1. Poisonous Books HUM 2212: British and American Literature I Fall 2012 Dr. Perdigao November 14-19, 2012

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3. The Poisonous Book

4. That book According to Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray is “poisonous but perfect” (Gillepsie 353) As “benchmark of Decadence in English, a key to the psychic and creative life of its author, and a mirror of the prejudices of an era that used it against its author in a court of law as evidence of his moral corruption” (353). “Within the narrative, for example, frequent references to the mores of Victorian society invite one to judge the actions of individual characters according to the values of the world in which they exist. At the same time, as a number of the cultural studies already cited have noted, the contradictory elements that make up fin de siècle English society call for a great deal of flexibility in any reading based upon general assumptions about these other Victorians of whom and for whom Wilde wrote” (395).

5. Layering Science versus religion—transforming the painting Metafiction—the “poisonous book”: “It was a novel without a plot, and with only one character, being, indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian, who spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his own, and to sum up, as it were, in himself the various moods through which the world-spirit had ever passed, loving for their mere artificiality those renunciations that men have unwisely called virtue, as much as those natural rebellions that wise men call sin” (104). Note about origins of book (102)

6. Identity Play Role-playing Sibyl Vane to her brother James: “‘You are like one of the heroes of those silly melodramas mother used to be so fond of acting in’” (61). Revelation of truth from mother to James: “It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal” (62). Assessing James’ threat to Dorian: “The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more freely, and for the first time for many months she really admired her son” (62).

7. Courtship Lord Henry’s assessment if Dorian were to marry Sibyl and then fall for another in six months: “He would be a wonderful study” (64). “‘She is simply a born artist’” (65). “‘I have been right, Basil, haven’t I, to take my love out of poetry, and to find my wife in Shakespeare’s plays?’” (66). Lord Henry on the theatre: “‘It is so much more real than life’” (68).

8. Art for art’s sake? Basil: “‘Love is a more wonderful thing than Art’” Lord Henry: “‘They are both simply forms of imitation’” (72). Lord Henry: “‘It is not good for one’s morals to see bad acting’” (72). Sibyl” “‘You taught me what reality really is.... You had brought me something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection’” (73). Dorian: “‘Without your art you are nothing’” (74). Appearance in a scandal—not good form (82) Dorian: “‘How extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, Harry, I think I would have wept over it’” (83). Dorian: “‘It seems to me to be simply like a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible beauty of a Greek tragedy in which I took a great part, but by which I have not been wounded’” (84).

9. Breaking Frames Lord Henry: “‘It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style... Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of beauty crosses our lives.... Suddenly we find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the play. Or rather we are both’” (85). Catharsis, fourth wall? Lord Henry: “‘The girl never really lived, and so she has never really died.... She was less real than they are’” (87).