Dorian Gray Notes:
Context:
Oscar Wilde was born on October 16, 1854, in Dublin, Ireland. He was educated at
Trinity College in Dublin and at Magdalen College, Oxford, and settled in London,
where he married Constance Lloyd in 1884. In the literary world of Victorian London,
Wilde fell in with an artistic crowd that included W. B. Yeats, the great Irish poet, and
Lillie Langtry, mistress to the Prince of Wales. A great conversationalist and a
famous wit, Wilde began by publishing mediocre poetry but soon achieved
widespread fame for his comic plays. The first, Vera; or, The Nihilists, was published
in 1880. Wilde followed this work with Lady Windermere’s Fan (1892), A Woman of
No Importance (1893), An Ideal Husband (1895), and his most famous play, The
Importance of Being Earnest (1895). Although these plays relied upon relatively
simple and familiar plots, they rose well above convention with their brilliant dialogue
and biting satire.
Wilde published his only novel,The Picture of Dorian Gray,before he reached the
height of his fame. The first edition appeared in the summer of 1890 in Lippincott’s
Monthly Magazine. It was criticized as scandalous and immoral. Disappointed with
its reception, Wilde revised the novel in 1891, adding a preface and six new
chapters. The Preface (as Wilde calls it) anticipates some of the criticism that might
be leveled at the novel and answers critics who charge The Picture of Dorian
Grayw ith being an immoral tale. It also succinctly sets forth the tenets of Wilde’s
philosophy of art. Devoted to a school of thought and a mode of sensibility known as
aestheticism, Wilde believed that art possesses an intrinsic value—that it is beautiful
and therefore has worth, and thus needs serve no other purpose, be it moral or
political. This attitude was revolutionary in Victorian England, where popular belief
held that art was not only a function of morality but also a means of enforcing it. In
the Preface, Wilde also cautioned readers against finding meanings “beneath the
surface” of art. Part gothic novel, part comedy of manners, part treatise on the
relationship between art and morality, The Picture of Dorian Graycontinues to
present its readers with a puzzle to sort out. There is as likely to be as much
disagreement over its meaning now as there was among its Victorian audience, but,
as Wilde notes near the end of the Preface, “Diversity of opinion about a work of art
shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.”
In 1891, the same year that the second edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray was
published, Wilde began a homosexual relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas, an
aspiring but rather untalented poet. The affair caused a good deal of scandal, and
Douglas’s father, the marquess of Queensberry, eventually criticized it publicly.
When Wilde sued the marquess for libel, he himself was convicted under English
sodomy laws for acts of “gross indecency.” In 1895, Wilde was sentenced to two
years of hard labor, during which time he wrote a long, heartbreaking letter to Lord
Alfred titled De Profundis (Latin for “Out of the Depths”). After his release, Wilde left
England and divided his time between France and Italy, living in poverty. He never
published under his own name again, but, in 1898, he did publish under a
pseudonym The Ballad of Reading Gaol, a lengthy poem about a prisoner’s feelings
,toward another prisoner about to be executed. Wilde died in Paris on November 30,
1900, having converted to Roman Catholicism on his deathbed.
Plot:
In the stately London home of his aunt, Lady Brandon, the well-known artist Basil
Hallward meets Dorian Gray. Dorian is a cultured, wealthy, and impossibly beautiful
young man who immediately captures Basil’s artistic imagination. Dorian sits for
several portraits, and Basil often depicts him as an ancient Greek hero or a
mythological figure. When the novel opens, the artist is completing his first portrait of
Dorian as he truly is, but, as he admits to his friend Lord Henry Wotton, the painting
disappoints him because it reveals too much of his feeling for his subject. Lord
Henry, a famous wit who enjoys scandalizing his friends by celebrating youth,
beauty, and the selfish pursuit of pleasure, disagrees, claiming that the portrait is
Basil’s masterpiece. Dorian arrives at the studio, and Basil reluctantly introduces him
to Lord Henry, who he fears will have a damaging influence on the impressionable,
young Dorian.
Basil’s fears are well founded; before the end of their first conversation, Lord Henry
upsets Dorian with a speech about the transient nature of beauty and youth. Worried
that these, his most impressive characteristics, are fading day by day, Dorian curses
his portrait, which he believes will one day remind him of the beauty he will have lost.
