Wow- where to begin with this story? In past blogs and comments, I’ve written on my opinion that a lot of stories are overanalyzed and pulled apart too much, but The Picture of Dorian Gray is one that I can justify that practice. There’s SO much that can be taken from this text! I really don’t think I will be able to even organize my thoughts as well as I would like to this week- I wish I had a little more time!
First, I want to say that I really enjoyed the novel and all of the social implications it presented. Next, I can’t help but contrast it with last week’s Carmilla. In a way, this novel is similar, yet opposite- in how Carmilla boasted predominately strong female characters with (as many people inferred) homosexual undertones, while The Portrait of Dorian Gray offers the same, just in male characters. In Carmilla I was hesitant to place a “lesbian” label on the relationships, but I feel the homosexual theme is highly present this week. You can’t help but easily see this in the strong attractions that both Basil and Lord Henry had for Dorian (though Basil’s appears to be stronger, as Lord Henry’s attraction seems to be more of curiosity and excitement on his ability to influence such an oddly good looking and seemingly innocent young man) One quote that helps to solidify this idea is in Chapter 5 when Lord Henry is asking Basil how often he sees Dorian, to which he replies, “Every day. I couldn’t be happy if I didn’t see him everyday. He is absolutely necessary to me.” On this subject, I have to connect the presence of homosexuality with its presence in the author’s own life. You don’t have to search long and hard to come up with evidence of a strong gay influence in Oscar Wilde’s life. He famously was sentenced to two years of hard labor after being convicted of “gross indecency” with a male friend in 1895. Reading just a brief biography of Wilde, I see many similarities between him and Lord Henry (and in turn, Dorian himself, since Dorian was very much formed by Lord Henry’s influence).
In the latter half of the novel when things take such a macabre turn, I couldn’t help but to draw my mind to some Edgar Allan Poe works. The whole guilt factor Dorian has, from the way he sees the corruptness of his soul reflected on the painting, to his reactions after Sybil’s death, then his murder of Basil and paranoia immediately following just screamed “The Tell Tale Heart” to me. I suppose drawing these connections can easily done because they’re both very much gothic works, but for me, it seemed especially strong.
Overall, I feel like I’m in over my head with the moral and social innuendos that Wilde presents with this story. I can definitely see them, but am at a loss as to how to best elaborate on them. I look forward to reading everyone’s blogs this week to get a broader view on the class’s perspectives, as I’m sure they will be interesting. I know I’m leaving off more points that I wanted to get into. As I read, I came across so many topics that I planned to discuss in this blog but I’m now a little disappointed in myself for not writing them down so I could remember! I’m sure they will come flooding back to me as I read the rest of the blogs, or next week while reading the literary analysis, so at least I know I’ll have more to comment on!
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Joy,
ReplyDeleteI absolutely feel the same way you do about Wilde! Where do we even begin? His works are so rich for analysis.
I do want to discuss the gothic further, but in comparing Dorian with Carmilla, I think your blog raises some important questions about Irish literature, which is that is sure is kind of..."queer," isn't it? What are we to make of that? How is the "queerness" of this novel different than the "queerness" of Carmilla? How does it work differently? Obviously Wilde himself possessed a fairly "gray" sexuality, and that certainly would have influenced the characters he created here, but other works of his aren't necessarily so overtly homo-erotic. What do these queer relationships signify? Could they be making a statement against the rigid social structures of Victorian English society in their transgressive nature? What do you think? We might also ask what is the relationship between the gothic and homoeroticism in both of these works?
Hi Joy,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your post. It has opened up some new ways of thinking for me. I also picked up on the whole guilt factor thing that Dorian seems to possess. Although, I don’t have much knowledge of Edgar Allan Poe I think it was really cool that you made that connection. It is almost like Dorian has a split personality throughout the novel. One second he feels terrible for hurting Sybil and the next minute he is carefree and selfish. That little yellow book sure is a bad influence! Reading your analysis of this made me realize that it is often the people who are the most insecure that are the most selfish and also have the most guilt. Dorian is very insecure, in my opinion. He is so obsessed with image and materialistic things that he really doesn’t care about anything but himself. But maybe that’s not why Dorian is insecure. Maybe he is insecure because he is gay, and he is so obsessed with elite society? I wonder if this is the hidden theme that Oscar is trying to portray?
I like how you connected the homoerotic relationship from Carmilla to that of this novel. There does seem to be a big theme of homosexuality playing out in the past couple of Irish novels that we have read. I wonder if it’s coincidence or if Irish gothic novels are known for this theme of homosexuality.
Thanks for your insight, it helped me more critically analyze my own ideas.
Hey Joy,
ReplyDeleteI have to agree this book is not exactly a “light” read. With all the different elements and themes to the novel I do not think that there is such a thing as overanalyzing it. I feel we need a whole month to really grasp a good understanding of the novel.
I love the connection that you made between The Picture of Dorian Gray and “The Tell Tale Heart,” which by the way is my favorite piece by Poe. Now that I think about it, the similarities between the characters reactions to the heart in the floorboards and the portrait in the attic are quite remarkable.
It is quite interesting that two Irish novels hinting toward homosexuality were published in the late-nineteenth century, when it was such a taboo subject. It seems a little strange that The Picture of Dorian Gray was made out to be such an immoral book for its implications, when Carmilla was not nearly as harshly criticized. Like I said in Lucky’s blog, I think that the vampires threw the homophobes off. Oscar Wilde’s liaisons with other men did not appear to come to light until about five years after the book was published so I am not sure why his novel was criticized so ruthlessly. You would think Carmilla would have been criticized more, especially when you take into account the fact that it was published eighteen years prior to Wilde’s novel. I am actually unclear as to when the criticism for The Picture of Dorian Gray began. Was it when it was first released, or was it not until Wilde’s homosexuality and charges of “gross indecency” came to light? Either way, the real question is why homosexuality was alluded to in both these novels given the time? Was it mere coincidence, or was there some more important reason, which went right over my head, as to why it is present in these novels?