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Q 21 ) Explain the causes of the movement of Aestheticism in Victoria England

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Q 21 ) Explain the causes of the movement of Aestheticism in Victoria England

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The movement of Aestheticism, along with Symbolism, started in Ireland in 1865 with its main exponent, William Butler Yeats. The father to this movement is considered Walter Pater and the last main aesthetic exponent of English Aestheticism was certainly Oscar Wild. Aestheticism is characteristic of the Victorian Age because it was developed as a reaction to the ugly industrial city and the hypocrisy typical of this Age. This characteristic consist that the behaviors of the aristocratic is divided in two different way. This movement indeed consists in the vision of the art like an independent thing, without any connection with their age. Aestheticism is for few cultivated and intellectuals artists, so the Elite; it exalts beauty and art for the art's sake, imposing to base human life only on beauty.

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Q 13) “The Picture of Dorian Gray” there are many references to the theme of the double. Explain how this theme is dealt with in the novel?

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Q 13) “The Picture of Dorian Gray” there are many references to the theme of the double. Explain how this theme is dealt with in the novel?

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In the novel "The Picture of Dorian Gray" there are many references to the theme of the double in fact Dorian's bad conscience is represented by his picture. The picture is not an autonomous self: it stands for the dark side of Dorian's personality.
The Picture is a symbol of Victorian hypocrisy: while from the outside Dorian remains beautiful and untouched by the bad actions he has commited, the picture gets ugly and corrupted. This is why Dorian must keep it hidden.
Whenever Dorian does a bad deed, a new trait appears on the evil portrait.
The theme of the double can be found throughout the whole novel and in particular in the final chapter, in which the story reaches its climax in an unexpected and dramatic way.
Dorian's dreadful metamorphosis does not consist in sincere repentance because in Dorian finds an excuse for all of them. He in fact says that the murders had been simply the madness of a moment. This theme becomes evident in the final chapter, when the protagonist stabs his picture and dies, showing that they were two sides of the same being.

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Q.18 In the Preface to “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, Oscar Wilde states that “there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book” . Why?

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Q.18 In the Preface to “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, Oscar Wilde states that “there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book” . Why?

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“The Picture of Dorian Gray” was written by Oscar Wilde in 1891. In the Preface to the novel, the author stated that ‘There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all’. So he wanted to say that “any moral disgust or vicarious pleasure derived from reading his book reflects more upon us as readers than it does on the novel itself”. The book is a tale, pure and simple.
Wilde explained his concept of art and the artist: the artist is the creator of beautiful things and the aim of art is to reveal itself, but also to conceal the artist, who does not desire to prove anything and should not have ethical sympathies but he can express anything. Art is quite useless and it doesn’t mirror life but rather its spectator. The Preface expresses Wilde’s view of art as the cult of beauty, which could prevent the death of the soul. From Oscar Wilde’s point of view, the art doesn’t need to teach all the rules, but everyone can interpret what they see or hear the way they want.
Wilde was inspired by the Renaissance idea of the correspondence between the physical and the spiritual realms. According to tradition, beautiful people are believed to be moral people and the ugly people are believed to be immoral people; but Wilde makes a variation on this theme, which can be found in the use of the magic portrait. The picture is not an autonomous self: it is the dark side of Dorian’s personality,, which he tries to forget by locking it in a room on the upper floor.
The moral of this novel is that every excess must be punished and reality cannot be escaped; when Dorian destroys the pictures, he cannot avoid the punishment for all his sins, which is death. The horrible corrupted picture could be seen as a symbol of the immorality and bad conscience of the Victorian middle class: Dorian’s corrupted soul and his pure innocent appearance in the picture are symbols of bourgeois hypocrisy. Finally, when the picture is restored to its original beauty, this illustrates Wilde’s theories of art: art survives people, art is eternal!

