The Picture Of Dorian Gray Analysis

“A picture is worth a thousand words”. The true personality of a person can be revealed through their character and actions unlike their words. Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray focuses on the corruption that envelops Dorian when he exchanges his soul for everlasting youth and beauty. Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, thoroughly demonstrates Dorian’s narcissism as it grows throughout the book and the struggle between good and evil as Lord Henry Wotton, one of his friends, negatively influences Dorian causing the downfall of his soul.

A more convincing evidence of the portrait being a reflection of Dorian’s moral decadence lies moments before the death of Dorian. At the night of his death, Dorian attempted to convince himself that he had indeed changed and had started committing

“There were passions in him that would find their terrible outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of the real evil” (Wilde,115). The author reveals pleasure as the driving force of many characters within Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, but this search for pleasure becomes fatal once taken into the hands of Dorian Gray. Throughout the novel Dorian Gray changes his opinion on pleasure based on what he requires in order to escape reality. With each death and misdeed he is responsible for; Dorian must search harder for a more drastic form of release. His path declines from his innocent beginnings with Sybil Vane, to the pleasure he finds in corrupt relations, and finally his need to escape the reality of killing a former

He is told to make the most of life while he is young. And even though time passees he never gets old so he continues acting immoral. When taking to Lord Henry in chapter 8, Lord Henry tells him, “Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that you, with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do” (Wilde 76). Lord Henry is expressing the power of Dorian’s youth. He escapes the many troubles of being old by staying young. Dorian is starting to believe nothing is more valuable than his youth. When he becomes aware of how his actions are affecting his soul by observing the changes in his painting, he decides to lock up the painting. The narrator says, “He himself would not see it. Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his soul? He kept his youth -- that was enough” (Wilde 89). Dorian is escaping the reality of who he really is. The painting shows his true colors, and he is represses it. He is running from his corrupt, immoral action because, he cares more about his physical youth. Youth is taking control of his actions and nothing else matters to him. Living the life that he is living takes a toll on his mental state causing him to become

The Picture of Dorian Gray, a novel laced with sin, treachery, and raging battles of inner conflict, is Oscar Wilde’s sole novel. Considered immoral and scandalous upon publication, the book centers around a young man named Dorian Gray, who does not age or reflect the darkness of his heart outwardly, and instead a portrait of him bears the damage his destructive life wreaks on his soul. However, the meaning of the story extends past the simple fact that Dorian lives a life of immorality—he walks the path that takes him there with his two friends, Basil Hallward and Lord Henry Wotten. The two attempt to guide and influence Dorian throughout the novel in their own ways, and are a vital piece of Dorian’s tale. Basil and Henry act as character foils as well as a symbolic angel and devil for Dorian Gray’s character, and also contribute themes of choosing one’s own fate.

In the beginning of The Picture of Dorian Gray, Dorian is viewed highly by Basil and is claimed to be his sole inspiration. By this little description we read of Dorian, the reader can already see how Dorian at the beginning of the book has a strong presence. However Basil describes Dorian as having a “simple and beautiful nature”(pg-12) and tells Lord Henry, “Don’t spoil him. Don’t try to influence him. Your influence would be bad.” (pg-12). Lord Henry is the first person to start to influence and change Dorian into being deceitful. The second factor that changes Dorian is the painting. In chapter two, Basil finishes the Painting and presents it to Dorian. Instead of being filled with joy, Dorian realizes that he will grow old and the Painting will stay young. Later in the story the Portrait changes to show a sneer around Dorians mouth. The reason for this is because Dorian broke Sybil’s heart. After learning about Sybil’s suicide, Dorian accepts that the Painting will show ageing while he appears to have not aged. This forces Dorian to lock away his painting and this also shows Dorian being deceitful with his looks.

Much of the criticism regarding The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde has dealt with Dorian Gray’s relation to his own portrait (Raby 392). While some may argue that the portrait represents a reflection of Dorian Gray’s character, this is only a superficial analysis of the novel and Dorian’s character. While Dorian Gray’s true character never changes, it is his own perception of his character (his conscience) that is reflected in the changing face of his portrait. In essence Dorian’s picture becomes a mirror through which the "true Dorian" judges his own metamorphasis as the superficial "Lord Henry Dorian" attempts to embrace Lord Henry’s teachings. Dorian’s

When Basil paints the portrait of Dorian Gray, Dorian becomes angry and curses the picture. The idea of the picture will retain the youthful and beauty, that Dorain now has, for all of time, while Dorian is strictened with the curse of having to endure all the signs of aging, is too much for him to bare. In jealousy and anger Dorian wishes that it be the portrait that bare the signs of aging and sin and he be the one that retains his beauty forever. In this moment of jealousy and anger, shows a Dorian that too bares the emotion of vulnerability and insecurity. From this point of the book onward, these emotions are now who this character becomes.

