“The Picture Of Dorian Gray” as Wilde actually wrote it
A new edition finally brings us the original text of the novella along with a wealth of editorial insight…
Strangely, considering the cult status that “The Picture of Dorian Gray” would eventually attain, Wilde’s original version has never been published until now, more than 120 years after the Lippincott edition. It has been made available by Harvard’s Belknap Press in a richly annotated and illustrated volume edited by Nicholas Frankel. It is not often that a piece of serious scholarship is accorded such deluxe treatment, and in this case it is a cause for real celebration, for Frankel has provided a wealth of supplemental material and visual matter, as well as a “Textual Introduction” and a series of notes that explain references and cultural context, help the reader understand the editing processes, and point out the passages that were singled out for deletion, such as this speech that the portrait painter Basil Hallward addresses to Dorian:
“It is quite true I have worshipped you with far more romance of feeling than a man should ever give to a friend. Somehow I have never loved a woman…. From the moment I met you, your personality had the most extraordinary influence over me…. I adored you madly, extravagantly, absurdly. I was jealous of everyone to whom you spoke. I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with you.”
There have been editions of TPODG coming out for years. I have a first edition and an illustrated one which was produced in the sixties. When I went into my local bookshop last week they had a paperback and a hardback of it. It’s a classic and with the dotty educational systems that are now being followed, I suspect it will be among the set books.
Dear Oscar wrote better works – but it is still a classic.