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N3 "The Picture of Dorian Gray" presents some Gothic elements. Explain

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N3 "The Picture of Dorian Gray" presents some Gothic elements. Explain

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“The Picture of Dorian Gray” presents some Gothic elements, in particular as regards the setting and the presence of an evil force that will lead Dorian into a life of sins and debauchery.
Although there is no mentioning of stormy nights and bad weather, the novel is set in the city of London and often takes the reader to the most vicious, mysterious places, like brothels and opium dens where crime and sins are spread.
Moreover, the novel deals with theme of the dualilty of man. Dorian Gray's personality has in fact two sides: one is neat and respectable while the other is hidden and corrupt. The magical device that Oscar Wilde introduces in the novel consists in the pact that the protagonist makes with the devil in order to remain forever young and beautiful.
The picture is the mirror of Dorian's soul, which records all wrong actions and sins that he commits. The novel presents various characters who will be murdered or induced to commit suicide, like Sibyl Vane, Basil Halward, Alan Campbell. They are presented like victims of Dorian's dissolute life and recklessness.
The novel ends with Dorian's death: when the protagonist understands that the painting has become the image of his evil soul and that there is no hope of salvation for him, he stabs the portrait and dies. Also the suspense through the final is revealed is typical of Gothic novels.

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Lord Henry Wotton temps Dorian Gray by persuading him that he is young and beautiful but these qualities will not last forever. He explains that when Dorian is old, he will lose the most important things in life: beauty and the desire to live in full. At this point in the novel, Dorian is totally seduced by Lord Henry and his theories about Hedonism and Aestheticism. In fact, when his portrait is revealed, he makes that terrible wish. He would be willing to sell his soul in exchange of eternal youth and beauty. Later, Dorian will however feel nostalgia for his pure boyhood when he refers to this period of his life as a rose-white, unspoilt age. In the scene in Basil's study, when Dorian first sees his picture, he says that he would give everything to remain young in eternity. This wish sounds like a Faustian pact with the devil, which is very similar to the one made by two other symbols of the double in the characters of Dr. Jekill and Dr Frankenstein. Dorian's terrible wish works out like a magical spell, which changes his mind and becomes visible through the horrible actions that he will commit, like the painter's murder, the doctor's suicide and seduction of several young girls. These actions are reflected in the ugliness of the portrait which reflects Dorian's corrupted soul. The picture becomes Dorian's obsession and produces in the character of Dorian a sense of desire for purification. He in fact starts to hate the picture and sees youth and beauty as the main causes of his ruin. When Dorian recognizes that repetence was for him a pure illusion, he decides to destroy the picture but this causes his own death, because Dorian and his picture are two sides of the same personality. The picture is not an autonomous object and by stabbing it, Dorian actually kills himself. In this novel Watton results as a tempter and represents the evil forces that lead the main character, Dorian, on the wrong path. Dorian is damnated and even if he recognizes his faults, he gets punished in the end.

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The story of Dorian Gray is profoundly allegorical. Wilde creates a correspondence between the physical and spiritual realms: beautiful people are moral people; ugly people are immoral people. This is a concept that is totally reversed in the novel. Dorian Gray remains in fact young and beautiful although he commits the worst crimes. Because of the pact he has made with the devil, his body remains beautiful while his soul decays. This is reflected in the picture, which is like a mirror of his corrupted soul. The picture of Dorian Gray stands for the dark side of Dorian's personality, which he tries to forget by locking it up in a room. The horrible corrupting picture could be seen as a symbol of the Victorian middle and upper classes, while Dorian and his innocent appearance are symbols of bourgeois hypocrisy. They are in fact more interested in appearance and respectability than in the consequences of their actions.

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Q 17) “In the Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde says that “all art is quite useless”. Explain the meaning of this statement with reference to Wilde’s aesthetic ideas.”

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Q 17) “In the Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde says that “all art is quite useless”. Explain the meaning of this statement with reference to Wilde’s aesthetic ideas.”

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The Preface to “The Picture of Dorian” was added by Oscar Wilde to the first publication of the novel in book form in official reply to the scandal that the novel had provoked. In the Preface, Wilde does not give any explanations about the book but he presents the characteristics of the Aesthetic Movement and the importance of art in our life and society.
Wilde criticises the hypocrisy of Victorian intellectuals, who on the one hand dislike Romanticism for its sentimentalism since - as Wilde says - they cannot recognize themselves in it; on the other hand they reject Realism because they are forced to see their real face in it.
The language used in the Preface is often difficult to understand, because it can lead to many interpretations. Wilde makes use of allegorical language, along with many paradoxes and aphorisms which reveal his great wit and make his message not always evident.
According to Aestheticism, only the artist can make beautiful things. Those who can find beauty in artworks are the elect. They are spiritually superior because they can go beyond the surface of the material reality and can appreciate beauty in art.
Beauty should be intensively admired only if it is useless. Those who look for utility or moral teaching in art are superficial and materialistic. According to the Aesthetic creed of "art for art's sake", art has to be intensely admired without scope. Therefore, as Wilde states in his famous aphorism “All art is quiet useless”, by which he means that art doesn’t have to teach anything or convey any special message since art lives for itself. Art survives the lives of men and deserves to be admired because it is a source of beauty and pleasure.