As his soul “undergoes…psychic disorder” (Monsman), his fascination with the grotesqueness of his picture also grows. Watching his picture Gray “would sit…filled…with that pride…that is half the fascination of sin…smiling with secret pleasure as the misshapen shadow…” (Wilde 133). Gray becomes interested in seeing his sin come alive on canvas. This in itself represents a man who is unstable mentally, as he derives pleasure from his own image’s ruin. Eventually Dorian’s downward spiral of mental ruin leads to his death.

In The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, the epigram “...to influence a person is to give him one's own soul.” (20) represents one of the major themes in the book, which is that influence from other people does not only change your mindset, it also changes your soul. In this book, Dorian started as an innocent and pure soul, which was soon tainted by Lord Henry’s influence, in the form of witty remarks about life. Dorian is soon bestowed upon the curse of eternal youth and perfection, while his portrait, a representation of his soul, ages and changes. Over the course of the book, Dorian becomes immersed in the desire for pleasure and sin, which reflects back upon the personality and soul of Lord Henry.

Basil idolized Dorian for his captivating features and innocence and as a result painted a portrait of Dorian. However, after noticing the depth of his beauty, Dorian became exceedingly vain and wishes himself everlasting beauty and agelessness, while cursing the painting into carrying his burdens of old age and sins. Most extensively, the author's characterization of Lord Henry Wotton, who fills Dorian's head with his poisonous theories, are evident through teaching Dorian the importance of his beauty which causes Dorian to become narcissistic. Henry is the main cause of Dorian's corruption, by provoking him into cherishing his youth and convincing him to live the hedonistic lifestyle. Each of these instances of characterization in the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, reveals the harmful effect influence can have and that sacrificing one's self for another individual can lead to

There is a continuous battle between good and evil forces throughout The Picture of Dorian Gray. Oscar Wilde eloquently crafts the storyline as he uses self-pleasures and indulgences against purity and spiritual correctness. Through the author’s use of expressive diction, it can be shown that Dorian Gray is the focal point of the controversies throughout the story. Dorian is cast into a lifestyle with all focus on temptations and pleasures when he first meets Lord Henry. Although Basil attempts to ward off Dorian from listening to Henry’s theories on lifestyle, Dorian ultimately ends up only living for his own selfish desires.

Oscar Wilde’s only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, revolves around a young man who has his wish of eternal youth granted. His age and sins are absorbed by his portrait, while he remains youthful and physically untouched. Ultimately throwing immortality away by not living as a proper human with morals, but by sullying his soul, demonstrated by the growing hideousness of his portrait throughout his his life. Wilde by using foil characters, choice of diction to employ emotional response, and an allegory within his novel, showcases human nature’s susceptibility to corruption. Surrounding the protagonist, Dorian Gray, are two juxtaposing characters: Basil Hallward and Henry Wotton.

The narrative of the novel displays the fallibility of art as a closet by means of this portrait. When the artist imbues their sins and virtues into the very foundation of their work, they become visible for all audiences. Dorian may not paint the portrait, but he shares a similar relationship with it; it is him it reflects. The portrait mirrors Dorian and paints his longings on a canvas for all to see: “the face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom […] Eternal youth, infinite passion, passions subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder sins—he was to have all these things. The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame” (Wilde 77, 88). The portrait embodies Dorian, everything he does, everything he wants, and everything he feels, the portrait projects. This further perpetuates the closet analogy; however, it also circumvents the metaphor itself, art does not conceal, it reveals. When Basil Hallward perceives the fruit of his labor after Dorian infuses it with himself, his response shows the portrait’s failure to conceal: “There was something in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing […] it was from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. Through some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing away” (Wilde 130-2). Art in this scenario fails as a closet and lays bare the sins of Dorian Gray, it is unable to hide that which he desires. Wilde states that “Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. / Those who read the symbol do so at their peril” (Wilde 3) but here, there is no beneath. The hidden intentions the work professes are visible from a brief

Throughout the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde tells a tale about a young man named Dorian whose entire life changes after he meets Basil Hallward, who paints a portrait of Gray that ultimately leads to Gray’s demise. At the same time, Dorian also meets Lord Henry, who eventually plays a bad influence over Dorian. The portrait shows the man Dorian has become