王尔德生于都柏林的一个家世卓越的家庭，是家中的次子，全名为：奥斯卡·芬葛·欧佛雷泰·威尔斯·王尔德（Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde）。他的父亲威廉姆·王尔德爵士是一个外科医生，他的母亲是一位诗人与作家。王尔德是一个优秀的学生，他获得了都柏林圣三一学院（Trinity College）的奖学金，1874年，他进入牛津大学迈格德林学院（Magdalen College）学习。在牛津，王尔德受到了沃尔特·佩特及约翰·拉斯金的审美影响，并接触了新黑格尔派哲学、达尔文进化论和拉斐尔前派的作品，这为他之后成为唯美主义先锋作家确立了方向。当时，虽然年轻的王尔德还没有获得一个文学奖项，但服装惹眼、谈吐机智、特立独行的他在社会上已经小有名气，一些杂志甚至刊登着讽刺他的文章。

1882年，王尔德在美国作了一个精彩的巡回讲座，两年后他与 Constance Lloyd 成婚，两名儿子 Cyril 与 Vyvyan 亦分别在1885年与1886年出生。1887年王尔德成为一家妇女杂志的执行总编辑，那上面发表着他的一些小说、评论和诗。王尔德的作品以其词藻华美、立意新颖和观点鲜明闻名，他的第一本小说道林·格雷的画像发表于1891年，之后他又发表了散文《社会主义下人的灵魂》，这两部作品都十分成功，但真正为王尔德赢得名誉的是他的戏剧作品。可以说他的每一部戏剧作品都受着热烈的欢迎，有一个时期，伦敦的舞台上竟同时上演着他的三部作品。

维多利亚女王时代的英国上流社会市侩腐朽，新旧风尚的冲突激烈，王尔德的自由作风和大胆的政治作风很快使他成为了这场冲突的牺牲品。1895年，昆斯拜瑞侯爵（Marquess of Queensberry）因儿子阿尔弗瑞德·道格拉斯（Lord Alfred 'Bosie' Douglas）与王尔德交往而令到父子不和，并公然斥责王尔德是一个 "somdomite"。对此，愤怒的阿尔弗瑞德叫王尔德立刻上诉告侯爵败坏他的名誉，可惜王尔德不但上诉失败，更被反告曾“commit acts of gross indecency”。根据当时英国苛刻的刑事法，王尔德被判有罪，在瑞丁和本顿维尔监狱服了两年苦役。这两年，王尔德停止了戏剧创作，而构思了诗作《瑞丁监狱之歌》和忏悔录《深渊书简》，在这两部作品中已很难寻得唯美主义的影响。在王尔德服刑期间，Constance与两个孩子改姓为Holland兼移居意大利，而他大多数的朋友则对他避之唯恐不及，当中只有寥寥数人如戏剧作家萧伯纳仍挺身维护他。

1897年获释后，王尔德立刻动身前往巴黎，对于英国他失望透顶，不再有丝毫留恋。其后他为了两名孩子曾尝试与Constance复合，但阿尔弗瑞德亦同时表示想与王尔德重归如好，最后王尔德放弃两名孩子而选择了阿尔弗瑞德。王尔德在以假名居住法国期间完成并出版了《瑞丁监狱之歌》，之后与阿尔弗瑞德同游意大利，但几个月后，两人再次分手。1900年王尔德终于在好友Robert 'Robbie' Ross 帮助下改信天主教，在同年11月30日因病于巴黎的亚尔沙斯旅馆（Hotel d’Alsace）去世，享年46岁，死时只有Robbie与另一朋友陪伴。

