The Picture of Dorian
Gray, by Oscar Wild, tells the story of a beautiful youth. He is happy to
be young and beautiful and live his life, until he is convinced he will be
worthless after his youth and looks fade. This young man, Dorian Gray, does not
get caught up in his own looks until he is shown a portrait of himself. When he
was first shown this picture, “A look of joy came into her eyes, as if he had
recognized himself for the first time. He stood there motionless and in wonder”
(24). Dorian is mesmerized by the
image of himself. It is easy to view this as an allusion to the story of Narcissus,
a Greek man of great beauty. The very first time Narcissus saw an image of
himself, in the manner of his reflection in a pool, he was entranced by his own
beauty. Narcissus fell in love with his own beauty and became so obsessed with
his imaged that he died because he was unable to stop gazing at his reflection.
Dorian Gray’s life parallels that of Narcissus, from the he
stands “motionless and in wonder” at his own picture, to the moment of his
death. Dorian’s downward spiral toward his death occurs because of his own
image and beauty, though he does not stay physically staring at his portrait,
he instead attempts to keep the beauty of the portrait on his actual visage,
and as the youth captured in the picture. Yet like Narcissus, Dorian dies in
front of his image.
In The Picture of
Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde includes ornate imagery, adding detail after
detail, creating an image-by-image picture of every scene for the reader.
Stylistically, this makes the writing develop like a painting. Many people
would view using prose that reflect the content of a story, in this case
painting, to add to the beauty of it, however, if Greek Philosopher Plato were
to review The Picture of Dorian Gray, he
would find the writing style to detract from the book. In Book X of his work The Republic, Plato conveys his contempt
for the artist. He expresses that the artist’s “creations have an inferior degree
of truth” (41). The inferiority of
art’s truthfulness comes from the fact that artwork is merely an imitation of
something more real.
Plato would look with scorn on Dorian Gray and Narcissus for
falling for such imitations of their beauty, however his view of Oscar Wilde
would be harsher. Wilde’s writing style, while trying to emulate painting,
becomes in Plato’s view, an imitation of an imitation. Plato would therefore believe
that only a minute amount of truth could possibly be represented in the work.
He would view Dorian as having wasted away his life with no hope of finding
truth. Plato would advise Dorian and Narcissus to leave their motionless wonder, and try to find the beauty of the real world.
I agree that both Narcissus and Dorian died in front of their images filled with love for themselves but I feel that they died for different reasons. While Narcissus was obsessed with himself so essentially starved to death Dorian was overcome with anger at his soul for ruining him and therefore essentially committed suicide by stabbing the projection of his soul. Dorian although vain thought constantly of his conscience, and less about his physical looks. He did however still use his physical looks to gain an advantage over others. Narcissus did not really come into contact with others and seemed to want to stay away from others in order to stare at himself. I also have one question and that is; do you think Plato would have looked at the picture or Dorian as the art, as Dorian was essentially a copy of himself and the painting became a truer version of Dorian?
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading this. Had I not already read Dorian Gray this would make me want to read the novel. You did a great job connecting the piece to Plato, and other discussions in class. The overall writing was great. Overall you did a very thorough job of reviewing the book!
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