The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde

The superego is a projection of the ego. It is the moral censoring agency; the part that makes moral judgments and the repository of conscience and pride. It brings reason, order and social acceptability to the otherwise uncontrolled and potentially harmful realm of biological impulses (Guerin 128-31).

Looking back on Oscar Wilde 's life, there are many realizations that he struggled finding something that suited him best with his type of work. A man of the 19th century, who is best known for his only novella The Picture of Dorian Gray and his play The Importance of Being Earnest as well as his infamous arrest, imprisonment and being a gay author leading to his downfall. Oscar Wilde who was known as a playwright, author, sometime poet, and also a not very motivated school student, still came to success. He was very talented, intelligent and aesthetically interested and looked at others works as influential. Using this influence he started to write his own works and became a successful and well known author.

In life it’s not about counting the years but instead making the years count. Kevin McElroyIn The Picture of Dorian Gray, the author Oscar Wilde relays the message to the reader that youth decays with age but value and beauty does not. The character Dorian Gray mourned his stage of youth through the portrait instead of having cherished the times he experienced. This use of symbolism through the portrait is Wilde 's way of expressing this theme. This main symbol is the portrait itself as the author uses it to gradually reveal Dorian’s true identity. Dorian Gray is an attractive figure on the outside, but on the inside there is an obsessive and selfish person. These inner qualities eventually lead to his murderous acts and overall self-destruction.

“ I wasn 't like this before I met you.” “ Like what?” “I didn’t feel like this. I didn’t think like this. You- you did this to me…(“Fallenoracle”).” This quote from the tv series Quantico does an effective job of expressing what Lord Henry’s influence has done to Dorian Gray throughout the philosophical novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. While some might argue that Dorian 's actual nature does not change significantly, an additional perspective is that Dorian Gray is a dynamic character that gains negative character traits by becoming vain of his youth, increasingly paranoid of someone learning of his portrait as well as the crimes he has committed, and attempting to gain pleasure from a number of deprived acts.

Oscar Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray” is a story that focuses on the journey of an innocent and pure man, and his downward spiral of giving into temptation and committing crime, and living a life of pleasure. The story is centered around the idea of aestheticism. Everything is beautiful, the thought of something having any kind of “moral” meaning is just absurd. “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde both honors and condemns the pure aesthetic theme through the conflicting standpoints of three different characters. Throughout the story he portrays the constant altercation between what is virtuous and unethical, which is played out in

Dorian Gray once told Henry "The soul . . . can be bought, and sold. It can be poisoned, or made perfect" (Wilde 213). Likewise, it would not be beneficial for one to sacrifice their soul with an exception of exchanging it in order to attain perfection. Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray explores the themes and ideologies of Hedonism and Aestheticism. Hedonists believe that pleasure is the most important aspect in life and can be obtained when one denies their moral instincts to partake in sensual activities, essentially neglecting their soul. Aestheticism focuses on the principle that art serves no purpose and exists for the sake of beauty alone in which critics illustrated the attitudes of the movement through The Yellow Book. Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, introduces the protagonist, Dorian Gray, as a young and handsome male during the Victorian Era in England. The story commences with Basil Hallward, a painter, using Dorian as his model. Meanwhile Lord Henry preys on the young lad to encourage him to engage in the Hedonistic lifestyle. More so, the portrait of Dorian presented by Basil represents Dorian’s soul. Immoral decisions made by Dorian slowly alter his portrait for the worse and ultimately mirrors the unsightliness of Dorian’s persona. Lord Henry furthers his projection of Hedonism onto Dorian by presenting a book which reiterates philosophies of