《道林•格雷的画像(Picture of Dorian Gray)》是王尔德的惟一一部小说，也是他美学思想的全面体现，因此已被认为是唯美主义小说中的力作。故事围绕着年轻而又漂亮惊人的道林•格雷展开。俊美的格雷立即激起国家霍华德的艺术想像力并成了画家最喜欢的模特，霍华德为他画的巨幅肖像使格雷意识到自己异常的美。新结识的朋友亨利•华顿勋爵对青春、美丽的赞扬又使他意识到青春易逝，美貌难恒，于是他表示愿用灵魂作交换以保持自己的青春俊美，而让肖像代他承受岁月的痕迹。他的愿望真的奇迹般地实现了，在亨利勋爵的不断影响下，格雷成了新享乐主义的实践者。他爱上了年轻的女演员西北比尔•苇恩，结果他的粗暴导致了西比尔的自杀，对此他不仅不自责，反而把这一悲剧件事件当成浪漫故事。从此追求享乐成了他生活的惟一目标，许多接近他的人也都因为他堕落、放荡的生活方式而变得或声名狼藉或身败名裂。后来他竟然丧心病狂地杀死霍华德并毁尸灭迹。就这样他一直过着双重生活，虽然20年过去了，但他看起来仍然是那个俊美、纯洁的20岁青年，尽管他干尽了腐朽堕落的勾当。最后当他想用刀破坏掉他罪恶的惟一证据——肖像时，刀子却插进了自己的胸膛，而肖像又回复到了它当实初的完美状态。

The Wordsworth Classics covers a huge list of beloved works of literature in English and translations. This growing series is rigorously updated, with scholarly introductions and notes added to new titles.

This is a story of moral corruption. A gothic melodrama, it is full of subtle impression and epigram. It touches on many of Wilde's recurring themes, such as the nature and spirit of art, aestheticism and the dangers inherent in it.

Amazon.com

A lush, cautionary tale of a life of vileness and deception or a loving portrait of the aesthetic impulse run rampant? Why not both? After Basil Hallward paints a beautiful, young man's portrait, his subject's frivolous wish that the picture change and he remain the same comes true. Dorian Gray's picture grows aged and corrupt while he continues to appear fresh and innocent. After he kills a young woman, "as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife," Dorian Gray is surprised to find no difference in his vision or surroundings. "The roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as happily in my garden."

As Hallward tries to make sense of his creation, his epigram-happy friend Lord Henry Wotton encourages Dorian in his sensual quest with any number of Wildean paradoxes, including the delightful "When we are happy we are always good, but when we are good we are not always happy." But despite its many languorous pleasures, The Picture of Dorian Gray is an imperfect work. Compared to the two (voyeuristic) older men, Dorian is a bore, and his search for ever new sensations far less fun than the novel's drawing-room discussions. Even more oddly, the moral message of the novel contradicts many of Wilde's supposed aims, not least "no artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style." Nonetheless, the glamour boy gets his just deserts. And Wilde, defending Dorian Gray, had it both ways: "All excess, as well as all renunciation, brings its own punishment."

From Booklist

Gr. 6-12. For teens who find even steadily paced novels a struggle, the biting but often meandering discussions between Basil and Lord Henry in Wilde's classic can seem overwhelming and pointless. But this version's informative sidebars make the surreal tale of the beautiful young man who never ages one that teens can not only tackle but also begin to relish. When the story advances or twists, Tony Ross' colorful artwork emphasizes Wilde's absurdly witty take on Victorian provincialism. For scenes in which characters discuss aesthetics, sidebar illustrations with helpful captions explain how Wilde's philosophies influenced his characterizations. Even when the sidebars only remotely relate to the story, they provide a clear cultural outline of the mores that resulted in Wilde's public undoing and his untimely death. The supplemental information and illustrations may strike sharp YA readers as amusing or interesting, but they may be the sole reason weaker readers tackle the novel at all.

　　Roger Leslie

From School Library Journal

Gr 10 Up-"The Whole Story" format provides illustrations and annotations to the classic text. Ross's lively and sophisticated cartoons add interest, and historical information helps readers place the novel in proper context and gives insight into its characters. The problem with this attractive, glossy layout, however, is that the text and the quotes pulled from it are not always on the same page. Further, some illustrations and notations visually cut into the narrative and may distract readers. For example, a drawing appears on the first page along with the passage, "In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty," but that quote does not appear until the second page of the story. Useful as a supplement to the original novel, but not a replacement for it.

