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Picture of Dorian Grey Pack (Oxford Bookworms Library)

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Picture of Dorian Grey Pack (Oxford Bookworms Library)

Manufacturer: Oxford University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0194237109

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'When we are happy, we are always good', says Lord Henry, 'but when we are good, we are not always happy.' Lord Henry's lazy, clever words lead the young Dorian Gray into a world where it is better to be beautiful than to be good; a world where anything can be forgiven - even murder - if it can make people laugh at a dinner party.

Retrato Deo Dorian Grey / Picture of Dorian Gray

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Retrato Deo Dorian Grey / Picture of Dorian Gray
Oscar Wilde
Manufacturer: Grupo Editorial Norma
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Collected Classics, Vol. 3: Emma- Far from the Madding Crowd, The Locked Room and Other Horror Stores, The Mill on the Floss, The Picture of Dorian Grey (Penguin Readers, Level 4)

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Collected Classics, Vol. 3: Emma- Far from the Madding Crowd, The Locked Room and Other Horror Stores, The Mill on the Floss, The Picture of Dorian Grey (Penguin Readers, Level 4)
Penguin
Manufacturer: Pearson ESL
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0582343631

Picture of Dorian Grey (Classic Library)

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Picture of Dorian Grey (Classic Library)
Oscar Wilde
Manufacturer: Book Sales
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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The Picture of Dorian Grey
Oscar Wilde
Manufacturer: The Franklin Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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beautiful. and thoroughly modern.
A bit of a high horse for Wilde.
Gothic Good Fun
Classical
Facinating study of sin

The Picture of Dorian Grey
Oscar Wilde
Manufacturer: Books On Tape
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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The Importance of Being Earnest (Dover Thrift Editions)
Dracula (Signet Classics)
Frankenstein (Bantam Classics)
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Dover Thrift Editions)
Crime and Punishment (Penguin Popular Classics)

ASIN: 5557018719

Amazon.com

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."

Book Description

Oscar Wilde's story of a fashionable young man who sells his soul for eternal youth and beauty is one of his most popular works. Written in Wilde's characteristically dazzling manner, full of stinging epigrams and shrewd observations, the tale of Dorian Gray's moral disintegration caused something of a scandal when it first appeared in 1890. Wilde was attacked for his decadence and corrupting influence, and a few years later the book and the aesthetic/moral dilemma it presented became issues in the trials occasioned by Wilde's homosexual liaisons, trials that resulted in his imprisonment. Of the book's value as autobiography, Wilde noted in a letter, "Basil Hallward is what I think I am: Lord Henry what the world thinks me: Dorian what I would like to be--in other ages, perhaps."

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Dorian Gray has just had his portrait painted. It is a perfect likeness of the quite extraordinary beautiful young man, and it prompts him to make a mad wish for eternal youth. In the years to come, he devotes his public life to and aestheticism-and his private one to decadence and debauchery.

Customer Reviews:

beautiful. and thoroughly modern........2007-06-19

this is one of the most accessible period novels i've ever read. the style of the storytelling is very conversational... indeed sometimes it seems like the main point is to showcase the conversations, especially the ones with Lord Henry in them, who is very quotable. i read that oscar wilde used to think of his witticisms ahead of time and then try to steer the conversations to a place where he could say them in public, and i guess there's no conversation more artfully directed where you want it than one you write yourself.

the basic story is one that most people know before they pick up the book, but the descriptive style and the snappy dialogue are interesting enough that it doesn't matter. the only real flaw is that it seems like a lot of the book is missing towards the end... the story wraps up a little too quickly and the descriptions of dorian's descent into depravity is really beautiful but also incredibly vague and so that kind of helps to flatten the pacing near the end.

overall i'd highly recommend this book, especially for lazy-reading. it has that kind of dreamlike quality to it.

A bit of a high horse for Wilde........2007-05-21

Dorian Gray is very good novel, but it suffers from soapbox syndrome. The writing is accessible, even to those who tend to dislike more old-styled English writing, and the plot is certainly among the greatest ideas in literature. However, the character of Lord Henry, who carries a great deal of the novel, often goes on seemingly unending rants of his views on life and they bring the book down quite a bit. With these discourses, the book loses development in favor of pseudo-philosophy in a clever if rough attempt to both attract and repulse the reader. There is a mid-chapter in the book that describes the middle of Dorian's life that is absolute work to make your way through. The philosophy of the book is important of course, but it's much better when the story lends itself for the purpose. Overall, for the brilliance of the idea of the story; it's required reading.

