Artists and Their Muses in Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray and Woolf's To the Lighthouse

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Both Oscar Wilde and Virginia Woolf’s novels depict the image of an artist and their muse. Within The Picture of Dorian Gray, Basil Hallward is inspired by Dorian Gray to create his greatest work of art. While in To the Lighthouse, Lily Briscoe finds her inspiration through Mrs. Ramsay and through her art she is able to blossom into her own woman. Briscoe grows through her art while Hallward is killed because of his masterpiece. The fates of the two artists differ so vastly because of how each artist envisions the idea of legacy and how they connect to their own muse.

To the Lighthouse and The Picture of Dorian Gray both present the dichotomy of legacy into male and female legacy. The women within Virginia Woolf’s novel come to see legacy as the “little daily miracles” of life (Woolf 161). Mrs. Ramsay is remembered for the small things she did such as the dinner she arranged in the first section of the novel and the time she spent with her children. Lily also addresses this idea at the end of the novel when she finally finishes her painting. Lily talks about how “[her painting] would be hung in attics” how “it would be destroyed” and she concludes “But what did that matter?” (208). Lilly is not worried about the future of this painting. She has a feeling of self-satisfaction with her painting and knows that everything comes to an end. She is happy with the small moment where she completed her painting and she sees her painting as he little personal legacy. While the women of the novel focus on the small moments within life Mr. Ramsay focuses on the larger idea of a legacy. He desires a legacy that will surpass time and spread throughout the world. Within the novel Mr. Ramsay debates on his potential to achieve his extravagant...

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...). At the end of the novel Lily is able to finally create her own image of Mrs. Ramsay and have a deeper understanding of her muse.

Lily creates a work of art that will not transcend time, but through her experience with Mrs. Ramsay she is able to become a New Woman born from an integral connection with the Ruskinian wife. Lily is able to appreciate the ways of the Ruskinian woman even when she does not desire those ideals for herself. While Lily grows through her art Basil remains static and fails to comprehend the destruction that his veneration of Dorian Gray causes. Basil’s failure as an artist can be seen through his untimely death. Lily’s art may not be considered a great masterpiece, but she is the character who lives. Lily’s success not only shows her as the triumphal artist, but it also illustrates the victory of the feminine over the masculine.

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