The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890)

Dorian Gray, a young Narcissus, has everything he desires; he has wealth, power, and friends who want to be in his company. After a friend paints his portrait, he bemoans the fact that his painting will always display a youthful visage while he will age.

"I'm am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must lose?"

Unaware of what he is doing, Dorian makes a Faustian pact:

"If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!"

When he falls for a young ingenue actress and she for him, but later spurns her affections and breaks off an unpending marriage, he notice a slight change in his portrait. Is he imagining the alteration?

For those who are familiar with the story, you know a change in the painting has occurred and with each subsequent sin, it continues to transmorgrify.

Although works of literature considered classics don't always hold the test of time in my humble opinion, this short literary classic was easily readable. Oscar Wilde's prose captured and entranced me as I turned pages to read about the continued degredation of the narrator. ( )

Art(ifice) does not create a new world within oneself; it creates a new chaos. ( )

Very witty! ( )

4.75

I very much enjoyed this story. I practically read it in one sitting. I loved the style and it was very engaging. The vocabulary was great, I particularly liked how often the author used the word “myriad” as it is one of my favourite words. I disagreed with a few of the social opinions expressed in this novel, but it was written over 100 years ago. ( )

on El Retrato de Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde incursiona por primera vez en el género de la novela. Su prosa refinada, irónica, abundante en cuentos, ensayos, poemas y comedias dramáticas, sintetiza en esta obra su singular dandismo y el sentido estético de su personalidad. Para Wilde la esencia del arte es la belleza, y lo expresa lúcidamente en el prefacio del libro cuando dice que «el artista es el creador de cosas bellas. Revelar el arte y ocultar al artista es la finalidad del arte».

En este maravilloso relato, agudo y siniestro el curso de la naturaleza humana es implacable como el tiempo, e ir contra ellos puede costar la vida. El tema de encontrar la eterna juventud a cambio de ceder el alma al diablo, o al espíritu del mal, lo hallamos también en Fausto de Goethe. ( )