The Picture of Dorian Gray

Oscar Wilde, 1891

Oscar Wilde’s novel of Dorian Gray, a beautiful young man in London who wishes that his portrait would grow old in his place, and who is drawn into a life of pleasure by the witty Lord Henry Wotton.

Start reading21 chapters, about 80,000 words

Famous quotes

The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.
In context
- Writing
The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.
The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
- Morality
No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
- Truth & Lies
All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.
The PrefaceIn context
- Art
All art is quite useless.
In context
- Art
There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
Chapter IIn context
- Fame
- Talking
The commonest thing is delightful if only one hides it.
In context
You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties.
Chapter IIn context
- Marriage
- Truth & Lies
Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know
Chapter IIn context
- Character
Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter.
Chapter IIn context
- Art
As for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it is quite incredible.
Chapter IIn context
- Faith
“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.”
Chapter IIn context
- Courage
- Morality
Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far the best ending for one
Chapter IIn context
- Friendship
- Laughter
A man can’t be too careful in the choice of his enemies.
In context
I can’t help detesting my relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand other people having the same faults as ourselves.
Chapter IIn context
- Family
Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices.
Chapter IIn context
- Ideas
I like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no principles better than anything else in the world.
Chapter IIn context
- Character
“Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions.”
Chapter IIn context
- Poetry
Genius lasts longer than beauty.
Chapter IIn context
- Beauty
- Genius
The mind of the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a bric-à-brac shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above its proper value.
In context
- Education
Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know love’s tragedies.
In context
- Love
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
Chapter IIIn context
- Morality
Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes.
Chapter IIIIn context
- Failure
- Wisdom
Punctuality is the thief of time.
In context
- Time
Men marry because they are tired; women because they are curious. Both are disappointed.
A Woman of No Importance (1893), Act IIIIn context
- Marriage
When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one’s self, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance.
Chapter IVIn context
- Love
Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them.
Chapter VIn context
To be in love is to surpass one’s self.
Chapter VIn context
- Love
I love acting. It is so much more real than life.
In context
- Acting
There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love.
Chapter VIIIn context
- Love
We live in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities.
In context
There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we feel that no one else has a right to blame us.
In context
One can always be kind to people about whom one cares nothing.
In context
It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style.
In context
Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man’s face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the moulding of his hands even.
Chapter XIIIn context
- Morality
When a woman marries again it is because she detested her first husband. When a man marries again it is because he adored his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs.
In context
Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, they will forgive us everything, even our intellects.
In context
- Forgiveness
- Women
The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled to use one.
Chapter XVIIIn context
- Clever Jabs
Skepticism is the beginning of faith.
In context
- Faith
“To define is to limit.”
Chapter XVIIIn context
- Philosophy
The only horrible thing in the world is ennui
Chapter XVIIIIn context
- Emotion
Destiny does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel for that.
Chapter XVIIIIn context
- Luck
To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be respectable.
Chapter XIXIn context
- Comedy
- Youth
The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young.
Chapter XIXIn context
- Age
- Youth

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Contents