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The Picture of Dorian Gray
Basil Hallward painted a picture of a young Dorian Gray, he admires. Dorian is angry because he will grow old and the picture will stay the same. He wishes that the picture would age instead of him. He buys the picture and he hides it. The years pass and Dorian never seems to age. But his wish has tragic consequences for many people.
198 pages, Paperback
Published June 29, 2005
2 people are currently reading
70 people want to read
About the author
Oscar Wilde
5,492 books38.8k followersOscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is best remembered for his epigrams and plays, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, and his criminal conviction for gross indecency for homosexual acts.
Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. In his youth, Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, he read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.
Wilde tried his hand at various literary activities: he wrote a play, published a book of poems, lectured in the United States and Canada on "The English Renaissance" in art and interior decoration, and then returned to London where he lectured on his American travels and wrote reviews for various periodicals. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversational skill, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day. At the turn of the 1890s, he refined his ideas about the supremacy of art in a series of dialogues and essays, and incorporated themes of decadence, duplicity, and beauty into what would be his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Wilde returned to drama, writing Salome (1891) in French while in Paris, but it was refused a licence for England due to an absolute prohibition on the portrayal of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Undiscouraged, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London.
At the height of his fame and success, while An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) were still being performed in London, Wilde issued a civil writ against John Sholto Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. The libel hearings unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest and criminal prosecution for gross indecency with other males. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and so a retrial was ordered. In the second trial Wilde was convicted and sentenced to two years' hard labour, the maximum penalty, and was jailed from 1895 to 1897. During his last year in prison he wrote De Profundis (published posthumously in abridged form in 1905), a long letter that discusses his spiritual journey through his trials and is a dark counterpoint to his earlier philosophy of pleasure. On the day of his release, he caught the overnight steamer to France, never to return to Britain or Ireland. In France and Italy, he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life.
Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. In his youth, Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, he read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.
Wilde tried his hand at various literary activities: he wrote a play, published a book of poems, lectured in the United States and Canada on "The English Renaissance" in art and interior decoration, and then returned to London where he lectured on his American travels and wrote reviews for various periodicals. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversational skill, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day. At the turn of the 1890s, he refined his ideas about the supremacy of art in a series of dialogues and essays, and incorporated themes of decadence, duplicity, and beauty into what would be his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Wilde returned to drama, writing Salome (1891) in French while in Paris, but it was refused a licence for England due to an absolute prohibition on the portrayal of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Undiscouraged, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London.
At the height of his fame and success, while An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) were still being performed in London, Wilde issued a civil writ against John Sholto Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. The libel hearings unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest and criminal prosecution for gross indecency with other males. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and so a retrial was ordered. In the second trial Wilde was convicted and sentenced to two years' hard labour, the maximum penalty, and was jailed from 1895 to 1897. During his last year in prison he wrote De Profundis (published posthumously in abridged form in 1905), a long letter that discusses his spiritual journey through his trials and is a dark counterpoint to his earlier philosophy of pleasure. On the day of his release, he caught the overnight steamer to France, never to return to Britain or Ireland. In France and Italy, he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
February 3, 2020
A simplest version of The Picture of Dorian Gray for english language students. It's nice :)
November 13, 2023
I'll start this review by saying that I have not read the full version of this story yet, but I'm planning to do so very soon. This one is a shorter version. I wanted to read The Picture of Dorian Gray for years and years, but I never did. This year, I finally made a decision and read it.
Dorian Gray was a young, handsome man with blonde hair and blue eyes. At the beginning, he radiated the innocent nature of a confused boy who doesn't really know what life is just yet. He doesn't know what to look out for or who he really is. For me, I notice that he was very naive, very trusting, and easily influenced by people around him, especially older people.
When Dorian Gray gets told to enjoy life and enjoy being young and beautiful, I feel like he gets this sort of boost of ego that isn't really healthy for a young man like him. He definitely took it the wrong way. Dorian had no idea what happiness meant, what being kind was, how he should express love, or how to control his negative emotions.
Throughout the story, I also noticed that in some parts he did actually try to be good to the women he met or his old friends, but once again, he had no idea what 'good' meant or how to express it. Dorian is someone who, if I had to describe him in one word, it would definitely be 'lost'. Of course he did horrible things; he was cruel to someone he thought he loved; he was cruel to his friends and everyone else, but on the other hand, he didn't know any better.
Being an orphan without parents to tell you why this thing is probably wrong is definitely hard. Dorian listened to someone who he thought had more experience with life and got easily consumed and manipulated without knowing.
The painting itself definitely gave him a glimpse of the person he was supposed to be and what his actions were. He definitely wanted to be kind; he hated the painting and his actions, but Dorian had no idea how to be kind or anything positive that would result in him actually changing his personality.
In some parts, it was really hard to try and believe that Dorian is capable of being kind to people around him. He was very selfish and cruel at times, and it was interesting to see him slowly changing because of the constant reminder of his not-so-pretty painting that he was trying to hide.
This story definitely shows that looks do not actually matter. The painting shows what's actually inside—what you try to hide, just like Dorian did when he placed a cloth over it. Your actions will change not only your surroundings but also you from the inside, which is shown through the painting as an actual object in reality.
I will definitely rate this 3/5 just because it's a shorter version of the original novel, which I will read in the future and review as well.
Dorian Gray was a young, handsome man with blonde hair and blue eyes. At the beginning, he radiated the innocent nature of a confused boy who doesn't really know what life is just yet. He doesn't know what to look out for or who he really is. For me, I notice that he was very naive, very trusting, and easily influenced by people around him, especially older people.
When Dorian Gray gets told to enjoy life and enjoy being young and beautiful, I feel like he gets this sort of boost of ego that isn't really healthy for a young man like him. He definitely took it the wrong way. Dorian had no idea what happiness meant, what being kind was, how he should express love, or how to control his negative emotions.
Throughout the story, I also noticed that in some parts he did actually try to be good to the women he met or his old friends, but once again, he had no idea what 'good' meant or how to express it. Dorian is someone who, if I had to describe him in one word, it would definitely be 'lost'. Of course he did horrible things; he was cruel to someone he thought he loved; he was cruel to his friends and everyone else, but on the other hand, he didn't know any better.
Being an orphan without parents to tell you why this thing is probably wrong is definitely hard. Dorian listened to someone who he thought had more experience with life and got easily consumed and manipulated without knowing.
The painting itself definitely gave him a glimpse of the person he was supposed to be and what his actions were. He definitely wanted to be kind; he hated the painting and his actions, but Dorian had no idea how to be kind or anything positive that would result in him actually changing his personality.
In some parts, it was really hard to try and believe that Dorian is capable of being kind to people around him. He was very selfish and cruel at times, and it was interesting to see him slowly changing because of the constant reminder of his not-so-pretty painting that he was trying to hide.
This story definitely shows that looks do not actually matter. The painting shows what's actually inside—what you try to hide, just like Dorian did when he placed a cloth over it. Your actions will change not only your surroundings but also you from the inside, which is shown through the painting as an actual object in reality.
I will definitely rate this 3/5 just because it's a shorter version of the original novel, which I will read in the future and review as well.
June 16, 2023
3.5, chce przeczytac oryginalna wersje!!
August 10, 2025
La trama enganxa com cap, malgrat que sigui una mica previsible. És una molt bona història. Venen moltes ganes de llegir l'original...
May 5, 2011
one of nice books I'm scared to read at night. silly me...
October 21, 2020
Thought provoking. Terryfing. Beautiful. EVEN FUNNY!
Probably the best book I've read for my english class and a new favourite.
Probably the best book I've read for my english class and a new favourite.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews