The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray
Author Name: Oscar Wilde
Age Rating: Older Teen
Star Rating: ✦✦✦✦✦
Genre: Classics, Supernatural
Summary: Dorian is a beautiful young man, blonde and blue-eyed, and in the springtime of his youth, Dorian seems to have it all. He is innocent and kind, handsome and pleasing to the eye. So what could be missing? When Dorian meets the learned older man Lord Henry Wotton, he becomes enamored with his way of speaking, and is soon roped into a hedonistic ideology, never to return…
Favorite Character: Basil Hallward was my favorite character. He was so sincere and kind to Dorian, he definitely had a crush on Dorian, but he never acted on his crush. He was very relatable and his fate at the end of the story proves that kindness never goes unpunished.
Storyline Development: The story starts with artist and painter Basil Hallward painting the portrait of his muse, Dorian Gray, who poses for his portrait.
During this time, Dorian meets the charismatic and well-spoken Lord Henry Wotton, whose talks soon enamor Dorian and push him into a world of hedonism and sin.
Dorian cries upon hearing that once his youth and beauty leave him, there will be nothing he can do to keep himself in society’s good graces except to have something unique about him.
Due to this, he wishes that he never ages. This wish inadvertently leads to him wishing for his portrait to take on all his sin and aging.
Thus begins the real big event of the story, Dorian meets Sybill Vane, a beautiful, Grecian-looking actress. The star of the Shakespearean plays put on by the local theater, Dorian slowly falls for her and her impeccable acting skills.
But once Sybill falls for Dorian, her acting suddenly dramatically declines, and Dorian falls out of love with her. But his rejection of her breaks Sybill’s heart irreparably, and she does the unthinkable.
Later on in the story the author Oscar Wilde, shows Dorian many years later, the talk of the town as the sinful man who never seems to age, and his treatment of Sybil soon comes back to bite him.
The end of this suspenseful story leaves readers satisfied, as Dorian pays for the consequences of his dastardly actions and also makes me wonder, what would’ve happened had Dorian not been led astray?
Worldbuilding: The story is set in the time of Oscar Wilde, the Victorian era. The story mainly focuses not on worldbuilding, but instead focuses on building up the significance of Dorian’s portrait as a physical representation of his sinful behavior and his true age as he presents himself as suspiciously youthful to the outside world. Rarely garnering too much suspicion from other landed gentry, it is only the poor folks who have seen Dorian’s true colors that think he is devil spawn.
My Thoughts: This story was not only a masterclass in manipulation, (the manipulation of Dorian by Lord Henry) but also a moral lesson. Wilde’s book reveals the negative effects of hedonism and the consequences of indulging too much in one’s vices.
The book’s descriptive explanations about the benefits of doing whatever you want not only come off as sort of funny, they also cause you to catch yourself wanting to actually do the things that Lord Wotton describes.
This is one of my favorite classics and I’m always eager to do a reread and uncover all the references that lend themselves to a certain subtext.
Overall this story will be enjoyable to anyone who has wanted to be perfect or has obsessed over their looks, or anyone who has done none of that but still wants an interesting read.