The Picture of Dorian Gray

by Oscar Wilde

When I find that I am growing old, I shall kill myself.”

“He is very good-looking,” assented Lord Henry.

I think my husband has got seventeen of them.”

We discover that Henry must be quite interested in Dorian’s appearance, and the photographs serve as mini portraits of Dorian and connect Henry’s interest with Basil’s adoration. It seems that Dorian cannot escape being copied everywhere he goes.

“Ah! that is one of Harry’s views, isn’t it, Mr. Gray?

Dorian’s phrases have begun to mimic Lord Henry’s, a sign that Henry's hedonistic ideas have already wormed their way into Dorian's thoughts

“Because they are so sentimental.” “But I like sentimental people.” “Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, because they are curious: both are disappointed.”

Marriage is not seen as a deep bond but rather an inconvenience or a meaningless vow. It's sort of like a ticket one needs to punch or purchase to stay at a certain level of society, but nothing more. Real love is said to be outside the realm of a vow like marriage, but this makes it seem unattainable and almost unreal. Lord Henry’s brash statements about Genius and women cut down Dorian’s joy and show a very simplified view of the world.

“My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over morals.”

It was Romeo and Juliet.

The mention of Romeo and Juliet, the most fateful, tragic story of young love, echoing the loss of innocence that Henry forecast in the garden, is ominous

Ordinary women never appeal to one’s imagination. They are limited to their century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious.

He lives the poetry that he cannot write.

I think it's about the difference between living life and writing about it. There's an idea that poetry expresses something 'more beautiful' than life or reality - so in this quotation, the person doing the living is experiencing the beautifulness of life (but not writing about it), and the 'others' are writing poetry about things they might not ever do. 'Realise' in this sense means 'make real'.

“But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature’s test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy.”

“They create love in our natures. They have a right to demand it back.”

Love is a more wonderful thing than art.”

You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were bored. I was bored.”

“you have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don’t even stir my curiosity.

mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! You are nothing to me now.

She had often mimicked death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her with him.

she died, as Juliet might have died.

They say that you corrupt every one with whom you become intimate,

too clever for a woman.

Scepticism is the beginning of faith.”