The Picture of Dorian Gray

Oscar Wilde

7.8 / 10
143 ratings

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde is a masterpiece of aestheticism and a moral parable.

Dorian Gray is a young man of impossible physical beauty whose portrait – painted by the artist Basil Hallward – becomes connected on an occult level with the workings of his soul. Drawn into a corrupt and sensual life by the dissolute Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian remains young and beautiful, while the painting ages in his stead, ultimately becoming a monstrosity.

Interwoven throughout is the author's brilliant commentary on beauty, art, love, and always, stunning wit.

Published
1891
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Author

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (1854–1900) was an Irish writer, poet, and prominent aesthete. His parents were successful Dublin intellectuals, and from an early age he was tutored at home, where he showed his intelligence, becoming fluent in French and German. He attended boarding school for six years, then matriculated to university at seventeen years old. Reading Greats, Wilde proved himself to be an outstanding classicist, first at Dublin, then at Oxford. After university, Wilde moved around trying his hand at various literary activities: he published a book of poems and toured America lecturing extensively on aestheticism. He then…