The Picture of Dorian Gray is Oscar Wilde's only novel, first published in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1890 and expanded as a book in 1891. A beautiful young man wishes that his portrait would age instead of him; while he keeps his youth through years of vice, the painting records every sin. It is a masterpiece of the Gothic and of the aesthetic movement.
The story
In his London studio, the painter Basil Hallward finishes a portrait of Dorian Gray, a young man of extraordinary beauty. Lord Henry Wotton, a witty cynic, persuades Dorian that youth and pleasure are all that matter, and Dorian wishes aloud that the picture could grow old in his place.
The wish comes true. After he cruelly abandons the young actress Sibyl Vane, who then dies, Dorian notices a change in the portrait. For eighteen years he lives a hidden life of corruption while his face remains untouched and the picture, locked away in an old schoolroom, becomes hideous.
Two versions
The first version, in thirteen chapters, appeared in the July 1890 issue of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, published in Philadelphia and London. Some reviewers in Britain attacked it as immoral, and Wilde defended it in letters to the press.
For the book edition, published by Ward, Lock and Company in 1891, he expanded the novel to twenty chapters, toned down some passages and added a preface made of short, provocative aphorisms about art, first printed in the Fortnightly Review in March 1891.
Art and morality
The novel reflects the aesthetic movement, which held that art need serve no moral purpose, and the influence of the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans, whose novel À rebours is generally identified with the mysterious yellow book that fascinates Dorian.
Yet the story itself is a moral fable about the price of a double life. It has been adapted many times for stage and screen, notably in a 1945 Hollywood film whose colour shots of the portrait stand out in a black-and-white film.
Anecdotes
A novel in the witness box
In 1895, when Wilde sued the Marquess of Queensberry for libel, Queensberry's lawyer, Edward Carson, read passages of The Picture of Dorian Gray in court and questioned Wilde about the novel's morality, using it against him.
Portrait sittings
Wilde said that the idea of the novel came to him while a painter friend was making his portrait; looking at the finished picture, he remarked how sad it was that the sitter would grow old while the painting stayed young. The story is told in several versions and cannot be checked.
Frequently asked questions
Is The Picture of Dorian Gray Wilde's only novel?
Yes. Wilde also wrote plays, fairy tales, poems and essays, but this is his only novel.
When was The Picture of Dorian Gray published?
First in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in July 1890, then in a revised and expanded book edition in 1891.
Who are the main characters of Dorian Gray?
Dorian Gray, the painter Basil Hallward, the witty Lord Henry Wotton and the young actress Sibyl Vane.