There are moralizing books. There are reflective books. There are inquisitive books. And yet, the most fascinating of them all is a poisonous book. Poisonous is too ambiguous a word to use in this context, but it is certainly a suggestive book. When Wilde set out to write Dorian Gray, the Victorian Era was drawing to a close. Curiosity became the primary, and only excuse, for people’s lavish explorations. The sins that were untouched were soon caressed, and to exhaust the soul, one at times exhausted the body. The Picture of Dorian Gray, even in its last hour, isn’t a moral sermon. It is the ultimate result of what follows when one’s subdued conscience reveals itself in a horrifying realization. And that is why, unlike Huysmans’s A’Rebours, Dorian Gray isn’t vivacious in details of corruption, but in details of indulgence, debauchery, and repentance. It isn’t certain while alluding to the gamut of poisons, but it teases them so effortlessly.
I’ve been reading the book for more than a month, even though it is spread across 200 odd pages with an introduction. I’ve come to realize the pages and your pace are never proportional. I’ve spent hours musing on mere lines. I’ve learnt to savour their paradoxical questions. I feel satisfied I took quite some time to finish it, else I would have been very distant from the world Dorian walks through. It has been nothing short of a rich reading experience. And much like its eponymous lead, the immorality in things fascinates me. But can a book ever be a corrupting influence, like Dorian Gray is to countless young men and women who he has blinded with infinite desire for new sensations? Here is what Wilde had to say when he vehemently defended that, immorality through text is nothing but false propaganda –
“Each man sees his own sin in Dorian Gray. What Dorian Gray’s sins are no one knows. He who finds them has brought them”
The first time I gazed at these sentences, I read them again. I read them over and over, flipping the page back and forth. Was it really true that I only saw sins that I envisioned in Dorian’s actions, or was it laid before me explicitly? I revisited every chapter, but I couldn’t find detailed descriptions of Dorian’s quests for pleasures in the immoral realm, with of course, the exception of an opium indulgence, and his seasonal indulgences in raiment, perfume, music and jewellery. But the latter was never an overt sin, as society would perceive, and would appear more so as aristocratic profligacy. Dorian had merely transcended to a plane of indulgence higher than his compatriots. But his actions of instilling corruption in the brightest of hearts are brought to the fore by Basil Hallward. However, never is it mentioned what pleasures or sins Dorian chose to plant in their minds. Even when he coerces Alan Campbell with a note, we are never shown the contents of that threatening message. We are left to our own imagination as to what those pleasures or sins could be. At times, these lines make me wonder, was Wilde too optimistic in his defiant resistance, or did Dorian Gray be more than just a mirror of one’s own sins?
I did something unusual for the first time, for a book of philosophical fiction. I jotted down everything my mind imagined during key exchanges and ruminations. I felt that I might be overdoing reading for pleasure, likening it to what would be an academic pursuit. The most obvious thing I could note was that everything was a chain of influence. When Henry teased the vanity in Dorian during their stroll in Basil’s garden, it set forth a chain of influence on ideas and thoughts, passing from one character to another. Henry’s epigram was that the soul should be cured by the senses, and to accomplish this, the senses must never be denied the opportunity to experience something new. Dorian builds his life around this, and he finds immeasurable fascination as he watches others seek new sensations, the same way Henry experienced fascination when he set Dorian on the same course.
But what made the novel extremely endearing was its exchanges. I’m not going to define it, because to define is to limit, as Henry exchanges words with his cousin Gladys. The countless comparisons to history itself, and the innumerable questions on existence and the purpose of art all make it seem enticingly paradoxical. Henry’s aphorisms for one, although passed with a tinge of contempt or more at times, ridicule mankind and the history of civilization, which was a cause for concern amongst the novel’s disgruntled readers. I was never concerned with the authenticity of the refuting claims made by the characters, but the brilliant style in which they were written and delivered. I still find it fascinating, because, excitement doesn’t exist in conformity. Even if they may appear condescending, the very fact that they dare to talk against firm beliefs and superstitions, makes them immediately captivating. Wilde’s choice of words in interplays, make the whole scene feel as though two Romans were exchange blows with sharp edged swords.
Going back to my very first statement. I mentioned that The Picture of Dorian Gray is a suggestive book. And it did what it was crafted to do, it did suggest to me, as a reader. I shunned from reading the preface before I began the book. I kept it a point to read it once I completed the very last verse of the novel. I came back to what Wilde had to say in his preface. And as I did, I got the most succinct yet philosophical sentences on art, where Wilde even signs off by saying –
‘All art is quite useless’
Wilde was a romanticist, and he felt that every reader indulges in any work of art by exercising their own free will, and in doing so, engage at their peril. If we find something real, we must not blame the artist. For each artist, morality and immorality are the two colours with which they would paint perfectly on imperfect mediums. Their words may never subsume actions or be representative of them, but they will still try. The author must never side with morality or immorality, as art is merely spectative. If one chooses to go further down, to plunge in search of meaning, he again, does so at his own peril, he states. But what does he imply through the above statement? Is art useless because it is spectative? Or is it because it never chooses sides on the scale of morality and immorality? Then again comes the question, what could art be? Can it be something more than spectative or reflective? For the man himself, style precedes right and wrong in art.
Apart from diverse world views, The Picture of Dorian Gray has shown me the two sides of hedonism, debauchery, and decadence. The fascination of all new sensations on one side, and the tussle with our own conscience for indulging on the other. It has also given me a new perspective on who a critic is. I would like to join the definition of Wilde’s term as a critic, and not what society perceives it to be. And if his definition were to hold, all of us are critics in our everyday lives –
“The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful thing.”
But I’m afraid this breed of critics are fast dying. I enjoy reading impressions that certain others hold while regarding any work of art or the presents bestowed by the world itself. But, those who take to writing, and including myself in that list, inject our own flames into the words we write. Our own anger must be kept at bay when trying to cast our impressions. I doubt that would be possible in our modern day and age, but it will have to be a conscious effort.
I’m not going to slice and dice the novel anymore, and in doing so, take the edge and excitement you would get in reading the novel yourself. I have gained a lot from Wilde’s only novel, and wish to read it again, with the weather of another season, down the road of time. But for now, I have decided to move onto Albert Camus’s L’Étranger or The Stranger. I look forward to the new perspectives it could give me, and the impressions I can impart, after indulging in it myself.
Beyond Four Corners 