The Sphinx

A poetic catalogue of the erotic misdeeds of Middle Eastern deities, this poem is a gesture of defiant gay pride, and a masterpiece of decadence. Wilde worked on it for 11 years, and published it in 1894, one year before his trial. This is the first edition of the poem in a century to reproduce the ten Charles Ricketts illustrations, and the only one ever to fully annotate the obscurities of the text. Justin Brumby, our poetry editor, has brought his vast expertise in Symbolism and Decadence to bear in solving the riddles of The Sphinx