STYLE AND ART IN WILDE'S THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY: FORM AS CONTENT
Author(s): JOHN G. PETERS
Source: Victorian Review, Vol. 25, No. 1 (Summer 1999), pp. 1-13
Published by: Victorian Studies Association of Western Canada
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ARTICLES
STYLE AND ART INWILDE'S THE PICTURE OF
DORIAN GRAY: FORM AS CONTENT
JOHNG.PETERS
University
of Wisconsin-Superior
M
any readers have seen a disparity between the "Preface" to The
Picture of Dorian
Gray and the novel itself. For example, Richard
Ellmann has said, "Wilde the preface-writer and Wilde
the novelist
deconstruct each other."1 Similarly, Robert Keith Miller has commented,
"Both in its theme and in its style the book is marked by that
that springs from an inadequately defined purpose."2
inconsistency
These comments voice a common perception of disparity between the
amoral purpose of art posited in the "Preface" and the novel's moral
like to resolve this seeming paradox and
plot.3 In contrast, I would
in
that
Wilde
fact
argue
deliberately juxtaposes the art and morality in
the novel in order to emphasize
their relationship as outlined in the
"Preface." Wilde has argued that his sole purpose in writing the novel
was to create a work of art, and he clearly believed the "Preface" to be
the novel's philosophical manifesto. In a letter responding to a negative
review of the book, he wrote, "My story is an essay on decorative art. It
reacts against the crude brutality of plain realism. It is poisonous if you
like, but you cannot deny that it is also perfect, and perfection is what
we artists aim at."4Wilde's
aesthetic theory was different from that of
it in his "Preface" and
many of his contemporaries, as he discussed
elsewhere.5 As is well known, Wilde
rejects the "instruct" half of the
"delight" and "instruct" criteria for art that most had accepted since
Horace's Ars Poetica. Instead, Wilde argued, "There is no such thing as
a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.
That is all. ... No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in
an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style."6For Wilde,
ethical
actions or ideas may form the raw materials for art, but art's purpose is to
the
delight with the beauty of the work's creation, not to persuade
Victorian Review 25.1 (Summer 1999)
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2
Victorian Review
reader of a particular moral idea.7 Linked to this idea isWilde's assertion
to this
that life imitates art rather than art imitating life.8 According
art
life
takes
"recreates
and
in
refashions
it
fresh
forms."9
it,
theory,
The primary target of Wilde's
aesthetic is realist art. Nineteenth
century realism sought to accurately represent reality so that whoever
experienced an artist's finished product would recognize it as something
from his or her own experience ?
in other words, something realistic. If
the work of art were successful, the objects, events, ideas, and people
should all concur with the audience's personal experience. In so doing,
realism yoked
it
and representation,
because
together morality
advocated a moral stance based upon representation of reality, so that
the moral
ideas, like the objects, events, and people,
represented
In contrast, Wilde
commonly held opinions.
argued for an art of
invention not representation, an art "dealing with what is unreal and
non-existent."10 Art should present an idealized creation thatmay have
some relationship or similarity to reality but was not to represent reality.
Even criticism, Wilde felt, should strive to be an art of perfection not
representation. In "The Critic as Artist," he argues that "the primary aim
of the critic is to see the object as in itself it really is not."11Wilde found
"the prison-house of realism"12 to be restricting because itwas limited to
commonly held morality and representation of reality; it was also
imperfect, because reality can never achieve the perfection of the ideal
(which perfection was Wilde's
goal for art). As a result, art cannot
imitate life if it is to be an invention of the ideal.
This rejectionof realistcriteriaforart is precisely thephilosophy
Wilde
defends in a letter to the St. James Gazette:
Your critic ... states that the people inmy story have no counterpart
in life; that they are . . . "mere catchpenny revelations of the non
existent." Quite so. If they existed they would not be worth writing
about. The function of the artist is to invent, not to chronicle. . . .
Life by its realism is always spoiling the subject-matter of art. The
supreme pleasure in literature is to realize the non-existent. (259)
comment echoes Lord Henry's statement in the novel that he
Wilde's
would like towrite "a novel thatwould be as lovely as a Persian carpet
and as unreal" (42). The similarity of these statements rests in their
aesthetic philosophy, the
rejecting realist representation. Given Wilde's
novel and the real world is crucial to
relationship between Wilde's
its claim to be art. In striving to achieve that stature, The
assessing
its energy on creation
Picture
focuses
and
of Dorian
Gray
?
