Guardian Newspaper 1000 Novels discussion

In August we will be reading The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde for our Family & Self category - who's in?

as I nominated it, Me - I guess :D

have you not read it before Phil?
if not, I think you're in for a treat, as this is one of those titles you rarely hear of anyone taking against

One of those novels that impressed me greatly. I read it many years ago (probably twenty) and I am still impressed. I want to reread it someday. I am not sure I will be able to do it this month.

Darren wrote: "have you not read it before Phil?
if not, I think you're in for a treat, as this is one of those titles you rarely hear of anyone taking against"

I have, but about 30 years ago, so almost a first time read again

I read it, as an "elective," in high school, and then again recently.
Between times, I listened to an audiobook, but that must have been the "Lippincott's" version, because there were a lot of scenes not in that version.

I also read an interesting (fre)e-book,
Oscar Wilde: Art and Morality A Defence of "The Picture of Dorian Gray"
which included some contemporary takedowns of the book.

... This is how he is addressed by the Blasé Puppy at their first meeting: "Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take away.... When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you.... Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will suffer horribly." [5] Why, bless our souls! haven't we read something of this kind somewhere in the classics? Yes, of course we have! But in what recondite author? Ah—yes—no—yes, it was in Horace! What an advantage it is to have received a classical education! And how it will astonish the Yankees!


"... I am jealous of the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must lose?... Oh, if it was only the other way! If the picture could only change, and I could be always what I am now!" [6] No sooner said than done! The picture does change: the original doesn't. Here's a situation for you! Théophile Gautier could have made it romantic, entrancing, beautiful. Mr. Stevenson could have made it convincing, humorous, pathetic. Mr. Anstey could have made it screamingly funny. It has been reserved for Mr. Oscar Wilde to make it dull and nasty.

(Not that "Anonymous" is right, but he is amusing...)

Today seems to be my day for being picky:

Fast quiz, no fair using Wiki or Google:
Who is, was, or reads:
Théophile Gautier (Wiki will tell you he and Wilde were buds)
Mr. Stevenson ( I assume this is supposed to be Robert Lewis S so one freebie, two points if you read him for other than his YA adventure books)
Mr. Anstey
and who had to research Old man Oscar W?

Not too shabby for a dull and nasty man low these 120 odd years later

Aha, something I have not only read several times but have on my shelf. Count me in.

Phrodrick wrote: "Today seems to be my day for being picky:

Fast quiz, no fair using Wiki or Google:
Who is, was, or reads:
Théophile Gautier (Wiki will tell you he and Wilde were buds)
Mr. Stevenson ( I assume thi..."

Touche, Phred. I was pretty surprised that Wilde's contemporaries did not hold him in as high regard as posterity.

There is a famous old line, that I never get right, Something about :
No one is a hero in his home town.

That plus the period ambivalence/hostility over the homosexual thing.

Silly me that is a mangled bible quite, still:Luke 4:24

And he said, “Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown.

And Luke did not have to deal with possibly jealousy among authors.

Surely, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is still popular.
At least as good, as ripping a yarn, as Dorian G.
(Although lacking the bon mots of Lord Henry)

Jekyll and Hyde is on the list too, is it not?