The Picture of Dorian Gray
Beauty's hidden moral ledger
*The Picture of Dorian Gray* is an 1890 novel by Oscar Wilde in which a young man's portrait ages and shows the marks of his sins while he himself remains youthful and unmarked.
The story explores vanity, moral corruption, and the relationship between beauty and ethics.
The title has become shorthand for any hidden record of someone's true nature or secret transgressions: His medical file was his picture of Dorian Gray.
- youthState of being immature
- eternal youthPermanent freedom from aging
- mirrorReflective viewing surface
- Faustian bargainRuinous exchange for power
- sinViolation of divine law
narcissism · conscience · Oscar Wilde · beauty · paint · self-destruction · corruption · moral decay · hedonism · decadence · identity · ephemerality · duality · double life · dark secret · portraiture · immortality · gaze
- Symbolist NovelsAxel
- Novelsnovel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Frankenstein, Pride and Prejudice, The Great Gatsby
- Classic BooksPride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, Moby Dick, Moby-Dick, Great Expectations
- Gothic horrorghost story, haunted houses, Dracula, vampires, Frankenstein
- 1900s LiteratureThe Time Machine, War of the Worlds, Heart of Darkness, Dracula, The Importance of Being Earnest
- British novelsPride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Great Expectations, Oliver Twist
The Picture of Dorian GrayA Christmas Carol
Holiday tale of transformation
Les Misérables · redemption narrative · The Scarlet Letter · The Prodigal Son · salvation story
The Picture of Dorian GrayPilgrim's Progress
Allegorical journey to salvation
The Brothers Karamazov · Uncle Tom's Cabin · Middlemarch · Paradise Lost · Utilitarianism
The Picture of Dorian GrayA Christmas Carol
Holiday tale of transformation
Little Women · Pollyanna · Anne of Green Gables · The Secret Garden
picture, pictures, pictured, picturing, picturesque, pictorial, pictorially, depict, depiction