?
an
not
a
of
of
real
world
but
unreal
world.
Its
representation
characters, plot, and style all work toward this end.
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JOHNG. PETERS
3
Epifanio San Juan, Jr. has written, "Wilde's characters seem flat."13
Although Wilde might have disagreed with San Juan, Jr.'s disparaging
the novel's characters, he certainly would have agreed that they are
unrealistic. Responding to a similar criticism by the St. James Gazette's
reviewer, Wilde writes, "There are no such people. If therewere I would
characters are types and
not write about them" (259). Instead, Wilde's
for artistic effect rather than realistic
extremes
that he chose
to be non
Wilde
intends
these characters
representation.
on
not
based
actual
creations,
representational
experience but solely on
artistic invention. Similarly, the significance of the novel's plot lies not in
of itseventsbut in itsabilitytoremindus that
themoralityor immorality
As a resulttheplot is both gothic
thisbook is a work of invention.14
from
corrupt and aging portrait descends
while
the
of
the
Vanes
eighteenth-century gothic literature,
description
comes from nineteenth-century melodrama. Miller faults the novel on
and melodramatic.
The
this point, chargingWilde
"with occasionally slipping into the
butWilde
is well aware of the novel's unreality and
melodramatic,"15
underscores
this quality of the novel. For instance, Sibyl scolds her
brother saying, "Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the
heroes of those silly melodramas mother used to be so fond of acting in"
later repeats this same idea:
(69). And just in case we missed it,Wilde
"The exaggerated
of
the
the
threat,
gesture that
passionate
folly
accompanied it, themad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid
to her [Mrs. Vane]. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed
more freely. . . . She would have liked to have continued the scene on
the same emotional scale" (71). As was true of the novel's characters, its
and gothic
the reader
melodramatic
from
away
plot moves
and
toward
invention.
representation
the novel's characters and plot both emphasize Wilde's
Although
the novel's style is themost important factor in his
of
realism,
rejection
has argued a similar point: "The
rejecting realism. Patrice Hannon
Picture of Dorian Gray is a novel of aestheticism because
it subverts
. . .
linguistic conventions of realism.
Style, not subject-matter is the
the distinction."16 Hannon
goes on to
determining factor in making
not
and
do
determine
that
character
the
novel's
suggest
plot
language
as they would a realist novel and that "[t]he language of the novel is
not the language of realism in part because
it rejects outright any
illusion of determinism in its narration of dialogue and events. It is
avoids the language of determinism by
highly artificial."17 Wilde
the language of representation. Realism's
avoiding
representational
nature limits the plot, characters, ideas, morality, and language used to
describe them. The artificiality of Wilde's
language, particularly as it
in
narrative
frees
him
from
convention and allows him
his
appears
style,
to create and invent. Wilde makes a conscious
effort to create an
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4
Victorian Review
artificial dialogue (Harmon's contention) as well as an artificial narrative
style (my contention).
artificial style leads to a seemingly puzzling aspect of the
Wilde's
novel: a very moral story line embedded within the structure of ornate,
sensuous language. Viewed
in light of the "Preface," such a plot seems
antithetical to the profound amorality of art thatWilde posits. However,
this perception of disparity between "Preface" and novel results from
the role of the novel's moral events. Wilde
himself
misunderstanding
saw this possible confusion for readers of the novel's serial version and
sought to rectify this problem in the book version. In a letter to the
editorof theDaily Chronicle,Wilde writes, "[S]o farfromwishing to
in
any moral in my story, the real trouble I experienced
emphasize
was
that
the
of
moral
obvious
the
story
writing
extremely
keeping
subordinate to the artistic and dramatic effect" (263). More
successful
than the novel's serial version, the book version plays down the plot's
morality, andWilde's attempt to suppress the novel's moral aspect is also
an attempt to enhance its aesthetic aspect. In fact, the "Preface" was
written after the novel's serial version appeared and in conjunction with
revisions for the book version. Rather than emphasizing
the book's
in order to instruct his readers, Wilde
moral qualities
uses them to
highlight the novel's aesthetic qualities
through antithesis. In "Pen,
Pencil, and Poison," Wilde
argues that "[t]o have a style so gorgeous
that it conceals
the subject is one of the highest achievements
of
writing,!8 and Wilde puts this argument to test in The Picture ofDorian
Gray, Aesthetics, juxtaposed as it is against morality, dominates the
novel's foreground. In other words, stylistic aesthetics so overshadow
the moral events that morality
aesthetics by
actually emphasizes
contrast. In the end, the novel's aesthetic style dominates the morality
and plot, so that themoral ideas and the plot become mere mirrors and
?
not
props to reflect and support the book's style; thus the style itself
?
or
themoral overtones
becomes
the
gothic and melodramatic
plot
in a sense, the novel's
book's most important aspect and becomes,
content.
