Theodore Wratislaw

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Theodore Wratislaw
Born	1871
Died	1933
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	English
Writing period	1892-1933

Theodore William Graf Wratislaw (1871-1933), Count of the Holy Roman Empire, was educated at Rugby School from 1885 - 1888; he entered his father's office and in 1893 passed his solicitor's final exams. He had to work to earn his living as a solicitor at Somerset House, describing life there as "penal servitude".

In 1892 he published at his own expense two slim volumes of poems - Love's Memorial and Some verses. In 1893 he published Caprices (now available unexpurgated). Wratislaw was published in the Strand Magazine and the Yellow Book along with such as Henry James, Arnold Bennett, Oscar Wilde and other fin-de-siècle contributors. Orchids (a double entendre for the Greek word 'orchis' - meaning 'testicle') was published in 1896.

In 1927 he moved to York Lodge, Walton-on-Thames, Surrey (commemorated now by a blue plaque - the house has been sympathetically restored by the current owner, Barry Taylor-Gregson) and his last work there was an account of his visit to Wilde's home at Goring-on-Thames. Just before his death in September 1933, Wratislaw re-visited Goring and had his account only at the proof stage; however a 1979 edition with foreword by Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman, edited by G Krishnamurti and entitled Oscar Wilde - a memoir, has been published. Other works include The Pity of Love a tragedy based on the love story of Sophia Dorothea, the wife of King George I, and Philip von Konigsmark; also Algernon Charles Swinburne: a study (1900) which was his best known work in his lifetime. Wratislaw's translations of Two Ballades by Francois Villon was published in 1933, with only 60 copies being printed and intended for his friends and sent out to them by his widow, Ada, after his death. Earlier on, he had written to a friend that he was writing a resume of his uncle's (Reverend A H Wratislaw- headmaster of Felsted 1850-55) translation into English from the Slavonic of their ancestor's - Baron Vratislav von Mitrovitz - account of his life as a galley slave of the Turks, when he was aged only 15-18 years in the 16th century. Count Marc Wratislaw von Mitrovitz, as an attache of the Austrian Embassy in Paris attended the marriage of Marie Antoinette to the future Louis XVI, then came to settle in England in 1770, becoming French master at Rugby School.

Descendant, Theodore Wratislaw's knowledge of classical Greek was extensive. He edited and corrected Thomas Taylor's translation of "Plato's Republic", copies of the Wratislaw edition now only available when printed to individual order in the USA. (The ancestral title Baron or hrabe of Mitrovitz refers to the Hungarian nobility. The graefliche title was the Holy Roman Emperor's 1701 award to Chancellor Jan Vratislav von Mitrovitz - see St Jakob's, Prague). The 'von Mitrovitz' was dropped by the second generation after the family were anglicised.

Sources: archivist, York Lodge.

References: 1. Professor R K R Thornton (2003) The search for Wratislaw 2. Ellman, Richard (1987) Oscar Wilde 3. Ellis, S M (1924) "A Poet of the Nineties" from Mainly Victorian and "Poets of the Shires" (1914). 4. Wratislaw, Theodore (1895) The Pity of Love, "Two Ballades" (ex Libris, York Lodge). 5. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 6. The Times Obituaries, September 1933.