The Conscience of Dorian Gray in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Conscience of Dorian Gray in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray

Much of the criticism regarding The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde has dealt with Dorian Gray’s relation to his own portrait (Raby 392). While some may argue that the portrait represents a reflection of Dorian Gray’s character, this is only a superficial analysis of the novel and Dorian’s character. While Dorian Gray’s true character never changes, it is his own perception of his character (his conscience) that is reflected in the changing face of his portrait. In essence Dorian’s picture becomes a mirror through which the "true Dorian" judges his own metamorphasis as the superficial "Lord Henry Dorian" attempts to embrace Lord Henry’s teachings. Dorian’s duality of character causes a constant internal struggle within him, ultimately culminating in his own suicide.

Initially, Lord Henry’s doctrine of "new Hedonism" contrasts sharply with Dorian’s youthful innocence and passions. These initial feelings are the reader’s first and clearest experience with the soon to be repressed "true Dorian." The terminology, however, does not imply that Dorian has never been influenced before. This unblemished character simply represents Dorian’s self at the start of the novel, a state which he accepts as his own and is able to find peace in. From this first conversation, Dorian’s peace begins shatter when he learns of Lord Henry’s philosophy and its implications for his own life. Dorian is described as a "brainless, beautiful creature" (3), appropriate since all Dorian has at this stage in the novel is his own initial, untainted feelings. Thus this "pre-Henry" stage is the only time in the novel at which Dorian expresses his "true self" outwardly. This "brai...

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...he Picture of Dorian Gray: A Norton Critical Edition. Ed. Lawler, Donald L. (1988). 405-412.

Raby, Peter. Oscar Wilde. (1980): 164. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. DiMauro, Laurie. Vol. 41. Detroit: Gale, 1991. 392-397.

Spivey, Ted R. "Oscar Wilde and the Tragedy of Symbolism." The Journey Beyond Tragedy. (1980): 57-71. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. DiMauro, Laurie. Vol. 41. Detroit: Gale, 1991. 501-502.

Summers, Claude J. "In Such Surrender There May Be Gain’: Oscar Wilde and the Beginnings of Gay Fiction." Gay Fictions: Wilde to Stonewall, Studies in a Male Homosexual Literary Tradition. (1990): 29-61. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. DiMauro, Laurie. Vol. 41. Detroit: Gale, 1991. 398-401.

Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray: Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.