Gothic Good Fun.......2007-04-03

Wilde's literary genious is evident throughout. It is written in a very cinematic style - quite visual and rich in detail. Drinched in symbolism and societal insights, you feel as though you are a painting yourself watching the story unfold - - - You can almost smell the musty English drapes, see the grandiose rooms with chairs so thick with dust that a poof rises gently in the air when you sit upon them. Thought provoking and grim. Masterful

Classical.......2007-03-22

The Picture of Dorian Gray will eternally go down as a classic.
This novel - whether you are reading it word by word or reading it knowing the historical background and many many illusions thrown throughout the novel - will appeal to you.
From the beginning to the end this novel is amazing. It makes you contimplate your interior wishes. The ending is shocking - which just puts another tally for "classic".
If you are looking for a classical novel that you can read over and over again and spend hours discussing it (either with people or just personal contimplations), I recommend The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Facinating study of sin.......2007-03-15

This book surprised me with its Gothic horror and surprising plot twists toward the end. This novel, for all its horrible philosophy on life, captures in a poignant way a lost person's search for fulfillment. Despite his indulgent quest for all kinds of pleasure, Dorian is still unfulfilled and in one of the most captivating passages of the book turns to opium to forget life. His descent into the opium den is characterized as a descent into hell, a personal hell which he has brought himself to and in which everyone sees through him and is against him.

Though I wasn't a big fan at the beginning, as the book progressed I think it may have become one of the most memorable books I've read. The theme of the book is sin - its putrefying effect both on the sinner and those around him. One of the best moments of the book and one that sticks vividly in my mind is towards the end, when Dorian, sick of seeing his portrait so mangled and distorted by the sins he has already committed, does a "good deed" in order to try to start to clean it up. He races up the stairs, unlocks the secret room where his portrait is hidden, throws back the cover, and is faced with the same ugliness that had been there before. Then he is faced with a horrible realization of truth: because he had done the "good deed" out of motivation of making his own portrait/soul look better, he hadn't done a "good deed" at all and was now so deep in his depravity that even what he calls love has been warped into an all-encompassing egotism.

Dorian's egotism gets progressively deeper. throughout the book. As Lord Henry says, It begins as innocent narcissism, but as it grows it begins to shunt blame for the sin of others and even motivates the good he does at the end of the book. Rather than his heavy sins bothering Dorian, "it was the living death of his own soul that troubled him" (226). His breakup with the young country girl was motivated more out of a desire to cleanse his portrait from its grime than any love for her, "for in hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's sake he had tried the denial of self" (228). Being able to view his sin on the portrait in a sense made it more difficult to be selfless - "nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all" (106) - and Dorian recognized this difficulty.

The idea of pleasure in Dorian Gray is portrayed as a goal to pursue but never reach. "A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied" (84). Despite Dorian's pursuit of pleasure (and pleasure of the most exquisite kind) he ends us dissatisfied and empty, jaded to the idea of the fullness of life. He is encouraged on by the influence of Lord Henry, who gives advice such as: "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it," (21) and "sin is the only real color-element left in modern life" (31). Dorian is quickly influenced by Lord Henry's philosophy, aping to everyone else Lord Henry's views and words and acting out on them by plunging into the pits of hedonism.

The portrait itself is a mirror of Dorian's soul. It was a "visible emblem of conscience" (96). As Lord Henry's pleasure seeking philosophy takes hold in Dorian's mind, he sees that "eternal youth, infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder sins - he was to have all of these things. The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame; that was all" (109). However, in with a horrible fascination, Dorian "grew more and more enamored of his own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul" (131) for "what the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on the canvas. They would mar its beauty, and eat away its grace. They would defile it, and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still live on. It would be always alive" (122). Even though "the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing away" (161) the portrait held on to its life of decay, just as Dorian held on to pleasure, refusing to be cleansed and beautiful again until Dorian's death.

Quotes:
"She was free in her prison of passion" (65).
"She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy" (49).
"There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about" (4).
"Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own life - that is the important thing" (82).
"And how horribly real ugliness made things!" (128)

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The Picture of Dorian Grey
Oscar Wilde
Manufacturer: Illustrated Editions Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Dorian : A Sequel to the Picture of Dorian Grey

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Dorian : A Sequel to the Picture of Dorian Grey
Jeremy Reed
Manufacturer: Peter Owen Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000HMY6Z6

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