The Weight of Angels by John Boyne is a ‘what if’ book considering Oscar Wilde’s life if he hadn’t died in Paris in 1900 aged 46. Boyne places Oscar into the literary world of the first half of the 20th century and imagines an alternate reality of his creative output, loves, losses and mistakes and a fight for the legalisation of homosexuality. The action begins as Oscar prepares to attend the trial of his lover Bosie, Lord Alfred Douglas, on a charge of gross indecency. I found the first few chapters disorientating until realising that Boyne inverts Oscar and Bosie’s life stories. Only when the fictional Oscar outlives the real Oscar did I settle into the story. There are wonderful snippets of theatrical sniping and rivalry, outrageous flirting and sexual inunendo as Oscar continues his output of successful plays. His life becomes a succession of landmark events; the passing of two world wars, the deaths and coronations of kings and queens, all giving opportunities for witty exchanges and brutal insults. After the death of his loyal wife Florence he lives alone, writing successful play after successful play, until he falls in love and gets writers’ block. He tells no one. Gus is not artistic or theatrical, he is a down-to-earth teacher who encourages Oscar to exercise more and eat muesli for breakfast. This is a new Oscar who is not tormented, but happy. Can he write successfully only when he is troubled?
As Oscar ages he crosses paths with literary luminaries including Kipling, Yeats, Shaw, Eliot, Forster and the Woolfs and in Hollywood meets Katherine Hepburn. The narrative is a mix and match of style including prose, scripts, letters, newspaper articles, which allows Boyne to jump forward in time (the novel stretches from 1895 to 1952). There are some fascinating interludes. I particularly enjoyed his meetings with Emmeline Pankhurst who says, ‘It is a sad and somewhat ironic fact that for the women’s movement to succeed, we need the support of men. Particularly men with a voice.’ Boyne has particular fun when Oscar meets Virginia and Leonard Woolf, mirroring their conversation with Virginia’s stream of consciousness writing style. The funniest scene involves Oscar, Winston and Clemmie Churchill and German sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld. Oscar and Winston have agreed to cooperate with the aim of legalising homosexuality while Clemmie talks in euphemisms (those who prefer ‘the Gregorian to the Julian calendar’) much to Hirshfeld’s confusion.
The Weight of Angels is more than 600 pages long, featuring Oscar’s life as the central spine with historical markers along the way involving factual events and meetings with real people. In places it turns into a bit of a who’s who. Some are fleeting passages with characters who don’t appear again while in other sections the story flies by.
Boyne has created a new Oscar Wilde as he might have been, dying in old age and haunted by the fact that he escapes censure when other men do not. ‘There are moments when I feel suffocated beneath the weight of angels, and I wonder whether, when my own time comes, those same seraphim will carry me to my reward, or simply watch as I am punished for my sins.’
Every one of John Boyne’s book is different. He is brave, political, sensitive, adventurous and humorous. He is an author who challenges himself, and his readers.

Check my reviews of these other novels by John Boyne:-
A HISTORY OF LONELINESS
A LADDER TO THE SKY
A TRAVELLER AT THE GATES OF WISDOM
ALL THE BROKEN PLACES
STAY WHERE YOU ARE AND THEN LEAVE
THE HEART’S INVISIBLE FURIES… try the #FirstPara of THE HEART’S INVISIBLE FURIES
WATER #1ELEMENTS
EARTH #2ELEMENTS

If you like this, try:-
‘A Little Life’ by Hanya Yanagihara
‘Days Without End’ by Sebastian Barry #1DAYSWITHOUTEND
‘Love is Blind’ by William Boyd

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview THE WEIGHT OF ANGELS by John Boyne @JohnBoyneBooks https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-ak9 via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:-