In a fit of distress, he pledges his soul if only the painting could bear the burden of
age and infamy, allowing him to stay forever young. After Dorian’s outbursts, Lord
Henry reaffirms his desire to own the portrait; however, Basil insists the portrait
belongs to Dorian.
Over the next few weeks, Lord Henry’s influence over Dorian grows stronger. The
youth becomes a disciple of the “new Hedonism” and proposes to live a life
dedicated to the pursuit of pleasure. He falls in love with Sibyl Vane, a young actress
who performs in a theatre in London’s slums. He adores her acting; she, in turn,
refers to him as “Prince Charming” and refuses to heed the warnings of her brother,
James Vane, that Dorian is no good for her. Overcome by her emotions for Dorian,
Sibyl decides that she can no longer act, wondering how she can pretend to love on
the stage now that she has experienced the real thing. Dorian, who loves
Sibyl because of her ability to act, cruelly breaks his engagement with her. After
doing so, he returns home to notice that his face in Basil’s portrait of him has
changed: it now sneers. Frightened that his wish for his likeness in the painting to
bear the ill effects of his behaviour has come true and that his sins will be recorded
on the canvas, he resolves to make amends with Sibyl the next day. The following
afternoon, however, Lord Henry brings news that Sibyl has killed herself. At Lord
Henry’s urging, Dorian decides to consider her death a sort of artistic triumph—she
personified tragedy—and to put the matter behind him. Meanwhile, Dorian hides his
portrait in a remote upper room of his house, where no one other than he can watch
its transformation.
Lord Henry gives Dorian a book that describes the wicked exploits of a
nineteenth-century Frenchman; it becomes Dorian’s bible as he sinks ever deeper
, into a life of sin and corruption. He lives a life devoted to garnering new experiences
and sensations with no regard for conventional standards of morality or the
consequences of his actions. Eighteen years pass. Dorian’s reputation suffers in
circles of polite London society, where rumours spread regarding his scandalous
exploits. His peers nevertheless continue to accept him because he remains young
and beautiful. The figure in the painting, however, grows increasingly wizened and
hideous. On a dark, foggy night, Basil Hallward arrives at Dorian’s home to confront
him about the rumours that plague his reputation. The two argue, and Dorian
eventually offers Basil a look at his (Dorian’s) soul. He shows Basil the now-hideous
portrait, and Hallward, horrified, begs him to repent. Dorian claims it is too late for
penance and kills Basil in a fit of rage.
In order to dispose of the body, Dorian employs the help of an estranged friend, a
doctor, whom he blackmails. The night after the murder, Dorian makes his way to an
opium den, where he encounters James Vane, who attempts to avenge Sibyl’s
death. Dorian escapes to his country estate. While entertaining guests, he notices
James Vane peering in through a window, and he becomes wracked by fear and
guilt. When a hunting party accidentally shoots and kills Vane, Dorian feels safe
again. He resolves to amend his life but cannot muster the courage to confess his
crimes, and the painting now reveals his supposed desire to repent for what it
is—hypocrisy. In a fury, Dorian picks up the knife he used to stab Basil Hallward and
attempts to destroy the painting. There is a crash, and his servants enter to find the
portrait, unharmed, showing Dorian Gray as a beautiful young man. On the floor lies
the body of their master—an old man, horribly wrinkled and disfigured, with a knife
plunged into his heart.
MAJOR CONFLICT · Dorian Gray, having promised his soul in order to live a life of
perpetual youth, must try to reconcile himself to the bodily decay and dissipation that
are recorded in his portrait.
RISING ACTION · Dorian notices the change in his portrait after ending his affair
with Sibyl Vane; he commits himself wholly to the “yellow book” and indulges his
fancy without regard for his reputation; the discrepancy between his outer purity and
his inner depravity surges.
CLIMAX · Dorian kills Basil Hallward.
FALLING ACTION · Dorian descends into London’s opium dens; he attempts to
express remorse to Lord Henry; he stabs his portrait, thereby killing himself.
Analysis: The Preface–Chapter Two
The Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray is a collection of epigrams that aptly sums
up the philosophical tenets of the artistic and philosophical movement known as
aestheticism. Aestheticism, which found its footing in Europe in the early nineteenth
century, proposed that art need not serve moral, political, or otherwise didactic ends.
Whereas the romantic movement of the early and mid-nineteenth century viewed art
