Nicholas Frankel

The Picture of Dorian Gray is an irresistible novel for someone like me. It just has so many of the things I most dearly adore: fin-de-siècle Decadence, eros, Dandyism, extended meditations on the nature of Beauty -- and all of these brimming with Wilde's signature wit. It's not a perfect novel by any means, and many parts of its story could be done better, but it is a singular and efficiently rendered tale, and one that every English reader should most certainly get to at some point.

Harvard University Press's publication of The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray not only restores the novel to its purest, most unadulterated form (working off of the original typescript that Wilde sent to his magazine publisher), it also supplies simply one of the best editions of the work currently available. Though lacking the marginal accoutrements of its original hardcover edition, this paperback printing includes the original's fantastic general and textual introductions, a selection of its notes, and is handsomely typeset besides. The text itself is identical to the hardcover's, and of course version provides the best insight into Wilde's original vision of the work and intended treatment of its themes (if you're into that sort of thing). And don't fear: it is not some mere scholarly trifle: The Uncensored Picture is a stunning novel even if you haven't read any of the other versions -- as, indeed, was the case with me.… (more)