De Profundis. Edited and Illustrated by Peter Forster. London: The Folio Society, 1991. First Edition Thus. Bound in publisher’s quarter black cloth and black-and-white printed paper boards with gilt lettering to spine. A fine bright copy.

Printed in Van Dijck at the stamperia valdonega, Verona on Magnani mould-made paper. Edited and illustrated by Peter Forster.

The Folio Society is a particularly significant and artistically rendered edition of Oscar Wilde’s seminal work, De Profundis. It transforms the text from a personal letter into a profound art object, reflecting the depth and tragedy of its content.

De Profundis (Latin for “from the depths”) is the long, harrowing letter Wilde wrote to his lover, Lord Alfred Douglas (“Bosie”), from January to March 1897 while imprisoned in Reading Gaol. It is not a literal plea for forgiveness but a sprawling, introspective essay. In it, Wilde moves from recrimination against Douglas’s vanity and extravagance to a deep meditation on suffering, art, Christ as a romantic artist, and his own spiritual awakening. It is a work of immense emotional power and intellectual brilliance, born from profound personal and social ruin.