The Picture of Dorian Gray's distinctive style is apparent from the
the significance of the novel's style lies not in its
outset.19 However,
distinctiveness, but rather in its attempt to raise the novel to the status
of art Throughout his works, Wilde emphasizes the importance of style.
In "The Importance of Being Ernest," Gwendolen
says, "In matters of
grave importance, style, not sincerity is the vital thing."20 On a more
serious note, Wilde declares, "The new age is the age of style."21 He
clarifies this comment when he writes, "[A]U the supreme masters of style
?
?
are the supreme masters of
Dante,
Sophocles,
Shakespeare
and
vision
intellectual
of
also."22
Similarly, in "The Decay
spiritual
that
is
of
Wilde
"the
condition
art"23
any
very
suggests
Lying,"
style
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JOHNG.PETERS
5
and that art "keeps between herself and reality the impenetrable barrier
or ideal treatment."24 He
further
of beautiful style, of decorative
he
the
of
when
"Truth
is
writes,
importance
style
entirely
emphasizes
and absolutely a matter of style"25 and "It is style thatmakes us believe
?
in a thing
nothingbut style."26
ReferringspecificallytoThe Picture
remarks in a letter the St. James Gazette
that
Gray, Wilde
of Dorian
to artistic effect and
"correctness
should always be subordinated
musical
of syntax that may occur in
cadence; and any peculiarities
Dorian Gray are deliberately intended, and are introduced to show the
value of the artistic theory in question"
of Wilde's
(258). Because
emphasis on style, there is no more initially striking aspect of the novel
than the highly self-conscious, highly crafted language of the novel's
opening scene:
The studiowas filledwith therichodourof roses,andwhen thelight
summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden there came
through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more
delicate perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. From the corner of the
divan of Persian saddlebags on which he was lying, smoking, as was
his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry Wotton could just
catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-colored blossoms of
a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to bear
the burden of a beauty so flame-like as theirs; and now and then the
fantastic shadows of birds in flight fitted across the long tussore-silk
curtains thatwere stretched in front of the huge window, producing
a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of those
pallid jade-faced painters of Tokio who, through themedium of an
art that is necessarily
the sense of
immobile, seek to convey
swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering
their way
through the long unmown grass, or circling with
monotonous
insistence round the dusty gilt horns of the straggling
woodbine, seemed tomake the stillness more oppressive. (1)
This
is perhaps
the best known ofWilde's
"purple patches." He
achieves
theeffectin thispassage (and others like it) throughsentence length
and a variety of sound patterns. In this scene, Wilde produces a feeling
of languor; such words as "lying," "shouldered," "straggling," "stirred,"
as well
as the long,
and "monotonous,"
"tremulous,"
"heavy,"
"straggling" sentence structure combine to produce a heavy, languid air.
of thefirstpartof
Adding to thisatmosphereis thedeferredsatisfaction
the long sentence beginning, "From the corner of the divan of Persian
on which he was
saddlebags
lying, smoking, as was his custom,
innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry Wotton could"; here Wilde
gives
the reader pieces of the scene and then finally completes the first part of
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Victorian Review
6
also employs this
this sentence by introducing its predicate. Wilde
to
in
elsewhere
to
his readers to
effect
order
force
technique
good
a
scene
its meaning
before
decode
experience
sensuously
they
we
in
"In
For
later
the huge gilt
the
read:
novel,
intellectually.
example,
Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, that hung from the ceiling
of the great oak-panelled hall of entrance, lights were still burning from
three flickering jets" (89). As in the novel's opening passage, here too,
Wilde
forces the audience to experience
the scene before they fully
when
he
its
introduces
the sentence's predicate.
