The Picture of Dorian Gray

is a novel by Oscar_Wilde first published in 1890.

Summary

Dorian_Gray is a very handsome young man living in England. His artist friend, Basil Hallward, is obsessed with his beauty and paints a perfect portrait of him. Dorian sees the finished painting and wishes that the picture would grow old and ugly instead of him - so he would stay just as the picture looks and the picture would look like him. Lord Henry, another friend of Basil, talks to him about Dorian, and influences Dorian to do many of the things he will. Dorian falls in love with the acting of an actress, Sibyl Vane. She loves him back, but being in love makes her act badly. He rejects her, and she commits suicide. After this, Dorian notices that his painting has a sneer on it, so he locks it in an unused room. Over eighteen years, Dorian becomes more and more evil, but looks the same as always, while his painting has become ugly and distorted. Dorian eventually kills Basil for discovering his secret. Dorian feels guilty over this, and goes to an opium parlor to lose himself. There, he sees Sibyl's brother, who tries to kill him, but he escapes. Later, the brother is accidentally killed by some hunters. Dorian decides to make up for the past life and become a new man, but with the help of his painting, he realizes he is just a hypocrite. He stabs the painting. His maids hear a crash, and goes to see what happened. The painting is just like it was when it was painted, and Dorian is lying stabbed on the floor, looking like an old, ugly man.

Other references

  • Dorian Gray was later reincarnated in "Dorian" by Will_Self.
  • The book was parodied in ''The_Green_Carnation'' by Stanley_Hichen.
  • The character also featured in the 2003 motion_picture ''The_League_of_Extraordinary_Gentlemen''.
  • The 1945 film version was nominated for several Academy_Awards and starred Peter_Lawford and Angela_Lansbury.

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    Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled
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