In
this journal, I would like to talk about beauty portrayed in The Picture of Dorian Gray.
First off, let’s start with what Lord Henry
says right at the beginning of the book. When Basil says that he has put too
much of himself in the portrait of Dorian, Lord Henry laughs that there is no resemblance
between the two of them. Basil has an intellectual expression at most, while
the picture—Dorian—is beautiful. Then Lord Henry launches off into a lengthily
speech about how beauty ends where an intellectual expression begins, and that
beautiful people don’t think, thus remain delightful.
Lord Henry is known for his wit and criticism,
as was Oscar Wilde. Personally I think he is the greatest resemblance to Oscar
Wilde himself. Then is it safe to think that Wilde thought the same of beauty?
Like what Lord Henry says about art—that the purpose of art is to be beautiful—Lord Henry deems Dorian “a brainless, beautiful thing, who should be always here
in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always here in summer when we
want something to chill our intelligence.” Lord Henry seems to
regard beauty as something totally independent of moral values.
On the contrary, Lady Narborough tells Dorian
that, “You are made to be good—you look
so good.” In this we can see that Lady Narborough sees beauty entwined with
ethics. Actually, this view was that of most of the Victorian society of the
time. This actually goes further into time, to the time of Plato and Socrates.
In his book The Symposium, Plato states
that things which are good are beautiful, and vice versa as well. Plato’s words
connect with the main theme of the Victorian era, which Wild criticized sarcastically
so much.
From what we see in the Preface—“beautiful things mean only beauty”—Wilde
clearly disagrees with the Victorian view that beautiful things must be moral
and ethical. We all know he does. But Wild devised his book to mirror himself
and the society around him. We can see Wilde as Lord Henry—although he himself
claimed to be Basil—disregarding the average ideas and spreading his own ideas,
Lord Henry by his words and Wilde by both words and writing. There are those
influenced by those words, such as Dorian, and there is also the society that
stands against his thoughts. In the book this is eminent in Lady Narborough’s
words. Wilde seems to have channeled his ideas into this book.
This is just another thing, but the book mentioned
above, Plato’s Symposium, is about
love, specifically Eros. Interestingly, according to this book, the best form
of love is when a young boy loves an older man. And when Wilde was convicted,
part of what he said for defense was indeed, that people of old, such as Plato
and Socrates, had loved young boys. Following the steps, perhaps? But if Wilde
read Plato, then does he relates with the homosexual part but not the view on
beauty?
