Measuring the Mirror/Mirroring the Measure: A Fresh Look at the Dorian-Picture Interface in The Picture of Dorian Gray

Submitted by: Bibek Adhikary M. A. (English) Semester II University of Gour Banga Reg. No: M011833 Session: 2008-2009 Roll: 001200502 No: 0046

.. (Signature of the Student)

Measuring the Mirror/Mirroring the Measure: A Fresh Look at the Dorian-Picture Interface in The Picture of Dorian Gray

Part gothic, part comedy of manners, part treatise on the relationship between art and morality The Picture of Dorian Gray continues to present its readers with a puzzle to sort out. Robert Mighall comments Works of art act as subjective mirrors in Wildes novel. So is The Picture of Dorian Gray Wildes only novel. Child of love and hate Dorian Gray, a radiantly handsome, impressionable and wealthy gentleman, is the hero of this text. The storyline tells us the heros meeting with his own portrait, his fascination with it, his involvements in various immoral and forbidden pleasures and sinful crime and finally his deluded self slaughter. On his way from an innocent, nave and beautiful gentleman to a sinner the portrait acts as a metaphor or mask for erotic desire, or the alibi for a life of secret vices, as pointed out by Mighall. My point here is to show the function of the portrait in Dorians brief sinful life. The novel opens with the painter Basil Hallward and his friend the orator, preacher of a new Hedonism(P.D.G. 25) Lord Henry Wotton beholding the painters new chef duvre , the portrait of Dorian. Here Dorian comes and meets with Lord Henry who, struck by his beauty, at once begins to influence him. After meeting Henry, Dorian is made to fear his dreadful, hideous and uncouth(P.D.G. 27) old age. When he sees his own portrait he feels jealous with the everlasting youth of the portrait and desires to give his soul for that.(P.D.G. 28) After his first meeting with the portrait Dorian makes a monstrous pact with it and as a result gains eternal youth. As he exchanges his soul with the portrait, henceforth all the marks of his depravity will appear there. So at the very beginning of the novel Basil and Henry bring about an important turn in Dorians life. By giving too much of him in the portrait Basil presents before Dorian his own beauty. On the other hand Lord Henry reshaped Dorian thoroughly and it is only because of him that Dorian desires for eternal youth and unbridled gratification of the senses. After making the pact with the portrait Dorian engages himself in a number of erotic encounters. First of them is his love affair with Sybil Vane, an actress. But he is enamoured of Sybil the actress and not Sybil the woman. So when she fails to perform unto his expectation, he unceremoniously rejects her. Heartbroken the poor girl Sybil commits

suicide. This is Dorians first sin and also causes the first mark on his soul. Now when he looks at the portrait he finds there was the picture before him, with the touch of cruelty in the mouth.(P.D.G. 87) Thus, for the first time, the picture becomes the visible emblem of his conscience. Though the mark of the portrait psychologically torments Dorian, the influence of Henry proves far more telling on him. He hides the portrait at the top storey of his house. By using his unalterable youth Dorian destroys the lives of some youth, of Adrian Singleton, Duke of Perth, Sir Henry Ashton etc. Eventually he shifts himself from the beloved gentleman of the ladies to the most hated client among the prostitutes, from the Prince Charming(P.D.G. 67) to the devils bargain(P.D.G. 180). All the marks of his action continue to appear on the portrait. But when Dorian looks at the portrait his sense of guilt arises. It is the result of his psychological turmoil that he stabs its creator Basil after showing him the picture. Thus the room so far a place where Dorian hides his soul now becomes the place of bloody crime and capital sin. Now Dorian is a confirmed sinner and criminal and he is troubled by conscience. He has the picture to give form to his evil essence and being hunted down and almost killed by James Vane, urges him to reform. However as Paulo Augusto Wagatsuma has pointed out, conscience is not able to open his heart to humaneness; it just scratches his huge egotism, for he wants to keep his lifestyle at the same time he wants to eliminate the constant reminder of his monstrosity, the portrait the most magical of mirrors.(P.D.G 103) At the end of the novel Dorian thinks that his recent good action at sparing a country girl, Hetty Merton, from an affair with him might have restored the painting. But when he looks at it he sees in the eyes look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite.(P.D.G. 211) Realizing that the portrait will be there all his life to shame and humiliate him, Dorian thinks just like his soul is in it, so is his conscience. This role of the portrait is emphasized throughout the novel, but only at the end Dorian concludes that he must get rid of it in order to be free, Yes, it had been conscience, he would destroy it.(P.D.G. 212) So the reader is told that Dorian advances to the portrait with a knife, the same with which he killed Basil, and stabs it but actually he stabs himself in the bargaining and dies raising a horrendous shriek. So we find that the role of the portrait becomes proleptically important vis-a-vis Dorians life. Instead of giving pleasure, the portrait becomes a source of fear to Dorian from the very

beginning. It is the cause of Dorians psychological torment; for the portrait never allows Dorian to lose track of his moral depravities. It rises in him a storm of inner conflict which, in the words of Michael Patrick Gillespie is a result of the struggle within an individuals nature between the impulse toward self-gratification and the sense of guilt that is a consequence of acting upon the inclination.

Works Cited: 1. Gillespie, Michael Patrick. The Picture of Dorian Gray: Preface, Authoritative Text, Background and Context, Criticism. 2nd Norton Critical Edition, New York: W. W. Norton, 2007. 2. Mighall, Robert. Introduction. In: Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. London: Penguin, 2003. 3. Wagatsuma, Paulo Augusto. Culture and Corruption in The Picture of Dorian Gray . UFMG 4. The Picture of Dorian Gray is abbreviated as P.D.G (All the textual references are taken from Wilde, Oscar The Picture of Dorian Gray. London: Penguin, 2003.)