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Pavlína Hlúpiková

Mgr. Igor Tyšš

Literature 2 – British Literature of the 19th century

17 January 2016

Elements of a Gothic novel in The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Picture of Dorian Gray, written by Oscar Wilde is one of the most known classics
of the Victorian era. It is actually Wilde's only novel and it was firstly published in
Lippincott's Magazine. The book was hatefully condemned by English critics because they
said it was a bad book for the wrong and moralistic reasons. Also a court agreed with this
opinion, because Wilde had to later explain his intimate friendships with young men. Oscar
Wilde was a typical representative of decadence. Decadence is a term which emerged at the
end of 19 century and at the beginning of the 20 century and the meaning of this term is
decay. Decadence is a artistic and literary movement associated with French writers. It was
originally a defamatory term for every single French poet, who turned away from traditions.
Decadents in general were artists, poets and writers who were against the ruling classicism,
rationalism and belief in progress. Decadent writers were showing how much they were
disgusted by society by kind of escape to the so called pure art, emphasizing feelings of
boredom, despair, futility, sadness, pessimism or skepticism. They were trying to escape from
the real world, which was too tight into the world of dreams and mysticism. Decadent tones
and themes are often connected with symbolist theme. Oscar Wilde reveals a typical decadent
sign, disinterest in morality, even in “The Preface” to ”The Picture of Dorian Gray” where he
wrote that ”There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or
badly written. That is all.” (Wilde 5)

As I already said, The Picture of Dorian Gray is one of the most known works of the
Victorian era, which begins in 1837, because that is the year when Victoria became a Queen,
and it lasts till 1901, because that is the year when she dies. She was the longest-reigning
British monarch in the world history until the last year, when Elizabeth II, her great-great-
granddaughter superseded her. This period brought to the worldwide literature a huge amount
of literary works, which are worthy of attention or notice. However, there was one specific
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genre - the British Gothic novel - which became one of the most popular genres of the late
18th and early 19th centuries. The Picture of Dorian Gray is a great example of Gothic novel
and the goal of this essay is to show the elements of this genre in The Picture of Dorian Gray.

To achieve this goal, I decided to not divide this essay into some sections but just
focus on the main thing which is characterize the British Gothic novel, talk about the elements
of this genre in The Picture of Dorian Gray and to prove them by using excerpts from the
novel.

GOTHIC NOVEL

Before I will characterize what the Gothic novel actually is, it's important to say what
the term ”Gothic” means. From a historical point of view, “Gothic“ was a tribe from
Germany, also called Goths, who “destroyed classical Roman civilization and plunged the
civilized world into centuries of ignorance and darkness.“ (Dryden 24) Nowadays a term
“Gothic“ is usually connected with architecture or with some kind of subculture. “The Gothic
novel, or in an alternative term, Gothic romance, is a type of prose fiction which was
inaugurated by Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto: A Gothic Story (1764) - the subtitle
refers to its setting in the middle ages - and flourished through the early nineteenth century.“
(Abrahams 111) Not everyone was following Walpole's example and some writers set their
stories for example in Spain or Italy. “The term “Gothic“ has also been extended to a type of
fiction which lacks the exotic setting of the earlier romances, but develops a brooding
atmosphere of gloom and terror, represents events that are uncanny or macabre or
melodramatically violent, and often deals with aberrant psychological states.“ (Abrahams
111)

In the Gothic novels there're some common motifs or elements which can be find
almost in every literary work which is marked as gothic. One of the most known elements is
the supernatural. In The Picture of Dorian Gray is more than just one supernatural motif but
the most noticeable is actually that one which makes the plot works and it's that Dorian's face
and body don't change from this moment: “I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not
die. I am jealous of the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must lose?
Every moment that passes takes something from me, and gives something to it. Oh, if it were
only the other way! If the picture could change, and I could be always what I am now! Why
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did you paint it? It will mock me some day - mock me horribly!“ (Wilde 55) and instead of it
the portrait changes. It's something what doesn't happen in a real life. The other gothic
element which we can't rationally explain and occurs in this work is at the end of the book,
when Dorian is so angry that he wants to destroy portrait of himself which shows him what
person he really is. He doesn't expect that by trying to ruin the portrait, by trying to be free, he
is actually killing himself: “He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. There was a
cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its agony that the frightened servants woke,
and crept out of their rooms (...) When they entered they found, hanging upon the wall, a
splendid portrait of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his exquisite
youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in evening dress, with a knife in his
heart. He was withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined
the rings that they recognised who it was.“

