It was the trial that mesmerised the chattering classes.

Oscar Wilde was the literary wit of his generation

In 1895, the literary wit of his generation, Oscar Wilde took a libel action against the Marquis of Queensbury, the father of his homosexual lover Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas.

The devastating cross-examination by fellow Dubliner and contemporary Edward Carson destroyed Wilde, leading to his later prosecution and imprisonment.

Currently running in Dublin, A Trinity of Two, written by Ulick O Connor, stars Dubliner and Hollywood star Patrick Bergin as Carson, and Fermanagh actor Adrian Dunbar as Wilde.

O Connor's novel dramatic treatment makes the trial a tough act to follow for those on stage.

"It is difficult - there are a huge amount of lines to learn, that's not necessarily a burden really," said Dunbar.

"What we have is really two one-man shows that are interweaved between each other and come together at various points during the trial."

While the trial has become a classic, less is known about how revolutionary nationalists admired the man who was later to lead the Ulster Volunteers.

"Carson could save Ireland and make Ireland", said Irish nationalist hero Sir Roger Casement.

Gunrunning

"I like him far better than those craven, scheming, plotting Englishmen, whose one aim is to see how little freedom they can give Ireland."

Casement was to be executed in 1916 for trying to land German guns in County Kerry to overthrow British rule - something Carson's Ulster Volunteer Force succeeded in doing at Larne, County Antrim, in 1914 for an opposing cause.

Patrick Bergin said exploring Carson's character had been a revelation.

"It was a shock for me to discover he was from Dublin - I always assumed he was from Belfast or somewhere else in the North.

"He was born in Dublin and raised in Harcourt Street into a middle class family and went to Trinity College.

"People like Padraig Pearse (the 1916 nationalist leader) and Sir Roger Casement actually found him a man of integrity, a man they could deal with, and they could trust him: when he said something he really meant it.

Patrick Bergin (left) and Adrian Dunbar star in A Trinity of Two

"The other thing I find which was really interesting for me personally, because I was brought up a Catholic, was to really understand his desire to separate Church and State," said Bergin.

The play also shows Wilde in a different light from conventional portrayals, said Dunbar who comes from Enniskillen where Wilde attended Portora Royal School.

"I hope that having played the part here in Liberty Hall I have brought quite a bit more than what we usually see as some kind of foppish dandy.

Union

"It is a part of Wilde's personality, but it's not all of his personality. There was a lot of darkness there; there was a lot of hurt, a lot of pain.

"But there was also a lot of pride and a huge amount of courage there too, to be what he was when he was it," says Dunbar.

The playwright, Ulick O Connor, argues that Carson's unionism was in his view, closer to Irish nationalism than the loyalism promoted in Carson's time by the British establishment.

"He was an Irishman who believed the Union [with Britain] would work. He did actually want a nine-county Ulster for I think the best possible reasons: he knew that it would be very close in its two allegiances, unionism and nationalism, and eventually it would work out into a sort of a good 'Commonwealth Ireland'," says O'Connor.

"To my mind he was always an Irish patriot," he smiles, aware that many in Ulster have almost deified him as the father of modern Unionism.