comprehend
meaning
on
with
this
the most
linear
emphasis
sensory perception,
Along
interesting aspect about the novel's opening passage is the prominence
of the senses; this is true ofWilde's
stylistically self-conscious passages
in general. A descriptive scene using sense images (particularly visual
images) to evoke a like experience in the audience is quite common in
literature; what Wilde does differently, though is to emphasize scent. In
many other similar passages as well, Wilde highlights, sometimes even
inundates the reader in sense experiences.27 And in so doing, he creates
scenes so rich and idealized that they could not appear in the real life
his detractors demanded as necessary for fiction.
smell is the dominant sense of the novel's opening
Although
other
passage,
passages have other effects and evoke other senses. For
instance, Wilde describes Lord Henry's library as follows:
It was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled
wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-colored frieze and ceiling
of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk
table stood a
long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satin-wood
statuette by Clodion,
and beside
it lay a copy of "Les Cent
bound for Margaret
of Valois
Nouvelles,"
by Clovis Eve, and
powdered with the gilt daisies thatQueen had selected for her
device. Some large blue china jars and parrot-tulips were arranged
on the mantelshelf
and through the small leaded panes of the
window
streamed the apricot-colored
light of a summer day in
London. (44)
In this passage, Wilde describes a library that resembles an art museum
more than a library.As a result, since most museums depend upon sight,
?
this passage emphasizes
sight
particularly color ("olive," "cream,"
"brickdust," "gilt," "blue," and "apricot")28 Unlike the languid movement
of the novel's opening scene, thismuseum scene is static?
as would be
so
uses
And
rather
than
active
Wilde
verbs,
expected.
passive verb
constructions and static verb forms ("was," "stood," "lay," "bound,"
some differences
"were arranged"). Despite
in these
"powdered,"
senses.
their
in
lies
their
the
The
passages,
commonality
emphasizing
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JOHNG. PETERS
7
novel forces the reader to experience the scene through sense stimuli,
and in this way the style conveys the sensuous experience of pleasure,
the form of beauty about which the book ismost concerned.
Both of these examples depend heavily on nouns and adjectives to
also constructs passages
that
convey sensory perception. But Wilde
rely on verbs for their sensory experience. For example, when Dorian
rides to discover the identity of the man who has been shot, Wilde
writes:
The trees seemed to sweep past him in spectral procession, and wild
shadows to fling themselves across his path. Once themare sw?rved
at a white gatepost and nearly threw him. He lashed her across the
neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air like an arrow. The stones
flew fromherhoofs.(208)
In this case, Wilde primarily wishes to convey the idea of speed, and
touch is the sense he uses to achieve that effect. Such verbs as "swept,"
"swerved," "flew," "fling," "cleft," "threw," and "lashed" describe quick,
use of words such as "wild" and
sharp movement. In addition, Wilde's
"arrow" also conveys this feeling of speed. The trees sweeping past, the
air being cleft, the lash striking the horse's neck, and the stones flying
from its hoofs all cause the reader to feel a rush of movement. And as
was true of the novel's opening passage,
the sentence and paragraph
In this instance, the
length convey the dominant idea of the passage.
brevity of the paragraph and sentences, along with the active verbs
used, cause the reader to experience the speed of the scene.
In addition to thedistinctivenessofWilde's styleand theway it
conveys the novel's scenes through sensuous experience, there is yet
another crucial way the novel's stylemakes The Picture ofDorian Gray
a work of invention rather than representation. Many
novels have
distinctive and self-conscious styles that evoke a reader response; for
instance, William
Faulkner, Joseph Conrad, and Henry James often
employ intrusive narrative styles in theirworks, but they maintain that
style throughout the work. Even with Faulkner, who often shifts
narrative styles as he shifts narrative voices, his works move from one
intrusive style to another.However,
the intrusive style of The Picture of
not
is
Dorian
In fact, this style is more often
evident.
