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he is a Narcissus,
the loser who felt in love with his own reflection
But Beauty, real Beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins.
There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one’s fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit quietly and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat.
The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it.
“every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the coloured canvas, reveals himself.
pink-petalled daisy from the grass, and examined it. “I am quite sure I shall understand it,”
i don’t remember why anymore, but pink was associated with homosexuality in Victorian england. then Lord Harry says ‘I shall understand it,’ looking at the pink flower.
The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy lilac blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup in the grass, and a long thin dragon-fly floated by on its brown gauze wings.
i really love wilde’s empahsis on the art form here. how visual the whole narration is.
I knew that I had come face to face with some one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself.
I have always been my own master; had at least always been so till I met Dorian Gray.
the penny newspapers, which is the nineteenth-century standard of immortality.
play with christian ideology. immortality; eternal life.
‘Sir Humpty Dumpty—you
“Laughter is not a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is the best ending for one,”
You like every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one.”
The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one believes it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices.
But a few minutes with somebody one worships mean a great deal.” “But you don’t really worship him?” “I do.” “How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but your painting—your art, I should say. Art sounds better, doesn’t it?” “He is all my art to me now.
He has stood as Paris in dainty armour, and as Adonis with huntsman’s cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with heavy lotus-blossoms, he has sat on the prow of Adrian’s barge, looking into the green, turbid Nile. He has leaned over the still pool of some Greek woodland, and seen in the waters’ silent silver the wonder of his own beauty. But he is much more to me than that.
MORE THAN THE TWO GREATEST MALE BEAUTIES OF PAGAN GREECE….
‘A dream of form in days of thought,’—who is it who says that? I forget;—but it is what Dorian Gray has been to me.
that is crazy. dorian gray is art in this ‘day of thought’ of victorian england damn
It is a sad thing to think of, but there is no doubt that Genius lasts longer than Beauty. That accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to overeducate ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place.
And the mind of the thoroughly well informed man is a dreadful thing.
sorry (coughs heavily) notes from underground…
The worst of having a romance is that it leaves one so unromantic.”
Those who are faithful know only the pleasures of love; it is the faithless who know love’s tragedies.”
WILDE STOPPPP ITS THE FIRST CHAPTER THERES TOO MANY GOOD QUOTES ALREADY
When Aunt Agatha sits down to the piano she makes quite enough noise for two people.”
HILARIOUS
He was made to be worshipped.
no homo
“But what about my man at the Orleans?”
hehehe he left ‘his’ man in the orleans for another man
The aim of life is self-development. To realise one’s nature perfectly—that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to oneself. Of course they are charitable. They feed the hungry, and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion,—these are the two things that govern us. And yet . . .”
really interesting to read the hedonistic and egoistic philosophies of late victprian england which caused, um. a domino effect. which many decades later turned into this 21st century mess
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it—and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful.
(theres no way im being converted to believing in hedonism but a fraction of this quote is true. yield to temptation, but also bring yourself up to the Lord. His power will defeat temptation)
It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also.
It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire.
“Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul.”
good quote but also a theme of the novel now is made quite clear: sensuality and the soul
im very sorry again (coughs heavily) brothers karamazov…
flower-like hands,
Beauty is a form of Genius, is higher indeed than Genius, as it needs no explanation. It is one of the great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It cannot be questioned. It has its Divine right of sovereignty.
idolatry of beauty
The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.
“A new Hedonism! That is what our century wants. You might be its visible symbol.
mmmm so thats what wilde’s saying. now idk if he’s against hedonism so far but his characters sure are hedonists
Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth!”
actually Lord Henry is kinda obviously tempting him with all this emphasis on how temporary his beauty is
The only difference between a caprice, and a life-long passion, is that the caprice lasts a little longer.”
HAHAHAHA TRUE
“In that case, let our friendship be a caprice,”
?!?!?!?!
Man is many things, but he is not rational.
i am really very sorry (coughs again) notes from underground… brothers karamazov… devils… the idiot… crime and punishment…
“Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the one in the picture?”
that foreshadowing is insane
“Don’t go to the theatre to-night, Dorian,” said Hallward. “Stop and dine with me.” “I can’t really.” “Why?” “Because I have promised Lord Henry to go with him.”
oscar wilde when he invented gay love triangles
forget-me-not eyes.
whats with all of this flower imagery
“I am afraid I must be going,” exclaimed Lady Henry,
harry did say they always lie to each other
I do everything you say.”
well how influenced dorian is by harry is interesting given harry’s previous speech about influence being immoral. harry is being consciously immoral, then.
I remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful night when we first dined together, about the search for beauty being the poisonous secret of life.
wilde’s choice to not show us that dinner is. a decision.
In art, as in politics, les grandpères ont toujours tort.”
Of so now it's glaringly obvious that lord Henry is consistently quipping on the 'old generation' and their philosophies right from the beginning with his first remark on ‘old men’.
Your voice and the voice of Sybil Vane are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear them, and each of them says something different. I don’t know which to follow. Why should I not love her?
No way. Sybil is a direct parallel of lord Henry. What. That ‘How can I not love her?’ is talking about him too.
the only thing worth loving is an actress?”
Bruh I just realised: Dorian is an image, and he falls in love with an actress
like a good boy:
Dorian gets that from the man who painted him and now from the man with extraordinary influence over him
When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving oneself, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls romance.
“To-night she is Imogen,” he answered, “and to-morrow night she will be Juliet.” “When is she Sybil Vane?” “Never.” “I congratulate you.”
Sybil is like Dorian, then.
You, who know all the secrets of life,
?!?!? that’s explicitly calling Harry the devil
