Items related to Picture of Dorian Gray
Synopsis
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Review
A lush, cautionary tale of a life of vileness and deception or a loving portrait of the aesthetic impulse run rampant? Why not both? After Basil Hallward paints a beautiful, young man's portrait, his subject's frivolous wish that the picture change and he remain the same comes true. Dorian Gray's picture grows aged and corrupt while he continues to appear fresh and innocent. After he kills a young woman, "as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife," Dorian Gray is surprised to find no difference in his vision or surroundings. "The roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as happily in my garden."
As Hallward tries to make sense of his creation, his epigram-happy friend Lord Henry Wotton encourages Dorian in his sensual quest with any number of Wildean paradoxes, including the delightful "When we are happy we are always good, but when we are good we are not always happy." But despite its many languorous pleasures, The Picture of Dorian Gray is an imperfect work. Compared to the two (voyeuristic) older men, Dorian is a bore, and his search for ever new sensations far less fun than the novel's drawing-room discussions. Even more oddly, the moral message of the novel contradicts many of Wilde's supposed aims, not least "no artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style." Nonetheless, the glamour boy gets his just deserts. And Wilde, defending Dorian Gray, had it both ways: "All excess, as well as all renunciation, brings its own punishment."
From the Publisher
Oscar Wilde's only published full length novel, is the story of a man who sells his soul for eternal youth. In exchange, what does he give up and what does he gain? This novel, by Wilde is a wonderful soul-searching example of the cost of paradise, and the price of a wish.
Read by actor, comedian, novelist, journalist, screenwriter Stephen Fry, Dorian Gray's dilemma comes alive. He has also acted in a variety of films including A Fish Called Wanda, Peter's Friends, and The Wind in the Willows.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherModern Library
- Publication date1985
- ISBN 10 0394605144
- ISBN 13 9780394605142
- BindingHardcover
- LanguageEnglish
- Edition number1
- Number of pages248
- Rating
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Picture of Dorian Gray
Seller: ThriftBooks-Dallas, Dallas, TX, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 0.85. Seller Inventory # G0394605144I4N00
Quantity: 1 available
Stock Image
Picture of Dorian Gray
Seller: ThriftBooks-Atlanta, AUSTELL, GA, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. Missing dust jacket; May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 0.85. Seller Inventory # G0394605144I4N01
Quantity: 1 available
Stock Image
Picture of Dorian Gray
Published by
Modern Library, New York, 1985
ISBN 10: 0394605144
ISBN 13: 9780394605142
Used
Hardcover
Seller: Sea Chest Books, Tucumcari, NM, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Fine. Alcorn, Stephen (illustrator). First Thus. First Modern Library edition. Small book of brown boards with gilt on the spine and black modern library symbol of running person with streamers centered on front cover. Very good plus condition with some wear along the bottom edge. The dust jacket is in fine condition with a jacket protector. Wilde's classic allegorical novel about a young man whose "moral disintegration is reflected by changes in a portait of him painted when he was young and innocent". When he sees it, it leads to further disintegration, violence and death, as the portrait return to its original vision of innocence. 248 pp. Seller Inventory # 008629
Quantity: 1 available