Gray
always
absent than present; examples
of it are interspersed throughout a
narrative style that is otherwise essentially unobtrusive. By appearing
then draw
intrusive passages
only intermittently, the stylistically
attention to themselves as they stand out against the rest of the
narrative space. In a sense, these passages defamiliarize
the reader to
their language, and, in almost all cases, such passages appear only after
what could be called crisis points in the narrative.29 These crisis points
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Victorian
8
Review
exist at various places in the novel where an important dramatic effect
occurs.30 At these crisis points, the novel's plot either threatens to
in
become realistic or to draw significant attention to itself. However,
each case, the crisis is followed either by a stylistically self-conscious
passage or (in a few instances) is related in a stylistically self-conscious
manner. By foregrounding stylistically intrusive passages within these
crises, Wilde diminishes the novel's moral aspects. For example, Dorian's
rejection of Sibyl is one of the novel's more significant crises. After
Dorian rejects her and leaves the theater, a few lines later,Wilde writes:
The darkness lifted,and,flushedwith faintfires, theskyhollowed
itself into a perfectpearl. Huge carts filledwith nodding lilies
rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy
with the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring
him an anodyne for his pain. He followed
into the market, and
carter
watched the men unloading theirwagons. A white-smocked
offered him some cherries....
They had been plucked at midnight,
and the coldness of themoon had entered into them. A long line of
boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red roses,
defiled in frontof him, threadingtheirway throughthehuge jade
greenpiles of vegetables.(88-89)
The narrative continues in thismanner for the next two paragraphs. The
same elements exist in this passage that were in the passages quoted
sense images, sound patterns, and so on. Wilde presents a
earlier ?
scene of beauty and peace and, most important, a scene in such contrast
to Dorian's
rejection of Sybil that this scene mutes the impact of the
sensuous experience.
rejection by creating a picture of overwhelming
And just as the flowers' perfume and beauty are "an anodyne for
[Dorian's] pain," the sensuous experience Wilde
provides blunts the
effectof Dorian's rejectionof Sybil. A significanttragedyhas just
occurred, and yet rather than continuing in a tragic vein (as the realist
writer would) Wilde
instead leads the reader to a lyric scene that never
has nor could exist in reality ?
only in the perfection of the ideal.
attention to style, he brings the focus around again to
Through Wilde's
not the representation of an
the novel's role, as a work of invention?
actual event requiring the reader's pathos.
As in thepassage followingDorian's rejectionof Sibyl, shortlyafter
Dorian's
confrontation with James Vane outside the opium den,
novel's style again directs our attention away from the plot:
It was
tea-time, and themellow
light of the huge lace-covered
the
lamp
thatstoodon thetable litup thedelicate china and hammeredsilver
of the service at which
theDuchess
was presiding. Her white hands
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JOHNG. PETERS
9
were moving daintily among the cups, and her full red lips were
smiling at something thatDorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry
was lying back in a silk-draped wicker chair looking at them. On a
divan sat Lady Narborough pretending to listen to
peach-colored
the Duke's description of the last Brazilian beetle that he had added
tohis collection.(193)
encounter with James Vane is one of the novel's most terrifying
events; Dorian nearly loses his life. This incident will haunt Dorian later
in the novel, but rather than immediately emphasizing
this encounter's
instead introduces a stylistically self-conscious
importance, Wilde
passage and defuses the scene's volatility by taking the audience away
from the danger of the plot and again into theworld of the ideal, and by
so doing reminds the reader of art's pre-eminence over life. Similarly,
besides the transformation of Dorian's portrait, Basil's murder is the
novel's most significant event. Yet this incident's intensity is also
deflected byWilde's
style. And in this case, the actual crisis is related in
a stylistically self-conscious manner:
Dorian's
was still seated in thechair,strainingover the tablewith
The thing
bowed
head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had
it not
been for thered jagged tear in theneck, and theclottedblack pool
thatwas
slowing widening
on the table, one would
have said
that
theman was simplyasleep.How quickly ithad all been done!He felt
strangely calm, and, walking over to the window,
opened it, and
stepped out on the balcony. The wind had blown the fog away, and
the sky was like a monstrous peacock's tail, starred with myriads of
golden eyes. (159)
This passage
reveals a moment
of violence but then shifts the emphasis
away fromtheevent In fact,the imageof thebrightsky andWilde's
suggestion of a man asleep blunt the scene's emotional
effect and make
it difficultfor thisincidentto evoke a significant
patheticresponse.31
Dorian's rejection of Sibyl Vane, his confrontation with her brother, and
his murder of Basil are among the novel's most important events, and yet
in each case, a crucial event is subordinated
to a stylistically self
conscious, descriptive passage.
