Oscar Wilde

Enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, Dorian Gray 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 decadence. The novel was a succès de scandale and the book was later used as evidence against Wilde at the Old Bailey in 1895. It has lost none of its power to fascinate and disturb.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

hessensitive

Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of is eyelids, the moulding of his hands even.

For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely house, were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he could escape, for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times to be almost to great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely locked room where he had spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with his own hands the terrible portrait whose changing features showed him the real degradation of his life, and in front of it had draped the purple-and-gold pall as a curtain.

Men who talked grossly became silent when Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to them the memory of the innocence that they had tarnished.

Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's-feet would creep around the fading eyes and make them horrible. The hair would lose its brightness, the mouth would gape and droop, would be foolish or gross, as the mouths of old men are. There would be the wrinkled throat, the cold, blue-veined hands, the twisted body, that he remembered in the grandfather who had been so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture had to be concealed. There was no help for it.

No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really lived, and so she has never really died. To you at least she was always a dream, a phantom that flirted through Shakespear's plays and left them lovelier for its presence, a reed through which Shakespear's music sounded richer and more full of joy. The moment she touched actual life, she married it, and it married her, and so she passed away. Mourn for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes in your head because Cordelia was strangled. Cry out against the heavens because the daughter of Barbantio died. But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was less real than they are.

There will be an inquest, of course, and you must not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. 

So what does it matter if she plays Juliet like a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating- people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing.

But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid.

Then she paused. A rose shook in her blood, and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted the petals of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion swept over her, and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love him," she said simply.

Karola

Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of my own soul.

Jamie Griffin

people are fond of giving away what they need most themselves. it is what i call the depth of generosity 

When critics disagree the artist is in accord with himself.

Rune

"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint,"

تينارة

The reason we all like to think so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. 

I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. 

Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely I never tell their names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it.

There were poisons so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken of them. There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through them if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great reward one received! How wonderful the world became to one!

This quote is from the preface (written by Wilde)! It encapsulates the ideal of Victorian decadence pretty well, I think.

Paige Leitner

We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. 

"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the lesson of romance.”

“He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize.”

There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of passion and youth; to convey one’s temperament into another as though it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume.

And beauty is a form of genius—is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is one of the great facts of the world.

“…Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion- these are the two things that govern us.”

It doesn't matter where you go or what you do, your guilt will follow you everywhere. That's my take away from this book.

Oscar Wilde’s writing is charming, I wish I could experience this book all over again. If the writing isn’t enough (which on its own would be) it is paired with one of the most interesting stories I’ve read in my lifetime. Worth the read, worth more than the read.

Iuno <3

yes the writing was beautiful, yes i know its a social critic and you’re not supposed to like the characters but books like that really aren’t my cup of tea. i decided to keep reading to give it a shot but this one really was a miss for me. idk what people are talking about when they say its hilarious and so quotable?? ill blame autism for me missing the jokes. ok but then chapter 12 happened and it got wayyy more fucked up and i started eating that shit UP omg stab stab stab… only for it to go back to being predictable and boring zzz

the first classic book i read i think and i really enjoyed reading it. it was so complex and there were so many interesting details. everything was described in such a beautiful, detailed and dramatic manner.

i have a love-hate relationship with the characters. i think they were written beautifully, but i still hate some of them. i hate lord henry. he ruined dorian's life. he made him believe that he was nothing without his looks. he just played with dorian as if he was his personal toy. he talked so much nonsense that sometimes he made me want to throw my phone out the window. i liked basil, but it seemed like he only liked dorian for his beauty and was using him for that. but he was an interesting character and he didn't deserve what happened to him.

i sometimes had a hard time understanding what they were talking about, so i read the book slowly and enjoyed every chapter.

victor

the first classic book i read i think and i really enjoyed reading it. it was so complex and there were so many interesting details. everything was described in such a beautiful, detailed and dramatic manner.

i have a love-hate relationship with the characters. i think they were written beautifully, but i still hate some of them. i hate lord henry. he ruined dorian's life. he made him believe that he was nothing without his looks. he just played with dorian as if he was his personal toy. he talked so much nonsense that sometimes he made me want to throw my phone out the window. i liked basil, but it seemed like he only liked dorian for his beauty and was using him for that. but he was an interesting character and he didn't deserve what happened to him.

i sometimes had a hard time understanding what they were talking about, so i read the book slowly and enjoyed every chapter.

It's a stunning indictment of Victorian high society where everyone is implicated in either a past or present scandal, or have become so detached from material concerns that their only course in life is to seek amoral pleasure.

Dorian manages to dupe several characters of suspecting his various sins because his youthful appearance prevents them from viewing him as the decrepit figure in the painting reflecting his true soul. A tale to be aware that culture, sophistication and beauty does not mean one isn't capable of villainous acts.

Winnie

It's a stunning indictment of Victorian high society where everyone is implicated in either a past or present scandal, or have become so detached from material concerns that their only course in life is to seek amoral pleasure.

Dorian manages to dupe several characters of suspecting his various sins because his youthful appearance prevents them from viewing him as the decrepit figure in the painting reflecting his true soul. A tale to be aware that culture, sophistication and beauty does not mean one isn't capable of villainous acts.

