Le portrait de Dorian Gray

The narrative follows a handsome young man whose portrait, painted by an admirer, becomes a supernatural ledger of his conscience after he wishes that the painted image bear the marks of age and sin in his place. Under the corrosive influence of a witty, hedonistic acquaintance, he pursues beauty and sensation, while his outward youth persists and the portrait progressively shows moral degradation and physical deformity. The story traces his descent into selfish acts, secrecy and violence, and culminates in attempts to confront or conceal the painting’s truth. A prefatory essay of epigrams frames recurring themes: aestheticism, influence, duplicity, and the consequences of divorcing art from ethics.