This effect also occurs at every other crisis point in the novel. Each
crisis point corresponds to a "purple patch" and has a similar effect, so
that at each crisis, the style deflects attention away from the plot and
onto thestyleitself,therebysubordinating
thecontent(plot) to theform
(style) and reversing their roles in the same way Dorian reverses roles
with the portrait. The form then becomes the content, and the plot and
the medium
characters merely
transmits the
through which Wilde
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10
Victorian Review
self-conscious style. There are two significant exceptions to this
juxtaposition of crisis and stylistically intrusive passage; these occur in
the book's opening and closing passages. However,
there are also very
good reasons for these exceptions to the novel's usual pattern. In the
takes the reader from a physical world into an
opening scene, Wilde
in
other
words, from life into art. The scene's ornate
imaginative world;
and self-conscious style reminds the reader that nowhere in the natural
world does such a scene exist. The scene's unreality is further
by the dream-like
emphasized
"heavy, opium-tainted cigarette" (2)
atmosphere, and by the reference to Japanese painting (both because of
its foreignness and because of the unreality of representing movement
through a static medium).32 Similarly, in the closing crisis (Dorian's
death), there are two reasons for the absence of a stylistically self
conscious passage. First, when Dorian tries to destroy the portrait and
destroys himself instead, the portrait and Dorian again exchange places,
so thatDorian is no longer the ideal and the
portrait the real, but rather
as theywere originally. Thus Wilde brings us
the other way around?
full circle from the novel's beginning, in which Dorian sells his soul in
order for him to become the perfection of art and the portrait to become
the imperfection of reality. Second, Dorian's
attempt to destroy the
reverses
the
of
the
novel's
process
portrait
opening passage and moves
the reader out of the world of invention and back into the world of
reality. By so doing, Wilde
again reminds his audience that they have
just experienced a work of unreality.
the reader has not left this imaginative world empty
However,
handed. The beauty of the language and rhetorical tropes?
the novel's
?
scenes
have
created
of
ideal
unviewed
style
beauty, and
previously
and
The
Picture
taste,
scent,
sound,
touch,
through sight,
of Dorian
Gray creates for the audience a new awareness of the perfection of art.
In so doing, Wilde
produces a work of art whose justification rests
novel's
solely on its stylisticbeauty not on itsmoral plot. And by rejecting
and morality, Wilde's
realism's
nineteenth-century
representation
idealized world of art can employ the raw materials of a moral plot
without having to posit a particular moral stance. As a result, far from
the moral plot leading to a particular moral conclusion with which to
instructWilde's
readers, the plot instead emphasizes, by contrast with
the novel's style, the unreal, ideal picture Wilde wishes to paint.
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JOHNG. PETERS 11
Notes
1. Richard Ellmann. Oscar Wilde. New York: Knopf, 1988. 315.
2. Robert Keith Miller. Oscar Wilde. New York: Ungar, 1982. 41.
3. See, for example, Norbert Kohl, Oscar Wilde: The Works of a Conformist
Rebel. David Henry Wilson (trans.).Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989. 167
68. In addition, some critics also seem to have completely rejected any
relationshipbetween the aestheticsposited in the "Preface" and the events of
the novel. See, for example, Philip K. Cohen, The Moral Vision of Oscar
Wilde. Rutherford:Fairleigh Dickinson UP, 1978. 105*55.
4. Oscar Wilde. "To theEditor of theDaily Chronicle" inThe Letters of Oscar
Wilde. Rupert Hart-Davis (ed.). New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1962. 264.
Hereafter, all quotations fromOscar Wilde's letterswill be taken from this
edition and will be followed by theirpage numbers inparenthesis.
5. Some otherworks inwhichWilde outlines his aesthetic theory include "The
Decay of Lying," "The Critic as Artist," "Pen, Pencil and Poison," and "The
Truth
of Masks."
6. Oscar Wilde. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Isobel Murray (ed.). Oxford:
Oxford UP, 1981. xxiii. Hereafter, all quotations fromThe Picture ofDorian
Gray will be taken from this edition and will be followed by their page
numbers
in parenthesis.
7. Oscar Wilde, "The Decay of Lying," inThe Complete Works of Oscar Wilde,
Patrons Edition De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday, 1923. 5: 27.
8. "TheDecay of Lying," 38.
9. "The Decay of Lying," 27.
10. "TheDecay of Lying," 27.
11. "TheCritic as Artist," inThe CompleteWorks ofOscar Wilde, Patrons' Edition
De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday, 1923. 5: 160. In this passage,
Wilde is of course responding to bothMatthew Arnold and Walter Pater.
