Reginald Turner

Reginald Turner (2 June 1869 – 7 December 1938) was an English author, an aesthete and a member of the circle of Oscar Wilde. He worked as a journalist, wrote twelve novels, and his correspondence has been published, but he is best known as one of the few friends who remained loyal to Wilde when he was imprisoned and who supported him after his release.

In Rupert Everett‘s biopic of Wilde, The Happy Prince, he is portrayed by Colin Firth.

Biography

Turner never knew who his parents were, but was an illegitimate member of, and raised by, the Levy-Lawson family, owners of the newspaper, The Daily Telegraph. having a leaning towards writing he joined The Daily Telegraph, where he inaugurated the paper's gossip column. Between 1901 and 1911 he published a dozen novels. None of them made a great impression – Turner observed that it was not his first editions that were scarce, but his second ones, although at least three of his novels were reprinted. His biographer, Stanley Weintraub, comments that the circumstances of Turner's birth, reminiscent of H.M.S. Pinafore and The Importance of Being Earnest, are reflected in his fiction, sometimes humorously and sometimes seriously. Harold Acton agreed, writing of Turner's conversation, "One forgot to eat while he spun his fantasies." Beerbohm wrote that he "would be eloquent even were he dumb," because "is face is a great part of his equipment,"

Turner's novels contain portraits of his contemporaries and of himself ("Reginald Cobbler," in Castles in Kensington). After Wilde's trial Ross lost contact with Cyril and Vyvyan, Wilde's sons. At his first meeting with Vyvyan Holland (as Wilde's son was now named) Ross was accompanied by Beerbohm and Turner – "a highly emotional meeting," Holland later recalled.

Oscar Wilde's correspondence with Reginald Turner forms the basis of The Lady Eccles Oscar Wilde Collection at the British Library, later much augmented with material from other sources.

After Wilde's death, Turner, who was homosexual, felt few ties to England. Weintraub writes, "He felt alienated from an England which had driven Oscar to his death, and realised that some of the hostility toward Wilde might now continue to be directed toward those who had stood by him, and were similarly suspect."

Turner's novels Cynthia's Damages. A story of the stage (1901). Greening & Co, London The Comedy of Progress – A novel (1902). Greening & Co Castles in Kensington (1904). Greening & Co Dorothy Raeburn – A novel (1905). Greening & Co Peace on Earth – A novel (1905). Alston Rivers, London The Steeple – A novel (1905). Greening & Co Davry's Affairs (1906). Greening & Co Uncle Peaceable – A comedy (1906). Greening & Co Imperial Brown of Brixton (1908). Chapman & Hall, London Samson Unshorn (1909). Chapman & Hall Count Florio and Phyllis K. (1910). Chapman & Hall King Philip the Gay (1911). Greening & Co