Dorian Gray Questions

I choose the book Being There by Jerzy Kosinski. As I was looking through all the possibilities of what to read, this book was the one that caught my attention. The passage that explains a little of what the book is really drew me in. The words “ money, power, and sex” are what essentially made me choose the book. It to me sounded somewhat like a drama. After reading the book, it wasn’t totally what I expected. It was interesting, but it wasn’t as informative to me. I wanted more to the book, especially with the way it ended. The ending upset, because it all of a sudden just ended. I thought by the end of the book Chance would’ve been figured out, and all would’ve been ok, but it just ended so abruptly. Even though it ended suddenly, it did end with him being at a place where he was content and at peace.

In The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde presents the theme of good versus evil side of human nature. The depths of what it means to be human is explored by Wilde with the three characters of Basil Hallward, Henry Wotton and Dorian Gary. Each character represents a different side of the conflict between morality and giving into temptation. The three characters equally represent the difference in the class structure of society.

In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde is able to show how possessions can change a man so drastically. Over the course of the book the readers examine how many items such as the painting, the yellow book and much more, shape and alter Dorian from being outgoing, likable, and overall good to secluded, manipulative and most of all deceitful. Dorian gray has many motives for being deceitful that help develop the characters, and change the way they interact with each other.

The book Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving was a pleasant book to read because of how much detail Irving had put into such

I chose the book Tale of Despereaux. The reason why is quite simple. I love this book and I always have. This book, I feel like, has always understood, that is if books could understand, and I have always had a deep connection with it and its characters. I have read this book several hundred times and it will never ever get old to me. I could read it when I’m fifty. This was my favorite book back in the day, and now because of this assignment, I get to read it once more! I will never and can never forget this book.

The two books that I choose is The Adventure of Tom Sawyer and Trash. The Adventure of Tom Sawyer was an adventurous book. It also had a crime scene. The Adventure Of Tom Sawyer was an Adventurous book, because Tom and his friend Huckleberry Finn went to a graveyards to cure warts and they also went to a haunted house. Each time they went to the graveyard and haunted house, they saw the murderer. They both were scared because they told about the murderer in the court. In Trash, it was an adventurous book and also had a crime scene. Trash is an adventurous book, because they were three trash boys that found a bag that they police had. They had to run away from the police and they met many new people on the way and learnt about Jose Angelico. The crime scene was when Raphael, one of the Trash boys, was in jail because the police found out he had the bag and he won’t surrender it. Both of these book are fiction. Both of the book, really got my attention. I really loved the book so much. I read it five times.

One book that I will want everyone to read should have a lot of life lesson which gives the reader knowledge of how they’re supposed to be in their real life. The book “Percy Jackson & the Olympians; The Sea of Monsters,” is a very good book in which gives you life lesson on how you can be successful in life and there is always a very good moral at the end which will teach us a very good lesson that could be the most important for success.

The Picture of Dorian Grey as a novel in the Victorian Era was shocking to readers of the time due to the open nature of topics like: sexuality, greed and corruption. A Freudian perspective of the characters: Basil, Lord Henry and Dorian can be seen as the Id, Ego and Super Ego. Basil is the Super Ego, he conforms to a certain extent and tries to make Dorian lead a moral life when it comes to desperate times of the loss of the 'real Dorian'; Lord Henry can be seen as the Id, the immoral character who tries to convince Dorian to submit to his natural urges and passions; Dorian is the Ego, one who in the beginning is in between the two and has a power struggle within as to how he should act as a character in the novel. In answering this question and exploring the conflicts shown in the novel one must look at the gender, identity and sexuality.

This is said by the narrator who is talking to the reader. During this scene, Dorian is talking with Adrian, he is a man Basil introduced him to and accused him of ruining. He was in a terrible state, blinded by the opium. They found each other in the mysterious location. During this time, Dorian's conscience is bothering him, he was beginning to feel guilt. He finds that the only thing that could help him was the opium which helped him to forget. While he was talking to Adrian, he noticed that the bodies of the people around looked strange. He realized that he was not the only one trying to escape from his problems, so were the people around him. The effect of the drug made people look grotesque but it made him feel an aesthetic fascination

The painting is a self-portrait of the fictional character Dorian gray. The painting was used in the film where the character had asked a portrait of him as a handsome man. Dorian gray trades in his soul for him to remain forever young and handsome. Gray lives a life where he does things that are morally corrupt. Gray continues not to age but the painting starts to change showing grays moral corruption. In the center of the piece you are drawn to the figure of Dorian gray. The figure shows aging and marks of damage in his face. The main figure is wearing a wardrobe that shows his class and wealth. The clothes however also have tear and fading colors that show aging effect in contrast to Gray. In the background a mixture of fading colors is seen. The red rug at the bottom is shown ruffled and not perfectly set in the ground. At the bottom of the painting and below the rug there is a hand that is shown reaching out. The hand is placed to say that there are bodies swept under the rug that show his corruption and sins. One of the most interesting background pieces is the statue of the cat. During the Renaissance dogs were used to mean loyalty. The cat in the background is used to mean the opposite of that and speak of grays values. Another contrast compared to the Renaissance is that the cat is a statue and not a

The book I selected to read was “The Diary of Anne Frank”. This story was about a happy girl who celebrated her birthday on June 12, 1942 with her family. As a gift, she got a diary. In the diary, she shared an amazing story about her thoughts and feelings because she had no friends to share them with. Although she has a big family, she still feels like no one listens to her and like she gets no attention.

Throughout this Arts and Humanities course we’ve been learning about various different topics. We reviewed over each topic in class and thoroughly interpreted each and every one of them. Out of the eight topics we learned the three topics that intrigued me the most were The Knight in the Panther’s Skin by Shota Rustaveli, The Canterbury Tales, “the Wife of Bath’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer, and The Allegory of the Cave by Plato.

Oscar Wilde’s fictional piece The Picture of Dorian Gray is a wonderful story that provides insight on the effect that sin has on the soul. In the beginning of the story Dorian is a kind hearted man, but by the end he becomes a cold blooded murderer who thinks only about himself. The ending is also very interesting in the sense that although Oscar Wilde escaped suspicion, revenge from James and those who could put his pursuit of pleasure in jeopardy, Dorian could not escape himself. This is the theme that really stuck with me. Dorian pursued pleasure with complete disregard for his soul or his conscience and in the end it led to his lack of pleasure and death.

A religious reading of purity helps to situate the direction through which both The Picture of Dorian Grey and “The Lame Shall Enter First” choose to take in relation to sin. Heaven is in closest proximity to the individual in infancy. This is often when Christians are baptized, and so baptism cleanses the infants of original sin. Therefore, the aging process moves the individual further and further from the purity associated with baptism. In a similar way, interacting with Eve prior to the fall is much like interacting with a child prior to the experiences associated with the maturing process, because both are susceptible to outside influence. When Eve succumbs to the forbidden fruit, it is much like a child’s sensibility impaired by adult experience. Both Wilde and O’Connor use the youth of their characters to blur the lines concerning the transgressions of their characters.

In The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, a young and once innocent character, named Dorian Gray, struggles to find who is he. Self- Discovery is one of the main themes in the novel. Dorian Gray, throughout chapters 1-12, gradually loses his innocence through discovering who he is. Dorian Gray sees the painting and though everyone finds it beautiful, Dorian says it is not and wishes he would never grow old. Dorian after losing his innocence, never wants to grow old, he wants to be young forever. Young Dorian Gray takes other people’s views, especially Lord Henry’s, and makes a little more extreme, but in the process, he lost his innocence and will never be able to get it back.