Dorian's Conscience In 'A Picture Of Dorian Gray'

He admits to Lord Henry that he goes nightly to her plays but does not truly love Sibyl, he loves the feeling of pleasure he gets from his obsession. He idolized her and calls her sacred but does not value her as a person. When asked by Harry, “When is she Sibyl Vane?” Dorian replies, “Never” (Wilde,54). This is the beginnings of Dorian’s ability to place his own pleasure above others and Dorian has immediately lost himself in this pleasure. “What there was in it of purely sensuous instinct of boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, changed into something that seemed to the lad himself dangerous. It was the passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most strongly over us” (Wilde,58). The danger of Dorian’s blind obsession is shown with Sibyl’s suicide. His obsession led to the death of one person as well as the first signs of his own worsening soul. After this experience pleasure is no longer a form of love for Dorian, but rather a detachment from reality. While talking with Basil over breakfast Dorian shows he does not place the same value in emotions as he had done before. “A man who is the master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure. I don’t want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them” (Wilde,105). In contrast to the emotional obsession with Sibyl, Dorian next becomes obsessed with his portrait and a book. Both are means to

Shortly after meeting Dorian for the first time, Lord Henry calmly declares, “to influence a person is to give him one’s own soul” (20). In these few words, Lord Henry foreshadows the

Furthermore, Dorian’s moral principles get progressively worse, eventually leading to the murder of Dorian’s longtime friend, Basil Hallward. Dorian acts impulsively and erratically while showing Basil the mutilated portrait, “and suddenly an uncontrollable hatred for Basil Hallward came over him” (115) spurring Dorian to stab Basil repeatedly. Due to his impulsive nature and devotion to seeking pleasure, the moment his anger took over, Dorian chose to ignore his conscience. He retains his childish behavior because he never

Dorian is introduced to Lord Henry Wotton. Lord Henry Wotton seems at the beginning of the novel to be the most corrupting character in the book, being the catalyst of Dorian Gray?s change in character, or realization of true character. Wotton is a cynical character, and is somewhat of a hypocrite, as Hallward rightly says (paraphrasing Charles 2nds epigram), "You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing" (4). For all his talk, Lord Henry remains a married man who chooses a life as a spectator rather than a carouser (Miller 385). From the instant of their acquaintance, Lord Henry causes an instantaneous difference in Dorian. "Lord Henry lives vicariously on the emotions and experiences of other people" (Shewan 376). Lord Henry awakens in Dorian feelings and thoughts Dorian has never had before, and Dorian feels overcome with awe. When asked about his negative influence on people, Lord Henry says," There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is immoral?Because to influence a person is to give him one?s own soul?" (17). Dorian immediately develops an attachment to Lord Henry, one which Henry claims will be everlasting. Jeffrey Meyers explains, "If Hallward is the masochistic creator of Dorian?s aesthetic glorification, Wotton (who manipulates the vanity stimulated by the portrait) is the sadistic catalyst of his moral degeneration"(372). In fact, Ted Spivey claims that

Basil Hallward and Henry Wotten are quite the opposite of each other—Basil is unwaveringly conventional in his values while Henry instead enjoys entertaining the idea of radical and inappropriate ways of thinking (on page 4, he claims that “the one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary,” to which Basil responds that he “hate[s] the way [Henry] talks about his married life). Because of their profoundly contrasting ideas, they are not so much foils for each other as they are for Dorian Gray. It is by these two men that one measures Dorian’s place on the scale of morality.

! ! 6 “When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others” (49). This quote from Lord Henry is significant, because Lord Henry is foreshadowing what Dorian is about to do to Sibyl, and how her love will betray her. 7 “I feel as if something horrible were going to happen to some of us.

Lord Henry presents to Dorian the effect of living life to the fullest but interchangeably, Lord Henry is afraid of life and the decisions to make for himself (Dawson). Lord Henry 's outlook on life is based on the New Hedonism, the complete opposite of the typical Victorian Society, thus creating another distraction for Dorian and a yearning for a deeper understanding on how to be different from everyone else and enjoy life (Liebman). New Hedonism is a different outlook on life revolving around enjoying life to the fullest with total happiness and satisfaction. In learning this from Lord Henry, Dorian claims that the only true happiness is to live life in someone else 's shoes and just be a spectator (Dawson). Following this new lifestyle from the New Hedonism, according to Lord Henry, Dorian 's attitude severely changes and he soon finds himself stepping into the wild side and observing people and their differences.

Lord Henry feels that, "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..." (Wilde 13). Lord Henry tries to persuade Dorian to believe that listening to his conscience will only bring him pain. Dorian must give into temptation if he wants to be happy. Dorian listens acutely to Henry's words. Dorian now has a justification for ignoring his conscience and acting sinfully. Slowly Henry's influence takes over Dorian's conscience.

As a whole, this opening confrontation between Lord Henry and Dorian’s initial character proves several points: one, Dorian does have his own passions and soul before meeting Lord Henry, and two, Lord Henry’s teachings initially echo Dorian’s own feelings, which are what draw him to Lord Henry over the two-dimensional Basil Hallward. Later, ironically, it is Lord Henry’s own teachings which leads to Dorian’s struggle to repress his "true self" and ultimately bring about his downfall.

While Dickens reveals the power of redemption from evil through good people, Wilde exposes the traumatizing effects of the absence of good people can have on influencing the identity of an originally good-hearted person. Because Henry swayed Dorian to live only for himself and the physical pleasures of life, he corrupted his soul, and therefore, lost opportunities to form relationships with good people, who could have saved him from himself. By the time he realizes he had “tarnished himself,” “filled his mind with corruption,” and “given horror to his fancy,” time has run out to turn his life around (Wilde 206). Wilde implies Lord Henry influences Dorain to the point of no return, and by the time he understands what he has become, he is too

As the novel goes on so does Dorian's life. He begins to be under the control of Lord Henry to some degree. He also begin's to spend more time with Lord Henry, who is

The Picture of Dorian Grey as a novel in the Victorian Era was shocking to readers of the time due to the open nature of topics like: sexuality, greed and corruption. A Freudian perspective of the characters: Basil, Lord Henry and Dorian can be seen as the Id, Ego and Super Ego. Basil is the Super Ego, he conforms to a certain extent and tries to make Dorian lead a moral life when it comes to desperate times of the loss of the 'real Dorian'; Lord Henry can be seen as the Id, the immoral character who tries to convince Dorian to submit to his natural urges and passions; Dorian is the Ego, one who in the beginning is in between the two and has a power struggle within as to how he should act as a character in the novel. In answering this question and exploring the conflicts shown in the novel one must look at the gender, identity and sexuality.

      Sibyl falls head over heels in love with Dorian Gray, willing to commit her life to him after only two weeks. Lady Henry hardly knows her husband, to whom she has been married for some time. Because neither woman is in a stable and comfortable situation, both eventually take drastic measures to move on. Therefore, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, both Sibyl Vane and Lady Henry are weak, flighty, and naive.

I don’t know which to follow.’ (p.46) Dorian discusses with Lord Henry and Basil how Sybil has changed his outlook on life, ‘[h]er trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me…. The mere touch of Sybil’s hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, delightful theories.’ (p. 67) Sybil’s character represents all that Dorian has lost; youth, beauty, innocence and purity. She is unwavering in her devotion to him whereas he is easily influenced by external factors. She represents truth and purity whilst Dorian’s character represents selfishness and deceit.

Lord Henry is captivated by the beauty that others see in Dorian. Lord Henry argues, “Conscience and cowardice are really the same