The second gothic element, which is very important is an atmosphere of mystery and
suspense. This scary atmosphere is created many times during the whole story, especially
from the moment when Dorian starts to enjoy that the portrait is changing instead of him and
does all those “bad“ things because he knows his physical beauty will not change at all. In my
opinion, the most frightening moment creating scary atmosphere is, when Dorian decides to
show Basil, creator of painting, a room where the portrait is and when a thought of killing him
comes to his mind: “He glanced wildly around. Something glimmered on the top of the
painted chest that faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a knife that he
had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, and had forgotten to take away with
him. He moved slowly towards it, passing Hallward as he didso. As soon as he got behind
him, he seized it, and turned round.“ (Wilde 442) The other scene when we can feel a little bit
scared is when Dorian visits opium den: “After a little time he heard steps in the passage, and
the chain being unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a word to
the squat misshapen figure that flattened itself into the shadow as he passed.“ (Wilde 372)
After this moment we know what places Dorian visits, what he does and what people meet
there. It shows us who Dorian really is. The two other scenes which create tension and
mystery are connected with Sibyl's brother, James. The first one is when he follows Dorian
from opium den and wants to kill him: “In a second he heard the click of a revolver, and saw
the gleam of a polished barrel pointing straight at his head, and the dusky form of a short
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thick-set man facing him.“ (Wilde 380) and then when he follows him at Selby Royal. As I
already mentioned, there're much more scenes with an atmosphere of mystery and suspense.

Duality is not only a gothic element in The Picture of Dorian Gray, but it also
describes Victorian society, which was hypocritical. Oscar Wilde was inspired by this
attribute and he applied it on the main character, Dorian. Dorian separates his soul from the
body and creates his own. It caused by his wish and he is able to live a double life and no one
knows about it.

The last gothic element in my essay, but not the last one in The Picture of Dorian Gray
is a devil. Term “Devil, as portrayed in Judaism and Christianity, stands as a spirit of
incarnate evil who rules over a dark kingdom. This spirit stands in constant opposition to
God.“ (Thomson 5). At first glance Dorian is the one who seems to be devil in this work but
when we focus on it we find out that the real devil is Henry Wotton. At the beginning of the
story is Dorian innocent boy until he meets Henry: “Because you have the most marvellous
youth, and youth is the one thing worth having.”

“I don’t feel that, Lord Henry.”

“No, you don’t feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled and ugly, when thought
has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion branded your lips with its hideous fires,
you will feel it, you will feel it terribly.“ (Wilde 42) This leads Dorian to say he doesn't want
to change and instead of it he would be happy if the portrait had changed.

CONSLUSION

By analysing The Picture of Dorian Gray I tried to focus on gothic elements in this
novel written by Oscar Wilde. There're much more elements than I mentioned, for example
yellow book as a magical object or revenge of Sibyl's death. Even The Picture of Dorian Gray
is not a typical Gothic novel, I tried to pointed out some characteristic signs of this genre
which occurs in this novel and maybe when you read it for the first time, you don't even
notice them or maybe you don't understand them as they're meant to be understood.
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Works Cited

ABRAHAMS, M. H. A Glossary of literary terms, Rinehart English Pamphlets: New York,

DRYDEN, Linda. The Modern Gothic and Literary Doubles: Stevenson, Wilde, and Wells.
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. ISBN 1-4039-0510-X.

THOMSON, D.H. A Glossary of Literary Gothic Terms, Saylor Academy. Web

WILDE, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Penguin Classics: London, 2007. ISBN 978-0-
14-062322-2.