Possible Influences on Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray

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Oscar Wilde’s writing of The Picture of Dorian Gray was possibly influenced by a variety of factors, both personal and external. His unique personality made him stand out from the crowd, but he was doomed to embrace his beautiful yet tragic life in the meanwhile.

Wilde’s personal experiences were a major influence on the novel. Firstly, He was born in Dubin, Ireland, in 1854. By that time, there was a significant wealth disparity between different classes, and he was blessed to be born into a well-off and highly respected family, giving him an exclusive opportunity to overlook various states of human beings without being forced to experience them himself. Secondly, he was highly educated, attending Trinity College in Dublin and then Oxford University in England, where he studied classics and literature, which brought him great wits and intelligence. Thirdly, he was a well-traveled man, visiting many countries extensively throughout Europe, including France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and the United States. His family background, and experiences in these places, combined with his research in the humanities, undoubtedly informed his writing and shaped the themes and characters of the novel, as he was physically and spiritually exposed to different cultures and ways of life. Some considered there was a projection of Wilde in the novel. For example, the character of Lord Henry Wotton, who is a hedonistic and cynical figure, is likely based on Wilde himself. In the novel, he says, “the only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.” The quote reflects Wilde’s own philosophy of life, which was to embrace pleasure and beauty.

As mentioned, espoused values of Wilde also played a role in his writing. First, heavily influenced by the Aesthetic Movement of the late 19th century, Wilde’s views on morality and aesthetics were extreme. He was a loyal proponent of aestheticism, promoting the idea of “art of art’s sake,” which is the belief that art should be judged and appreciated solely on its beauty and not for any sake, like moral or political implications. This likely had a great influence on his writing, as he was able to explore themes of beauty and morality without worrying about the consequences. As a reflection of his advocacy of that idea, the hero of this novel, Dorian Gray, demonstrates his life aesthetically that he is obsessed with beauty and pleasure and consequently destroyed by his own vanity. Second, He also promoted his idea of “the mask,” which advocates that people should be able to express themselves without fear of judgment or criticism. A counterexample can be found in the role of Dorian, who is able to hide his true self behind a mask of beauty and pleasure, and who is ultimately destroyed by his mask, too. Additionally, Wilde was a proponent of the philosophy of nihilism, which emphasizes the lack of meaning or purpose in life. This is seen in the novel’s exploration of Dorian’s pursuit of pleasure and the consequences of his actions, specifically, how he lives his beautifully useless life, which presents the novel’s overall theme of the emptiness of life.

On top of Wilde’s bold philosophical values, Wilde himself was also a complex individual. He was dealing with a number of personal struggles at the time he wrote the novel. These included his homosexuality, his strained relationship with his father, and his financial difficulties. It can be said that his unusual sexual orientation at that time was a double-edged sword, as it had enabled him to occupy a place in the market to realize his artistic pursuits. However, this was also the culprit of having a strained relationship with his father, who was a successful doctor and expected Wilde to follow in his footsteps rather than choose to pursue a career in writing and the arts. His father was also very conservative and disapproved of Wilde’s flamboyant and eccentric behavior, and that was also common among contemporary powerholders that illustrated disapproval of Wilde’s pursuit, which further became a significant reason that Wilde suffered from financial difficulties throughout his life. Furthermore, he experienced his most severe financial difficulties beginning in 1895 when he was sued for libel by the Marquess of Queensberry and was subsequently convicted of gross indecency. These struggles are reflected in the novel in the way that Dorian Gray is constantly trying to escape his own reality and find solace in the world of art and beauty.

In addition to personal factors, some external factors also likely influenced Wilde, which involved the social pressure and the political climate of that time. The Picture of Dorian Gray was written during a time of great social and political upheaval in England, which was near the end of the Victorian era, and with it, the rigid social conventions and moral codes that had been in place for so long were also being loosened. This shift in social mores allowed for a greater degree of freedom of expression, and Wilde was one of the first to take advantage of this. The potential effects of this climate on Wilde’s writing were twofold. On the one hand, it allowed him to explore themes and ideas that had previously been considered taboo, such as homosexuality, hedonism, and the pursuit of pleasure. On the other hand, although the moderation in social pressure had relatively mitigated the pain caused by the shackles on the feet of dancing writers, the essence of nature hadn’t changed by any means. Thus, Wilde had to be careful not to push the boundaries too far, as he could be subject to censorship or even persecution for his work. As a result, he had to cautiously craft his work in such a way that it would be accepted from the press to the public, while still being able to express his own ideas and opinions. As a matter of fact, roughly 500 words were removed solely by the press prior to the publication of the novel, even if it was already short and concise as well as self-censored enough assessing by today’s criterion. For instance, in one scene, Basil Hallward confesses to have worshipped Dorian Gray with a “romance of feeling”, and that he had never loved a woman. Besides, being reflected in the novel to the rise of the Suffragette movement and the increasing power of the working class, in the way that Dorian Gray is constantly attempting to maintain his public image and avoid scandal; In the way that he is ultimately brought down by his own actions.

Lastly, apart from the matters of society and politics, it can also be seen that the works of other authors that Wilde was familiar with could influence his writing. Wilde was a great admirer of the works of Romantic poets, such as John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley. This is reflected in the hero of the novel, Dorian Gray, who is a romantic figure who can transcend the mundane and find beauty in the world. Wilde was also heavily influenced by the works of the French Symbolists, such as Charles Baudelaire and Paul Verlaine to whom Wilde’s use of language and poetic structure is similar, as evidenced by his use of imagery, symbolism, and themes of decadence and beauty. In his poem “The Harlot’s House”, Wilde uses imagery to evoke a sense of decadence and beauty, which is a common theme in the works of the French Symbolists. He also uses symbolism to explore common themes of love, death, and the human condition, which are also common themes in the works of the French Symbolists. Also, especially for The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde lifted many quotes from other’s books, cannibalized two of the novel’s sources for near-verbatim citations in the text, and closely paraphrases the conclusion to Pater’s era-shaping art-historical treatise, of which the author was an aesthetic sage whom Wilde admired at Oxford.

There is no doubt that the factors influencing an author when they craft their masterpiece can be various, and making a prediction of the cause based on the effect may get a result far from reality. However, it is widely believed that the creation of the infamous Dorian Gray and his beauty, dandy, impressionability, and petulance is not out of nowhere. In conclusion, there are several factors, both from the perspective of Wilde’s personality and the outcome of social effects, accompanied by Wilde’s life filling with tragedy and heartache, which play an essential role in the formulation of the themes and characters and help to make it a timeless classic.