The Picture of Dorian Gray By Oscar Wilde (1890) Download free eBooks of classic literature, books and novels at Planet eBook. Subscribe to our free eBooks blog and email newsletter. Chapter I The studio was filled with the rich odor of roses, and when the light summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden there came through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the pink- flowering thorn. From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was lying, smoking, as usual, innumerable ciga- rettes, Lord Henry Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-colored blossoms of the laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to bear the burden of a beauty so flame-like as theirs; and now and then the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted across the long tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front of the huge window, producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of those pallid jade-faced painters who, in an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their way through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous insistence round the black-crocketed spires of the early June hollyhocks, seemed to make the stillness more oppressive, and the dim roar of London was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the full-length portrait of a young man of extraordi-  The Picture of Dorian Gray nary personal beauty, and in front of it, some little distance away, was sitting the artist himself, Basil Hallward, whose sudden disappearance some years ago caused, at the time, such public excitement, and gave rise to so many strange conjectures. As he looked at the gracious and comely form he had so skilfully mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his face, and seemed about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, and, closing his eyes, placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he sought to imprison within his brain some curious dream from which he feared he might awake. ‘It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done,’ said Lord Henry, languidly. ‘You must certainly send it next year to the Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. The Grosvenor is the only place.’ ‘I don’t think I will send it anywhere,’ he answered, toss- ing his head back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at Oxford. ‘No: I won’t send it any- where.’ Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows, and looked at him in amazement through the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls from his heavy opium- tainted cigarette. ‘Not send it anywhere? My dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com  A portrait like this would set you far above all the young men in England, and make the old men quite jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion.’ ‘I know you will laugh at me,’ he replied, ‘but I really can’t exhibit it. I have put too much of myself into it.’ Lord Henry stretched his long legs out on the divan and shook with laughter. ‘Yes, I knew you would laugh; but it is quite true, all the same.’ ‘Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn’t know you were so vain; and I really can’t see any resem- blance between you, with your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young Adonis, who looks as if he was made of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you—well, of course you have an intel- lectual expression, and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself an exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. How perfectly hid- eous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But then in the Church they don’t think. A bishop keeps on saying at the age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, and consequently he always looks absolutely delightful. Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, but whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of that. He is a brainless, beau- tiful thing, who should be always here in winter when we  The Picture of Dorian Gray have no flowers to look at, and always here in summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. Don’t flatter yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like him.’ ‘You don’t understand me, Harry. Of course I am not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the truth. There is a fatality about all physical and in- tellectual distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one’s fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit quietly and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live, undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others nor ever receive it from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they are,—my fame, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray’s good looks,—we will all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly.’ ‘Dorian Gray? is that his name?’ said Lord Henry, walk- ing across the studio towards Basil Hallward. ‘Yes; that is his name. I didn’t intend to tell it to you.’ ‘But why not?’ ‘Oh, I can’t explain. When I like people immensely I nev- er tell their names to any one. It seems like surrendering a part of them. You know how I love secrecy. It is the only thing that can make modern life wonderful or mysterious to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it. When I leave town I never tell my people where I am going. Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com  If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance into one’s life. I suppose you think me awfully foolish about it?’ ‘Not at all,’ answered Lord Henry, laying his hand upon his shoulder; ‘not at all, my dear Basil. You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception necessary for both parties. I never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. When we meet,—we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go down to the duke’s,— we tell each other the most absurd stories with the most serious faces. My wife is very good at it,—much better, in fact, than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I some- times wish she would; but she merely laughs at me.’ ‘I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry,’ said Basil Hallward, shaking his hand off, and strolling to- wards the door that led into the garden. ‘I believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary fel- low. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. Your cynicism is simply a pose.’ ‘Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritat- ing pose I know,’ cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the garden together, and for a time they did not speak. After a long pause Lord Henry pulled out his watch. ‘I am afraid I must be going, Basil,’ he murmured, ‘and before  The Picture of Dorian Gray I go I insist on your answering a question I put to you some time ago.’ ‘What is that?’ asked Basil Hallward, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. ‘You know quite well.’ ‘I do not, Harry.’ ‘Well, I will tell you what it is.’ ‘Please don’t.’ ‘I must. I want you to explain to me why you won’t ex- hibit Dorian Gray’s picture. I want the real reason.’ ‘I told you the real reason.’ ‘No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of yourself in it. Now, that is childish.’ ‘Harry,’ said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, ‘every portrait that is painted with feeling is a por- trait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the colored canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown with it the secret of my own soul.’ Lord Harry laughed. ‘And what is that?’ he asked. ‘I will tell you,’ said Hallward; and an expression of per- plexity came over his face. ‘I am all expectation, Basil,’ murmured his companion, looking at him. ‘Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry,’ answered the young painter; ‘and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will hardly believe it.’ Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com  Lord Henry smiled, and, leaning down, plucked a pink- petalled daisy from the grass, and examined it. ‘I am quite sure I shall understand it,’ he replied, gazing intently at the little golden white-feathered disk, ‘and I can believe any- thing, provided that it is incredible.’ The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy lilac blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup in the grass, and a long thin dragon-fly floated by on its brown gauze wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hall- ward’s heart beating, and he wondered what was coming. ‘Well, this is incredible,’ repeated Hallward, rather bit- terly,— ‘incredible to me at times. I don’t know what it means. The story is simply this. Two months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon’s. You know we poor painters have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to re- mind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious Academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at me. I turned half-way round, and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious instinct of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some one whose mere personal- ity was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know  The Picture of Dorian Gray yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. My father destined me for the army. I insisted on going to Oxford. Then he made me enter my name at the Middle Temple. Be- fore I had eaten half a dozen dinners I gave up the Bar, and announced my intention of becoming a painter. I have al- ways been my own master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. Then—But I don’t know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had a strange feeling that Fate had in store for me exquisite joys and exquisite sorrows. I knew that if I spoke to Dorian I would become absolutely devoted to him, and that I ought not to speak to him. I grew afraid, and turned to quit the room. It was not conscience that made me do so: it was cowardice. I take no credit to myself for trying to escape.’ ‘Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.’ ‘I don’t believe that, Harry. However, whatever was my motive,— and it may have been pride, for I used to be very proud,—I certainly struggled to the door. There, of course, I stumbled against Lady Brandon. ‘You are not going to run away so soon, Mr. Hallward?’ she screamed out. You know her shrill horrid voice?’ ‘Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty,’ said Lord Henry, pulling the daisy to bits with his long, nervous fin- gers. ‘I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to Royal- ties, and people with Stars and Garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras and hooked noses. She spoke of me as Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com  her dearest friend. I had only met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. I believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, at least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is the nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself face to face with the young man whose per- sonality had so strangely stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. It was mad of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. Perhaps it was not so mad, after all. It was simply inevitable. We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were destined to know each other.’ ‘And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man? I know she goes in for giving a rapid précis of all her guests. I remember her bringing me up to a most truculent and red-faced old gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my ear, in a tragic whis- per which must have been perfectly audible to everybody in the room, something like ‘Sir Humpty Dumpty—you know—Afghan frontier—Russian intrigues: very successful man—wife killed by an elephant—quite inconsolable— wants to marry a beautiful American widow—everybody does nowadays—hates Mr. Gladstone—but very much in- terested in beetles: ask him what he thinks of Schouvaloff.’ I simply fled. I like to find out people for myself. But poor Lady Brandon treats her guests exactly as an auctioneer treats his goods. She either explains them entirely away, or tells one everything about them except what one wants to 10 The Picture of Dorian Gray