The Victorian era is an extraordinarily complex age that occurred throughout the reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1901. The Victorian Era was a tremendously exciting period that created the emergence of many various artistic styles such as literacy, poetry, and painting. In addition, the Era caused the social, political, and religious movements to flourish. The Victorian Era, although being known as the beginning of modern times, still embraced some radical views that today we would associate as "prudishness" and "repression". In 1890, author Oscar Wilde wrote The Picture of Dorian Gray and submitted it to Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine. The magazine’s editor, J.M. Stoddert, immediately declined the novel and determined that it would offend the sensibilities of his readership (Wilde x). It was believed that Oscar Wilde’s book contained explicit sexual, especially homosexual, content which contradicted the time period of the Victorian Era and was deemed obscene. It was not until 2011, that Wilde’s novel was published as originally written under the title, The Picture of Dorian Gray: An Annotated, Uncensored Edition. The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray highlights the triangular relationship between the three leading characters: Basil Hallward, Dorian Gray, and Lord Henry Wotton. Although it is arguably debated, there is an appearance of homosexual content in The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray which appears in Basil Hallward’s emotions toward Dorian and in the

In Oscar Wilde’s first novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde strategically uses his main characters Lord Henry Wotton and Basil Hallward to represent good versus evil influences throughout the reading. In the book, Dorian Gray plays the role of the everyman who is in a vicious circle on having to decide between the side of good or evil. Lord Henry is the evil influence and is seen as a more devil-like character while Basil Hallward is the good Christianity like influence that is trying to counteract the teachings of the devil. From the very beginning of the novel Lord Henry’s evil forces tempt Dorian and a battle quickly begins between good (Basil) and evil (Henry) over control of Dorian’s soul. This essay aims to prove that Wilde’s strategical use of influence from Basil and Henry on Gray ultimately destroy Dorian and lead to his surprising death.

Thesis-In The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, main character, Dorian Gray , in his times of greatest pain chooses to focus only on what is beautiful which leads to his death and shows that beauty obscures reality.

My choice for this summer reading assignment was to read The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. This is a philosophical fiction novel meaning it devotes a significant portion of the novel to sort the questions that are addressed in discursive philosophy, that can include: the role in society, the purpose of living, ethnic or morals, experience, etc. Throughout history art has played a huge role in portraying the structure of society and how the people play in it.The novel takes place in the late 19th century in London. The novel is about a beautiful young man who is hiding a ugly secret. Dorian Gray is a beautiful young wealthy gentlemen that does not age and thats life is dictated my art. He was the subject of one of Basil Hallward,

The novel takes place in the peak of the Decadent artistic movement of the 1890s, which occurred in the Victorian era of London and is known for its judgmental social standards, highlighting the contrast between the wealthier, materialistic higher classes and the dull middle-class society, making the novel more audacious.

1) In the book, The Picture of Dorian Gray, several characteristics of the world have been presented. The author portrays the world as a den of individuals with a skewed view of the immediate environment. The author depicts the world as a place where physical traits like beauty or handsomeness are important than a person’s virtues. Dorian spends his time studying music and other beautiful things that life has to offer. Visible aspects such as youthfulness are viewed by the characters of the novel as the most superior aspects of life. Lord Henry reminds Dorian that soon he would lose vital attributes that mattered to him in life. By saying so, he

Oscar Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray was published in 1891. The novel reflects the authors carelessness and hastiness. The plot of the story is simple, however, the issues that come about are very complex. The novel is about three characters: Basil Hallward, Lord Henry, and Dorian Gray. In the beginning of the story, Basil paints a portrait of Dorian and gives it to him as a present. Lord Henry talks about the importance of being young and explains to Dorian how exhilarating it is to be young. As a result, Dorian begins to feel sad because he knows that one day he will grow old, but the picture will always remain young. Wilde uses this to set up a framework to examine some ideas

It is apparent that vanity, sin, and beauty are the key elements found in The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. But, where do these elements originate from? What is the reason behind man’s internal need to pursue sin or his ideal sense of beauty that, on occasion, leads to his vanity? In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde explores naturalism through the use of symbolism and the tools of characterization, such as speech, action, interiority, the narrator, and the actions of other characters towards the protagonist, to illustrate how humanity’s perception of vanity, sin, and beauty are an inherent part of man’s nature and a blinding disillusion to the meaning of life.

beauty. Looking at the gruesome painting, which once was beautiful, disgusts Dorian and he rips it apart with the knife he used to kill Basil only to end in his own murder.