The Picture of Dorian Gray (Oneworld Classics)

by OscarWilde (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2008

  $3.54

  Published just before he reached the height of his fame, Wilde's only novel has endured as surely as the great plays for which he is celebrated. By exploring the actions of a young man who contracts to retain his outward beauty at the expense of inward corruption - symbolized in a portrait that ages as he stays the same - Wilde achieved a seminal novel that is part fable, part comedy of manners and part treatise on the nature of art and beauty. As the figure in Dorian's portrait changes to reflect Dorian's inner decay, the stage is set for a masterful tale about appearance, reality and the ultimate burden of conscience. A lasting classic of sophisticated wit and playfulness, The Picture of Dorian Gray assembles all the elements of Oscar Wilde's wide-ranging talents in a compelling reinterpretation of the Faustian myth.

• Used

  Paperback
  1998

  $16.64

  In Oscar Wilde's famous novel, Dorian Gray is tempted by Henry Wotton to sell his soul in order to hold on to beauty and youth. Dorian succumbs and murders the portrait painter Basil Haliward, who stands between him and his goal. Though in the end vice is punished and virtue rewarded, the novel remains one of the most important expressions of fin de siecle decadence. It is in the preface to the expanded edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray that Wilde coined the most famous expression of his aesthetic: There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well-written or badly-written. That is all.
  
  Like other Broadview Editions, this edition includes a wide range of materials from the period that help to set the text in context. In particular, the editor locates the text both in relation to elements in the mainstream culture of the day (such as the aesthetes); and in relation to the gay subculture.

• Used

  Hardcover
  1999

  $4.72

  The first World's Classics were introduced by some of the greatest writers of their day, including Virginia Woolf, Graham Greene and T.S. Eliot. In these hardback editions, contemporary novelists including A.S. Byatt and Joyce Carol Oates introduce their favourite classics in original pocketbook size. Echoing the original World's Classics series, the books are produced to gift-book standard with stitched binding, head and tail bands, printed on 60msg paper and featuring matt laminated jackets in a retro-look design. When Dorian Gray gazes upon his own portrait, he makes a wish that his youth and beauty will last forever. Good-natured and easily led, he falls into bad company and a life of debauchery, yet all the time retains his innocent good looks. Only his portrait reveals the true corruption of his soul.

• New

  Paperback
  1992

  $7.43

  With an Introduction and Notes by John M.L. Drew, University of Buckingham. Wilde's only novel, first published in 1890, is a brilliantly designed puzzle, intended to tease conventional minds with its exploration of the myriad interrelationships between art, life, and consequence. From its provocative Preface, challenging the reader to believe in 'art for art's sake', to its sensational conclusion, the story self-consciously experiments with the notion of sin as an element of design. Yet Wilde himself underestimated the consequences of his experiment, and its capacity to outrage the Victorian establishment. Its words returned to haunt him in his court appearances in 1895, and he later recalled the 'note of doom' which runs like 'a purple thread' through its carefully crafted prose.

• New

  hardcover
  

  $18.61

  Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design. Enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, Dorian Gray exchanges his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Influenced by his friend Lord Henry Wotton, he is drawn into a corrupt double life; indulging his desires in secret while remaining a gentleman in the eyes of polite society. Only his portrait bears the traces of his decadence. The novel was a succes de scandale and the book was later used as evidence against Wilde at the Old Bailey in 1895. It has lost none of its power to fascinate and disturb.