time through the eyes of the central figure, Mary Travers, and
in her diary she reveals her own part in this scandal, her unhappy home
life and her intimate connection with two of the most celebrated writers
of her time, William and Jane Wilde.
Walsh's fascinating and meticulously researched book (Oscar's Shadow) examined unpublished archival material and delves into a wealth of Irish critical studies and dramatizations of Wilde's life and sexuality.
