The Perversion of Dorians Soul in Oscar Wildes The Picture of Dorian

The Perversion of Dorians Soul in Oscar Wildes The Picture of Dorian Gray The soul is thought to be an immaterial entity coexistent with our bodies which is credited with the faculties of thought, action, and emotion. It is the part of our body which is believed to live on after the body dies. In Oscar Wildes, The Picture of Dorian Gray, the main character, Dorian Gray, destroys the innocence of his soul and creates corrupt. He becomes corrupt by failing to live a life of virtue. The main reason for his transformation can be attributed to a portrait painted of him that captured the lawful essence of his innocence. This portrait is the personification of his soul. At the beginning of the book Dorian makes a wish that inevitably changes his life forever. His wish is that, If it were I who was to be unceasingly young, and the picture that was to grow old For that - for that - I would transcend everything Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give I would give my sou l for that (Wilde, 40) As Dorians wish of staying young and beautiful forever come true so does the fact that he has given his soul away to the devil. other contributing factor to the perversion of Dorians soul comes from his supposed friend, Lord Henry Wotton. Lord Henry fills Dorians head with his outrageous philosophies such as, ....youth is the one thing value having. .... You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it... (34) and The only way to get unfreeze of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous ... ... that Dorian has become a dissolute and perverse man who cannot understand that vanity and the thrill of new sensations are not what run the world. Works Cited Cohen, Ed. Talk on the Wilde Side. groovy Britain Routledge, 1993. Freidman, Jonathan (edit ed). Oscar Wilde A Collection of Critical Essays. New Jersey Prentice-Hall, 1996. Pearson, Hesketh (edited). Essays By Oscar Wilde. New York Books For Libraries Press, 1972. Ransome, Arthur. Oscar Wilde A Critical Study. London Mr. Martin Secker, 1913. Weintraub, Stanley (edited). Literary Criticism of Oscar Wilde. Nebraska University of Nebraska Press, 1968. Woodcock, George. The conundrum of Oscar Wilde. London-New York T.V. Boardman and Co., Ltd., 1950. Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Denmark Wordsworth Editions Limited, Reprinted V