My favorite book ever, shoutout 14 year old me for wanting to be ~literate~

Sierra Scanlan

The excruciating detail in both conversations and vanity seem to be small nice bits and its the character of Dorian Gray that’ll make you wrench of what an ugly man can really be

Hugo Hernandez

It's an amazing book, honestly it was one of the first classics I've read but christ I had to put the book down a few times, both because it's good but it's also the type of book you'd have to start yelling at ink on paper and look like a complete psycho. I did tear up a bit when it came to basil, like oh my god WHAT IS GOING ON RIGHT NOW SHEBEHR. Seriously though, it's lovely, it's well written and I love it's ideas it's a very enticing book and enjoyable. Oscar was definitely open about his sexuality through the book which would be surprising for it's time period since it was in 1891. It does contain some anti semitism however which is genuinely annoying because I'd have thought it'd be a more progressive book. Other than that, I do definitely recommend.

migs

Corruption, the obsession of beauty, and ego: will always be a part of human nature. Whether we completely understand or realize the influence or not—it is up for us to decide. Dorian's corruption slowly worsened as he lost the sense of empathy, hiding away the person that we met during the very first few chapters of the book.

Dorian Gray had taught me that once we see that corrupted self as our nature, it will then fuse, turning into our own flesh and blood. The vices and wrongs will ultimately take their toll, in whatever form it may be.

Though I may not possess the strongest English fluency, nor I have a high literature analysis skill, Wilde surprised me by how many points you can unpack. I will be making sure to read the uncensored version after this 😄

Corruption, the obsession of beauty, and ego: will always be a part of human nature. Whether we completely understand or realize the influence or not—it is up for us to decide. Dorian's corruption slowly worsened as he lost the sense of empathy, hiding away the person that we met during the very first few chapters of the book.

Dorian Gray had taught me that once we see that corrupted self as our nature, it will then fuse, turning into our own flesh and blood. The vices and wrongs will ultimately take their toll, in whatever form it may be.

Though I may not possess the strongest English fluency, nor I have a high literature analysis skill, Wilde surprised me by how many points you can unpack. I will be making sure to read the uncensored version after this 😄

I had to reread this classic for a course called Victorian Masculinities I'm taking. I was able to pick up on so many other details while reading this novel through a Victorian Masculine lens that I just haven't gotten from my other readings of it. 

Dorian's character has always been a mystery to me, but I think that's the whole point. Using a new lens to read this did uncover some more truths about his personality and the time period in which he/ Oscar Wilde lived. I'm really glad to have reread it and I know this is a classic I'll always come back to.

P.S. I only docked points from my rating because while this book is revolutionary and groundbreaking in not just Queer culture but also all of western literature- it does have many negative facets when it comes to the discussion of women and women in the Victorian era.

I had to reread this classic for a course called Victorian Masculinities I'm taking. I was able to pick up on so many other details while reading this novel through a Victorian Masculine lens that I just haven't gotten from my other readings of it. 

Dorian's character has always been a mystery to me, but I think that's the whole point. Using a new lens to read this did uncover some more truths about his personality and the time period in which he/ Oscar Wilde lived. I'm really glad to have reread it and I know this is a classic I'll always come back to.

P.S. I only docked points from my rating because while this book is revolutionary and groundbreaking in not just Queer culture but also all of western literature- it does have many negative facets when it comes to the discussion of women and women in the Victorian era.

jeanro b.

Lord Henry kept on getting on my nerves in some part of the book and that’s how you know that you love it.

Abisatyayay

breathtakingly stunning and gut-wrenching. i am just speechless, i cannot express my feelings about this book without spoiling anything. a must read!

ayoni

it was a bit hard to get through the language for the first couple pages, but i really enjoyed it!

JJ Hampton 

I listened to this via audio and I felt very immersed in the story. This was an exploration of the shallowness of beauty and pleasure and the unsatisfying nature of them. The idea that our souls become ugly and damaged the more we do wrong was so interesting to read about. I love Oscar Wilde and his first and only novel is definitely a fav now. The way it ends is simultaneously unsatisfying and satisfying. It is more of a dark and contemplative read and I definitely recommend it.

Ellen Ivey

I don't know what to think really. I was really exited to read this book but got a bit desapointed. I was hoping for more of "going insane" over destriptions of rocks. I truly adore Dorian's monologs and conversations with Bazyli and Henry as well as the writing but i do feel a bit starved of the "dark vibes". Hoped there just would be more but overall it's a good book.

Martina

"The Picture of Dorian Gray" is the level of timeless classic where it is difficult to separate its significance from the enjoyment of reading it. Sometimes you read a novel to see how cleverly it has bee put together, you know?

But if it were not that, if it failed to depict the ever-relevant questions of youth and beauty and the interior vs the exterior expression of beauty, the novel still has an absolutely riveting plot. I knew very well what was going to happen and still found myself gasping at certain points. Just an all-around great reading experience. 

"The Picture of Dorian Gray" is the level of timeless classic where it is difficult to separate its significance from the enjoyment of reading it. Sometimes you read a novel to see how cleverly it has bee put together, you know?

But if it were not that, if it failed to depict the ever-relevant questions of youth and beauty and the interior vs the exterior expression of beauty, the novel still has an absolutely riveting plot. I knew very well what was going to happen and still found myself gasping at certain points. Just an all-around great reading experience. 

I loved the book even tho Harry got on my nerves most of the book, Dorian an impeccable character, just the evolution of his personality was wonderfully written by Oscar Wilde, I loved every second of the book. The end specifically got me. How he wanted to get rid of the painting but instead killed himself, because getting rid of the painting would mean getting rid of ones soul.

Ester Waclavova

I loved the book even tho Harry got on my nerves most of the book, Dorian an impeccable character, just the evolution of his personality was wonderfully written by Oscar Wilde, I loved every second of the book. The end specifically got me. How he wanted to get rid of the painting but instead killed himself, because getting rid of the painting would mean getting rid of ones soul.

I loved that 

The chapters catched me more and more, despite the twelfth one but i thought the book really left me something to think about

Joelina Schlabbach

Brilliant. None of the characters are likeable. Some are pitiable, some are tragic but none likeable which makes for an interesting dynamic. Great tragedy. 

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Reviews

Highlights