【Key words】aestheticism; hedonism; narcissism;  dandyism;  cynicism;sensibility; paradox

In public eyes, he belongs to “the alternative society”. His quaint style of dressing, trenchant wit and eloquence, aesthetic belief of “art for art’s sake” and sexual orientation make a mystery of him. In his lifetime, discussion over his literary works and private life remains intent among the reading public. And many years after his death, his mystic resplendent charm, instead of being effaced by the lapse of time, began to assert itself and gained increasing admiration from more open-minded generations. The appeal emanated from within the Irish wit is so enduring that even when Winston Churchill is asked with whom he prefers most to talk if chance permits, the worldly acknowledged master of language offered the name without any hesitation. The name falls on none other than Oscar Wilde.

As a staunch advocate for the aesthetic movement which developed in Britain during the late nineteenth century as a protest against the prevailing industrial emphasis on “the useful” or utilitarianism, Oscar Wilde impresses the world primarily with his amazing power of language in presenting his aesthetic thoughts and theories. Pervading in his literary works are epigrammatic wit, amusing irony and paradoxical quotes with humorous skepticism and cynical charm. Especially in “the picture of Dorian Gray”, his only novel, Wilde instills himself and his aesthetic doctrines into the three characters involved in such a tactful way that the book has since become one of his most celebrated works, a brilliant example of his power as a storyteller and of his flamboyant wit as an aesthetic writer. The three characters in question, Dorian Gray, a youth with heart-throbbing physical beauty; Basil Hallward, a painter devoted to art heart and soul; and Lord Henry Wotton, an aristocratic dandy who tempts Dorian Gray into moral degeneration, combine to make a true and complete Oscar Wilde as he himself famously said: “Basil Hallward is what I think I am; Lord Henry what the world thinks me; Dorian what I would like to be---in other ages, perhaps.” In this sense, “the picture of Dorian Gray” is not only a picture in which Wilde’s aestheticism is faithfully painted, but also a picture that delineates his inner world. In the novel that is tinged with mythical color, Dorian, Basil and Henry are all aesthetes respectively representing Oscar Wilde’s aestheticism in their own way. The protagonist Dorian Gray is a youth with stunning beauty, through whose physical charm Wilde presents his aesthetic ideas in two aspects: Narcissism and hedonism.

Narcissism:

The narcissistic passion as the distinguishing feature in Wilde’s beauty-seeking can be detected in the novel from Dorian Gray the “wonderfully handsome”. Dorian is so indulgent in his own beauty that “in boyish mockery of Narcissus, he had kissed or feigned to kiss those painted lips,… morning after morning he sat before the portrait, wondering at its beauty, almost enamored of it”. To perpetuate his youth and charm, the narcissist even jeopardizes his soul by wishing: “If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that---for that---I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!” The fanatical prayer brings to life a youth who succumbs to self idolatry. Sharing with his character the narcissistic complex, Oscar Wilde the creator presents himself to the world as a brilliantly talented writer who thinks much of himself. He takes great delight in adopting a high profile in public and talking in full flow with his fellowmen about his unorthodox thoughts that shock the world. Besides, Wilde is never one to lose the opportunity of recycling those well-turned phrases and remarks invented by himself. In many of his works, words and phrases made by him are found to be copied repeatedly just because he prefers his own used words to others’. This self-plagiarism is, psychologically, a solid proof of his narcissistic inclination as an aesthete.

Hedonism:

Disillusioned with a human nature distorted by capitalization and commercialization pervading in 19th century British society, aesthetes led by Wilde take hedonism as a spiritual refuge in their pursuit of life ideals. The key role hedonism plays in Wilde’s aestheticism could be discerned from his portrayal of Dorian Gray, the epitome of beauty who pursues a life of exquisite or perverse sensation and exhausts passions for a catalogue of sensory disciplines from interior design to exotic cuisine. As Dorian himself told Lord Henry: “I lounged in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly…There was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations…”. Receiving every day “invitations to dinner, tickets for private views, programmes of charity concerts and the like…”, Dorian in his budding life spends his days on nothing but luxurious sensuous enjoyment, leading a lifestyle “morally” intolerable in an industrial and utilitarian society yet welcomed by aesthetes who take superb sensuous pleasure as a form of self-fulfillment. In “the picture of Dorian Gray”, when Dorian gets the information about the death of Sybil Vane his lover, he announces to Basil: “ A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure. I don’t want to be at the mercy of my emotions, I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.” The declaration is consistent with Wilde’s publicized epigrams that “ nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul” and “I can resist anything but temptation”. Yet Wilde’s hedonism is not mere idleness, it is, instead, a “new hedonism” which takes sensuous pleasure as the ultimate aim in the creation of art. As a new hedonist to every inch, Wilde himself is always searching for new sensations, which can be observed from his way in writing the novel. He devotes a whole chapter (chapter11) to an exhaustive account of how Dorian abandons himself to such sensuous pleasures as collecting perfume, jewels and embroideries, etc, the details of which points toward an aesthete’s love of opulent decoration and the endeavors he makes in the study of it. But evidently, the hedonism meant for the “redemption of mankind’s souls” as claimed by aesthetes is in essence escapism that can’t bear fruits in the end. If, say, Dorian Gray is the embodiment of beauty in the story, then it is Basil Hallward the painter who converts Dorian’s worldly existenceinto a heightened sphere of art. Throughout the book, the impression of basil upon readers is nothing other than his keen sensitiveness to the value of beautiful things, or simply his preoccupation with sensibility.

Sensibility:

In Basil’s appreciation of beauty and art, top priority is given to his sensibility rather than sense and reason. When he first met Dorian Gray, he gives a delicate and passionate description of the psychological change he undergoes “a curious sensation of terror came over me,…it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself”. And in the same chapter, he made a confession to Lord Henry about the influence of Dorian’s beauty upon his art as “unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh school, a school that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and body---how much that is! We in our madness have separated the two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar and ideality that is void”. Here the effect of sensibility is heightened to an extent to which it can even penetrate one’s nature and soul while realism is despised as being vulgar. The description serves as an indicator of the artist’s preference of sensibility to rationalism in his pursuit of art, which is in accordance with Wilde’s theory of “they are elect to whom beautiful things mean only him so long as it is beautiful and what matters is beauty itself instead of any moral significance it bears. That is why he lavishes praises upon Dorian despite his ignorance of the l beauty” and “All art is quite useless”. To basil Hallward, anything will appeal toatter’s nature. And to Wilde, “there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all”. Basil’s extravagant panegyrics on Dorian’s beauty is a reflection of his emphasis upon sensibility in artistic creation, which could be further proved by his refusal to paint for somebody else despite the huge price offered to him just because “there was something in the shape of his fingers that I hated”. Basil’s, or rather, Wilde’s infatuation with sensibility is inseparable from his attempt to seek an escape from the stifling confines of Victorian painting and writing, from those arts weighed down by an ever increasing burden of moral, social and sentimental baggage.

The greatest fascination of the novel, as unanimously applauded by most readers, owes itself to the portrayal of Lord Henry Wotton, a dandy and cynic who treats life as a spectator sport and exercises a malign influence upon Dorian. It is through his scintillating remarks that Oscar Wilde finds an ideal outlet for his own outlook toward art and life. In Lord Henry three elements coalesce to distinguish Wilde as a leading aesthete: dandyism, cynicism and masterly use of paradox.