The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray

Oscar Wilde must have felt about The Picture of Dorian Gray the same way Basil Hallward felt about his portrait of Dorian Gray when he said: "An artist should create beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. If I live, I will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall never see my portrait of Dorian Gray." (Wilde, O. The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray. p. 68. United States of America: Harvard University Press, 2012). It felt like it was Oscar Wilde saying those words, not Basil Hallward. Maybe Oscar Wilde at some point thought people would see too much of him in his novel, as they (perhaps incorrectly) in fact do.

  This original version of the novel is immensely more beautiful than the 1891 version I had previously read. Mainly because Basil's romance for Dorian Gray becomes crystal clear, and Dorian's bisexual promiscuity becomes more crude. The story becomes more honest. But also because the novel is excised of dull and banal chapters and characters. Like James Vane, and the uninteresting chapter about his improbable death. In fact, I was extremely happy to see that the things I did not adore of the 1891 version of the novel were not in fact part of the original typescript. The result of going back to the original version is a more compact and more powerful narrative, short enough to be effortlessly read in just one day.

  I feel so grateful to be living in an age where The Picture of Dorian Gray has been published as Oscar Wilde wanted it in the first place. I will go as far as to say that now that we have this version widely available, no one should ever read neither the 1890 Lippincot's version, nor the 1891 version of The Picture of Dorian Gray. They are a completely different story that lost perfection the moment they tainted it with their censorship.

  So, if Oscar Wilde did feel what Basil Hallward felt upon finishing his portrait, why did he end up publishing the novel? Perhaps we can find the answer in Basil Hallward once again, when he later changes his mind and says: "[I]t seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I had said anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour, that is all." (Wilde, O. The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray. p. 145. United States of America: Harvard University Press, 2012).

The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays

The five plays contained in the book are:

  2. Lady Windermere's Fan
  4. Salome
  2. A Woman of No Importance
  1. An Ideal Husband
  3. The Importance of Being Earnest

In order of appearance, and indexed according to my preference. I was mildly disillusioned with some of the plays. Particularly with The Importance of Being Earnest, because I thought it was absurd without being charming. Whereas my favourite of the plays, An Ideal Husband, was witty, funny, and entertaining.

  However, in general, the plays pale in comparison to the genius of The Picture of Dorian Gray. Mainly because Oscar Wilde takes his supercilious characters to the extreme, forcing wit into some lines which only results in hollow banality. And, in the case of Salome, the play was plain boring.

  This collection of plays definitely leaves me with mixed feelings.

The Complete Short Stories

Debo decir que la verdad no me gustaron tanto los cuentos como pensé que me iban a gustar. Antes de este libro, The Picture of Dorian Gray era lo único que había leído de Oscar Wilde y me había parecido maestrísimo. Especialmente el prefacio, pues lo que dice sobre el arte es básicamente lo que yo también pienso sobre el arte actualmente, sentí que realmente había una comunión entre mis ideas y el prefacio.

       En general los cuentos no son malos, simplemente son mundanos. A pesar de lo anterior, sí hubo dos cuentos que me agradaron en particular: The Nightingale and the Rose y The Birthday of the Infanta. El primero que mencioné porque siento que expresa lo vacía que es esta vida, que uno le puede otorgar importancia suprema a una cosa, pensando que es lo más importante en esta vida, hacemos sacrificios, simplemente para que otra persona no le de la misma importancia y deseche en un instante todo el esfuerzo y el sacrificio que se hizo. El segundo porque es muy cruel, habla del sufrimiento y de cómo te puede destruir, te cambia la vida, y que además, no le importa tu sufrimiento a las personas que te hicieron sufrir; hay gente muy cruel en este mundo. Creo que es bastante común pensar que el sufrimiento es inútil, así justo como Oscar Wilde escribió en su cuento Lord Arthur Savile's Crime: "And yet it was not the mystery, but the comedy of suffering that struck him; its absolute uselessness, its grotesque want of meaning. How incoherent everything seemed! How lacking in all harmony! He was amazed at the discord between the shallow optimism of the day, and the real facts of existence. He was still very young." (Wilde, O. The Complete Short Stories. p. 12. Reino Unido de Gran Bretaña e Irlanda del Norte: Oxford University Press, 2010). Pero aquí creo que debo disentir del pensamiento de que el sufrimiento es inútil. Creo que el uso del sufrimiento es aprender de él, para no volver a sufrir, por lo menos no por la misma causa, y esto es algo que debemos recordar de la novela de Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and Damned, uno debe aprender de sus errores para no cometerlos en el futuro. Esto es muy difícil, sí, lo sé por experiencia propia; así que sólo nos queda tratar de ser fuertes y tener la determinación, la sabiduría, para no dejar que el sufrimiento sea inútil.