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Q.9 on plot: The characteristics of Lord Henry Wotton and his influences on Dorian Gray.

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Q.9 on plot: The characteristics of Lord Henry Wotton and his influences on Dorian Gray.

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Lord Henry Wotton is a typical dandy. He is a member of the Victorian upper classes. When we first meet him in Basil's study, he appears as a refined gentleman. He is lazy, spoiled and a cynical materialist. He likes to indulge in all kinds of pleasures and we see him smoking his pipe while sitting on Basil's coach. The way he speaks is full of wit and paradoxes, so that Dorian is fascinated by him.

He considers the picture of Dorian Gray simply as a portrait, without emotions.

Wotton influences Dorian, when he tells him that he is young and handsome and that, therefore, he must live his life without worries for the future. Wotton believes that youth and beauty last one season so Dorian must have lots of experiences during his life and take pleasure in the beauty of life.

His role in the novel is that of representing a tempting devil, who persuades Dorian Gray to live a dissolute life full of experiences and sins.

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Question n.11 The novel ends with Dorian's death.Why does he destroy the picture?

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Question n.11 The novel ends with Dorian's death.Why does he destroy the picture?

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"The Picture of Dorian Gray" ends with the death of the protagonist. When Dorian finally understands that there is a spell on him and that the portrait has been the cause of his moral corruption, he sees no way out and stabs the portrait.
Although he feels remorse for what he has done, Dorian is not willing to accept responsibility for his crimes. He still thinks that it was Basil's fault if his life was destroyed. Basil should never have painted the portrait and should not have followed him into the locked room. He had to kill Basil because his secret had been discovered.
Dorian justifies Basil's murder like "simply the madness of a moment". Also the suicides that other characters in the story commit, such as Sibyl Vane or Alan Campbell, are not his fault, because they had decided to kill themselves.
Dorian had even tried to repair the suffering he had caused to others with some good actions in the hope that the potrait would change and become less ugly. But the portrait does not change, because it reflects Dorian's soul, which is corrupted. Everything that he had done, was only for vanity and hypocrysy. So, when he finally realizes that there is no hope of salvation for him, he decides to destroy the portrait because it is the only evidence against him. But by stabbing the portrait, he kills himself.

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Oscar Wilde and Alfred Douglas, summer of 1893.

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An opium den in Victorian Times

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Q. 1 ) How is the story told (setting, narrators, characters)?

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Q. 1 ) How is the story told (setting, narrators, characters)?

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The novel “The picture of Dorian Gray”, written by Oscar Wilde in 1891, is set in London during the Victorian Age.
The story is told through an external, non-omniscient narrator and there are many descriptive scenes, in which the language is very figurative and rich in symbols. Wilde makes also use of direct speeches, which are often full of paradoxes and witty aphorisms.
The characters of the story are Dorian Gray, a narcissistic young man who indulges in every pleasure that life can offer and who will eventually die. Another important character is Basil Hallward, who paints the picture of Dorian Gray. Basil is a deeply moral man and will be killed by Dorian when he discovers his secret. Lord Henry Wotton is central figure in the novel. Lord Henry is an aristocrat and a decadent dandy, who persuades Dorian to follow his philosophy of self-indulgent hedonism. In the novel Wotton represents the devil because he tempts Dorian into a life of debauchery and self realization. In his view, Dorian should live his life experiencing all kinds of pleasures as a form of beauty, abandoning all moral scruples.
Sibyl Vane is an actress and a young, innocent girl that falls in love with Dorian and will kill herself, when Dorian brutally rejects her. Alan Campbell is a chemist friend of Dorian who is blackmailed by Dorian, who threatens to ruin his reputation and obliges him to cut Basil's corpe into pieces. Also Cambell will kill himself and add up to the long list of Dorian's sins.

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Q. 22) Point out a link between the story of Dorian Gray and the myth of Faust.

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Q. 22) Point out a link between the story of Dorian Gray and the myth of Faust.