Arnold argued that theaim of criticismis to "see theobject as in itselfit really
is" ("On Translating Homer," inOn theClassical Tradition, The Complete
Prose Works ofMatthew Arnold. R.H. Super (ed.), 11 vols. Ann Arbor: U of
Michigan P, 1960. 1: 40, while Pater countered that "in aesthetic criticism,the
first step toward seeing one's object as it really is, is to know one's
impressionism as it really is" (The Renaissance: Studies inArt and Poetry.
Adam Phillips (ed.). Oxford: Oxford UP, 1986. xxix.
12. "The Decay of Lying," 35.
13. Epifanio San Juan,Jr.The Art ofOscar Wilde. Princeton: PrincetonUP, 1967.
59.
14. It is interestingto note thatWilde's descriptionof theYellow Book begins by
stating,"Itwas a novel without a plot" (125).
15. Miller, 41.
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12 Victorian Review
16. Patrice Hannon. "Theatre and Theory in theLanguage of Dorian Gray" in
Victorian Literature and Culture. JohnMaynard and Adrienne Auslander
Munich (eds.). Vol. 19.New York: AMS P, 1991. 144.
17.
Hannon,
146.
18. Oscar Wilde. "Pen,Pencil, and Poison," inThe CompleteWorks ofOscar Wilde,
Patrons' Edition De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday, 1923. 5: 88.
19. Despite itsdistinctiveness,few criticshave investigatedthe styleof The Picture
of Dorian Gray. In addition to Hannon, San Juan? Jr.briefly discusses the
style of chapter eleven, suggesting that the syntax and sentence structure
mirror the cataloguing that occurs in that chapter and also thatWilde's
descriptions are sometimes representativeof the characters involved (53, 57).
Miller also discusses Wilde's style (38-40), though in disparaging terms,
remarkingthat "wemust labor througha good deal of sludge" (38) in reading
thenovel. Finally, Donald H. Ericksen brieflymentions theway the imagery
Wilde uses resembles themood and settingof particular scenes in the novel
Oscar Wilde. Boston: Twayne, 1977. 110-12.With these exceptions, however,
thereseems tobe no otherdiscussion of thenovel's style.
20. Oscar Wilde. "The Importanceof Being Earnest," in The Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde, Patrons' Edition De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday,
1923. 8: 137-38.
21. Oscar Wilde. "The Rise of Historical Criticism," inThe Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde, Patrons' Edition De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday,
1923. 10: 137.
22. Oscar Wilde. "The English Renaissance of Art," in The Complete Works of
Oscar Wilde, patrons1Edition De Luxe, 12 vols. Garden City: Doubleday,
1923. 11 [Part 2]: 35. (Note: This volume has a confusing printing
while the
characteristic;thefirstpart consists ofDe Profundis and two letters,
second part consists of a collection of essays. However, thepagination begins
again with page one in the second part, and the table of contents for the
second part appears at the beginning of the second part, There is no
indicationof thisprintingcharacteristicin the table of contents in the frontof
thevolume, and so it appears as if thevolume contains only theDe Profundus
section.).
23. "The Decay of Lying," 29-30.
24. "The Decay of Lying," 27.
25. "TheDecay of Lying," 35.
26. "TheDecay of Lying," 55.
27. Miller disagrees with thisassessment ofWilde's style and remarks that "[t]he
novel often seems about to sink beneath theweight of an omate prose style"
(38), going on to cite the opening passage of the novel as evidence. He also
argues, "[D]espite thewealth of detail we are given,we learn almost nothing
which is relevant to thenarrative" (39). Of course,Wilde would have agreed
completely with Miller's assessment, because Wilde is concerned with the
novel's
?
style
not its plot.
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JOHNG. PETERS
13
28. For a more complete treatmentof color in the novel, see Jan B. Gordon's
essay "'Parody as Initiation':The Sad Education of 'DorianGray,,MCriticism, 9
(1967): 355-72.
29. Harmon has discussed a somewhat similar point, convincingly arguing that
language shapes and reshapes the novel's characters, events, etc. However,
while Harmon makes a strong case for the effectof dialogue, I am interested
primarily in the novel's stylisticallyself-conscious descriptive passages rather
than itsdialogue.
for example 21-23, 25-26, 50-51, 68-69, 75-76, 89-90, 98-101, 118-26,
See
30.
162-63, 183, 199, 202, 210, and so on.
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