The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Rating 3⭐s

You can buy The Picture of Dorian Gray...here

You can find out about the author...here

253 pages

• The Blurb...

Oscar Wilde's alluring novel of decadence and sin was a succès de scandale on publication. It follows Dorian Gray who, enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, exchanges his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Influenced by his friend Lord Henry Wotton, he is drawn into a corrupt double life, indulging his desires in secret while remaining a gentleman in the eyes of polite society. Only his portrait bears the traces of his depravity. This definitive edition includes a selection of contemporary reviews condemning the novel's immorality.

• Our Review...

Wilde's famous for his one and only novel. Dorian a young, very wealthy and strikingly handsome man loves himself so much he wishes for eternal youth as he is sitting, having his portrait painted. Low and behold after a while he notices his picture is ageing cruelly, but he is not. Dorian decides his life from now on will be one of excess and hedonism, knowing that there is no cost to his depravity (at least in the physical.) But how much depravity can one man sustain. How will it end. Will his past come back to claim revenge at some point?

Wilde famously was sent to prison for homosexuality, in a time when this was illegal. Reading The Picture of Dorian Gray (TPODG) feels like it is written by a man who wishes there was no consequences to his vices. If only Wilde could drain the shame out of himself and trap it in a painting, leaving him to lead a care free life. Of course the irony, these days his actions would not be illegal, he would suffer no guilt or shame. One century's crime is another centuries freedom.

Famous his wit and insight into society, TPODG is rife with razor sharp wit, beautifully balanced one liners and sage like asides on life and class. See selected quotes for just a few. So why only 3 stars? Well I feel the novel is less than the some of its component parts. It is pure upper middle class indulgent naval gazing, where the most pressing issue is how to deal with "ennui." No, i didn't know what it was either, It's a deep, existential weariness that comes from feeling like nothing is worth doing. I don't think i have ever been that far up the financial food chain to be rich enough from what is essentially very posh boredom. 

He is forever naval gazing and talking about himself. It is so very narcissistic and self indulgent. It is not a very attractive quality. "But it's just the character of Dorian Gray"  you say. But for reasons stated earlier Gray and Wilde seem to me to be one and the same person. His attitude to the lower class in general and women in particular speak to a lack of empathy. Yes he is insightful and witty but that wit is disparaging and cruel and self aggrandising. I can appreciate the humour and societal analysis but I don't think I'd go for a pint with Oscar Wilde/Dorian Gray.

• Selected Quotes...

The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live—undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet.

"she is a peacock in everything but beauty,"

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself,

I should fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege of the rich."

In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak. That was all.

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