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One of the themes in the novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, written by Oscar Wilde, is that of the temptation of a human being.
At the beginning of the story, while standing in front of the beautiful portrait of Dorian Gray, Lord Henry Wotton tempts Dorian by telling him that he has to live his youth in full and have plenty of experiences forgetting the moral principles of the Victorian Age. Time passes by - says Lord Henry - and Dorian will remain young and beautiful like he is in the portrait painted by Basil only for one season. Lord Henry represents here an evil force, which influences Dorian and puts a spell on him.
Dorian becomes obsessed with Wotton’s words and, being scared about this idea of losing his youth, he swears in front of his picture that he would give everything to remain young as he is now, even to the prive of his soul.
To the reader this sounds like a pact with the devil and evokes the story of Doctor Faustus who, desirous to access forbidden knowledge and an immense power, makes a pact with the Mephistophiles: he will sell his soul in exchange of 25 years of power and richness.
The theme of temptation, which is a typical Gothic element, underlines that people in general are often tempted into getting anything they want, no matter what it takes! The conclusion of the book suggests however that when you make a pact like that, the final resul will be eternal damnation.

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 Q. 14)Both in “Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde” and in “The Picture of Dorian Gray” the presence of a mirror is highly symbolical. What interpretation can be given to it?

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 Q. 14)Both in “Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde” and in “The Picture of Dorian Gray” the presence of a mirror is highly symbolical. What interpretation can be given to it?

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After drinking the potion, Dr. Jekyll starts to change both mentally and physically. His body completely changes and the elegant Victorian gentleman turns into a horrible being called Edward Hyde. After the experiment, the doctor rushes into his bedroom to watch himself in a mirror. Besides reflecting My Hyde's image, the symbol of the mirror also evokes the theme of the double, so that Mr Hyde is presented as the primitive alter-ego of the refined Victorian doctor. In the mirror Dr Jekyll sees his evil twin.
This object is used by Stevenson, to convey the sense of obsessive and horrible setting, the proper place for such a mysterious and ambiguous man. Also in the Picture of Dorian Gray there is a mirror, which the protagonist uses for checking if there have been changes to his beauty after commiting bad actions. The picture is a mirror of Dorian’s soul and of his dark, corrupted soul. He had sold it for having eternal beauty and any time he sees himself in the mirror, he admires his beauty but feels horrified by the loathsome portrait. Later Dorian will become dangerous and suspicious, but when he remains alone he understands that he has made a mistake following Henry Wotton.
Both in the novel by Stevenson and the one by Wilde, the mirror is used to introduce the theme of the double, or to create the double effect: the reflection Dr Jekyll sees in the glass is actually the subject’s alter-ego.
The mirror shows that there is much more under the surface of hypocritical, Victorian society: behind its image of triumph and economic progress, there is ugliness, corruption and moral decay which the symbol of the mirror makes evident.

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Q,10 “The world is yours for a season!” In his panegyric about the precious value of youth and beauty, Lord Henry persuades Dorian to live his life in full. Why? 

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Q,10 “The world is yours for a season!” In his panegyric about the precious value of youth and beauty, Lord Henry persuades Dorian to live his life in full. Why? 

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In the second chapter of “the Picture of Dorian Gray” Lord Henry Wotton makes his famous panegyric about the fugacity of beauty and youth.
Dorian is not conscious of his own charm, so his friend tries to make him understand that he isn’t going to live forever young. Dorian is a really handsome boy who fascinates many people but, as Lord Henry says, he will become wrinkled, old and ugly; for this reason he has to live his life in full, enjoy every moment to the end and forget about scruples or the moral principles in which Victorians believed.
This new Hedonism that Lord Henry proposes is the expression of the Aesthetic theories of Art for art's sake, which saw the cult of beauty as a possible reaction for an elite of intellectuals to the vulgarity and materialism of the Victorian Age.

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Q. 6 Describe Dorian’s reaction and feelings when he first sees the portrait made by his friend Basil Halward.

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Q. 6 Describe Dorian’s reaction and feelings when he first sees the portrait made by his friend Basil Halward.

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Basil Halward is the artist who paints the picture of the young and handsome Dorian Gray. Basil puts a lot of himself in his work of art: it in fact reveals also his secret, homosexual love for this charming boy.
When Dorian first sees the portrait, his reaction is dual: at first he draws back, his cheeks blush up and he feels overwhelmed with pleasure as if he were enchanted by his own beauty. Then, the memory of the conversation he had with Lord Henry about the fleeting youth, falls upon him suddenly: Dorian realizes the transience of his youth. He becomes aware of his own beauty but at the same time he understands that, as Lord Henry said, the world belonged to him only for one season. The terrible warning about the brevity of youth scares the boy. He realizes that there would be a day when his face would be ‘wrinkled and wizen’, his eyes dim and colourless’ and ‘the grace of his figure broken and deformed’. He thus starts to feel ‘a sharp pang of pain’, as if a knife had just pierced him and on his eyes came a mist of tears and he felt as if an icy hand had just been placed on his heart.
When Basil asks Dorian if he likes the portrait, he answers that it is sad, because his figure in the picture will remain like this forever while he will become ‘horrible and dreadful’. This leads Dorian to make that terrible wish which will be his damnation, i.e. that he would do anything if only it could be the opposite.

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Q.2) Briefly summarise the story and explain how it is
told

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Q.2) Briefly summarise the story and explain how it is
told

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"The Picture of Dorian Gray’ is a novel written by Oscar Wilde in 1890. The structure of the book is symmetrical and the story is told by a third person narrator. Chapter I introduces the story, chapters II to X cover one month, chapter XI covers eighteen years and chapters XII to XX again few weeks, until Dorian's death.
Basil Hallward is the artist who has painted the portrait of Dorian Gray. Because of the picture and under the influence of Henry Wotton's words, Dorian becomes obsessed with his beauty and youth, and he makes a wish: he would be willing to give his soul if only he could remain forever young and beautiful like in the portrait while the picture should grow old and ugly. His wish comes true.
Dorian first notices a change on it after he has brutally rejected poor Sibyl Vane, who had fallen in love with him. He found that the picture had assumed a cruel expression.
Later Dorian proceeds in his pursuit of pleasure among scandals, sins and crimes. He provokes the suicide of many people, starting from Sibyl's and the murder of the painter Basil Halward, but no signs of age or corruption mar his "marvellous visage".
Throughout the novel he seems to be protected by a supernatural and infernal power. In spite of it, Dorian feels no remorse. On the contrary, he believes that his life and the lives of his friends were ruined because of the picture.
When he finally understands that there is no remedy for his sins, he decides to stab the picture. Magically, the portrait resumes its original shape while Dorian becomes old and wrinkled. His horrible body is found dead on the floor and will be recognized only because of the rings that he was wearing.

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15) Why is the horrible, corrupting picture a symbol of the Victorian middle class? What does Dorian's image symbolize?

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15) Why is the horrible, corrupting picture a symbol of the Victorian middle class? What does Dorian's image symbolize?

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The Victorian Age was a period characterised by great progress and industrialisation. This led on the one hand to great economic development and but on the other also to a materialistic approach based on the values of Utilitarism. While the upper and middle classes enjoyed great prosperity, the lower classes lived in extreme poverty and crime was widely spread. The Victorian Age was, in fact, characterised by unrest, change and instability. The Victorian Establishment refused to admit the existence of a materialistic philosophy of life. Victorians tried to cover the unpleasant aspects of society and the ugliness of the industrial civilisation with respectability and facile optimism.
English Aestheticism with its belief in the cult of beauty was to some extent a reaction to all that.
In the novel by Oscar Wilde, the protagonist Dorian Gray tries himself to cover the umpleasant aspects of his life. The signs of his moral depravity and of the many crimes he has committed are shown only on his portrait while his body remains the same as it was when Basil painted the picture. The portrait, in fact, represents the dark side of his soul and shows all his hypocrisy. It, in fact, ages and gets ugly and corrupted instead of him.
All in all, Dorian's image symbolises the typical Victorian middle class man who tried to keep the umpleasant aspects of his life and his hypocrisy hidden and locked up away from public view.

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Q.16

The novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde deals with lots of theme which some are refers the gothic novel and other refers to the Aestheticism.
The theme of the duality is one of the gothic element in the novel and it is represented by the strong connection between the main character, an young and handsome man called Dorian Gray, and his portrait which symbolizes the dark part of his soul;
the temptation, which make a link with other novels in literature as “Doctor Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley, “Doctor Faustus” by Christopher Marlowe and “Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson, is another gothic theme and it underlines that Dorian makes a pact with the devil to remain young and handsome forever because he was tempted by Lord Henry Wotton, who in fact represents the devil in the novel.
The pursuit of pleasure in art, which means to enjoy himself seeing a painting or a sculpture, is reconnected with the characteristic of Aesthetic movement which Oscar Wilde belongs to; this movement purposes that the life have to live plenty of experience and without any moral rules, as Lord Wotton suggests to Dorian, and that people have to take pleasure standing in front of art.
In addiction Aestheticism made a strong critic against the Victorian Age, especially the hypocrisy of the people in this period.

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Q.4

In the conclusion of the novel, Dorian destroys the picture in the hope of being able to liberate himself from the evil life that he was leading and the sense of oppression that he feels. While at the beginning of the novel, Dorian was fascinated by his picture, he now hates it. He says in fact that it is because of the portrait that his life has been ruined.
Doing so he cannot avoid the punishment for all his sins, in fact tearing the picture the spell is broken and he also kills himself. This happens also because the picture is not an autonomous object, but rather the dark, inner side of himself.
The moral of this novel is that every excess must be punished and reality cannot be escaped. In the end the picture, restored to its original beauty, illustrates Wilde’s theory of art: art survives people, art is eternal.

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Concentrate on the character of Dorian Gray. How does he change through the novel?

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Concentrate on the character of Dorian Gray. How does he change through the novel?

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Lord Henry Wotton temps Dorian Gray by persuading him that he is young and beautiful but these qualities will not last forever. He explains that when Dorian is old, he will lose the most important things in life: beauty and the desire to live in full.
At this point in the novel, Dorian is totally seduced by Lord Henry and his theories about Hedonism and Aestheticism. In fact, when his portrait is revealed, he makes that terrible wish. He would be willing to sell his soul in exchange of eternal youth and beauty.
Later, Dorian will however feel nostalgia for his pure boyhood when he refers to this period of his life as a rose-white, unspoilt age.
In the scene in Basil's study, when Dorian first sees his picture, he says that he would give everything to remain young in eternity. This wish sounds like a Faustian pact with the devil, which is very similar to the one made by two other symbols of the double in the characters of Dr. Jekill and Dr Frankenstein. Dorian's terrible wish works out like a magical spell, which changes his mind and becomes visible through the horrible actions that he will commit, like the painter's murder, the doctor's suicide and seduction of several young girls.
These actions are reflected in the ugliness of the portrait which reflects Dorian's corrupted soul. The picture becomes Dorian's obsession and produces in the character of Dorian a sense of desire for purification. He in fact starts to hate the picture and sees youth and beauty as the main causes of his ruin.
When Dorian recognizes that repetence was for him a pure illusion, he decides to destroy the picture but this causes his own death, because Dorian and his picture are two sides of the same personality. The picture is not an autonomous object and by stabbing it, Dorian actually kills himself.
In this novel Watton results as a tempter and represents the evil forces that lead the main character, Dorian, on the wrong path. Dorian is damnated and even if he recognizes his faults, he gets punished in the end.

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Q.8

Lord Henry Wotton is a Victorian aristocrat. He is a friend to
painter Basil Hallward, but later becomes more intrigued with
Dorian's beauty.

He's seen as a critique of Victorian culture at the
end of the century, exposing a view of Hedonism. He conveys to
Dorian his world view and Dorian becomes corrupted as he follows
him. As an aesthete, Lord Henry is dedicated exclusively to searching
for pleasure and for sensations.

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Q.12

Basil Halward is the author of Dorian's portrait. He's an eternal idealist who truly believes in the innate goodness of mankind. He has faith in the possibility of redemption and believes in pure values like Beauty, Truth, and Love. He thinks that all art is “unconscious, ideal, and remote.” His love for Dorian Gray changes the way he sees art and the portrait marks a new phase of his career. Before painting the portrait, Basil had painted Dorian like an ancient soldier or a romantic figure from mythology. However, when he paints him as he really is, Basil fears that he has put too much of himself into the work, thus revealing his own hidden feelings of love for Dorian. The painting reflects the dark side of Dorian soul. The picture is connected with Dorian because while he remains young and handsome the picture becomes old and ugly as a reflection of Dorian's wrong doing like murder. Dorian continues to be handsome, Basil optimistically thinks that he also will continue to be truthful and loving. Basil refuses to believe that his supposed friends, Henry and Dorian, can be really bad. Ultimately, he pays for his optimism and good faith with the highest price – his life.

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The Picture of Dorian Gray, painting by Ivan Albright, 1945 - Art Institute Chicago

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Work in groups of 4 and answer the questions. Then organise your findings in 4 categories and choose a picture to illustrate your ideas:

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Work in groups of 4 and answer the questions. Then organise your findings in 4 categories and choose a picture to illustrate your ideas:

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1) Features of the novel

2) Main themes

3) The double

4) Criticism of Victorian society - Aestheticism