Karen Hoth, Marathon Middle/High School, FL

From AudioFile

This remarkable rendering perfectly captures the spirit and characters of the chilling melodrama that scandalized polite society when first published in 1890. Enthralled with his own physical beauty, Dorian Gray wishes his portrait to grow old while he himself stays young, and Wilde makes it so. Just as the portrait mirrors the ravages of Gray's soul, Petherbridge's narration exudes decadence, hedonism and destruction--every syllable foreshadowing the protagonist's dismal end. The narrator's storytelling and narrative skill are exemplary. R.B.F.

The Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature

Moral fantasy novel by Oscar Wilde, published in an early form in Lippincott's Magazine in 1890. The novel had six additional chapters when it appeared in book form in 1891. An archetypal tale of a young man who purchases eternal youth at the expense of his soul, the novel was a romantic exposition of Wilde's Aestheticism. Dorian Gray is a wealthy Englishman who gradually sinks into a life of dissipation and crime. Despite his unhealthy behavior, his physical appearance remains youthful and unmarked by dissolution. Instead, a portrait of himself catalogues every evil deed by turning his once handsome features into a hideous mask. When Gray destroys the painting, his face turns into a human replica of the portrait, and he dies.Gray's final negation, "ugliness is the only reality," neatly summarizes Wilde's Aestheticism, both his love of the beautiful and his fascination with the profane. Publication of the novel scandalized Victorian England, and The Picture of Dorian Gray was used as evidence against Wilde in his 1895 trial for homosexuality. The novel became a classic of English literature.

About Author

Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854. His father was a celebrated surgeon, his mother a supporter of Irish independence who presided over literary salons in Ireland and England. Although his brilliance as a classicist at Dublin's Trinity College won him a scholarship to Magdalen College, Oxford, Wilde failed in his attempts at an academic career. Instead he set his sights on the literary and artistic worlds of London. Fusing the influences of Ruskin, the Pre-Raphaelites, Walter Pater, and Gautier's l'art pour l'art, he made himself the most visible manifestation of the Aesthetic movement; by 1881 a burlesque of Wilde provided the protagonist for the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta Patience. It was to exploit the popularity of the operetta, in fact, that the producer D'Oyly Carte underwrote Wilde's immensely successful lecture tour of America. Married in 1884 to Constance Lloyd, Wilde worked briefly as a magazine editor while publishing poetry, plays, fairy tales, and essays.

The Picture of Dorian Gray was commissioned by J. M. Stoddardt, the Philadelphia publisher of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine. It appeared in the July 1890 issue and immediately gained a certain notoriety for being 'mawkish and nauseous,' 'unclean,' 'effeminate,' and 'contaminating.' When it was published as a book the following year, Wilde greatly revised and expanded the text, filling it out with a melodramatic subplot and adding a preface that defended his aesthetic philosophy. As for the book's value as autobiography, Wilde noted in a letter that the main characters are in different ways reflections of him: '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 the early nineties, Wilde was at the center of an artistic milieu characterized by The Yellow Book, The Rhymers' Club, and the art of Aubrey Beardsley. Banned from performance in England, his poetic drama Salome (1892) was illustrated by Beardsley and finally produced in Paris in 1896. At the same time, Wilde achieved success as a popular playwright, writing in rapid succession Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and The Importance of Being Earnest. In 1895, two of his plays were on the London stage simultaneously, and he was acknowledged as a pivotal figure in English literary life, admired for his wit and eloquence.

Since at least the mid-1880s, however, Wilde had lived a sexual double life, and in 1893 he distanced himself from his family by taking rooms at the Savoy Hotel. He had by then embarked on a passionate relationship with the considerably younger Lord Alfred Douglas, the English translator of Salome, whom he had met the year after he wrote The Picture of Dorian Gray. In March 1895, Wilde undertook a libel action against the Marquess of Queensberry, Lord Alfred's father, who had denounced Wilde as a 'somdomite' (sic). Wilde withdrew the suit following damaging cross-examination by the marquess's defense attorney, a former classmate of Wilde's. (Question: 'Have you ever adored a young man madly?' Answer: 'I have never given adoration to anybody but myself.') Shortly thereafter, Wilde was arrested for homosexual offenses and underwent two trials before being sentenced to hard labor at Wandsworth Prison and Reading Gaol. A long recriminatory letter to Douglas written while in prison was eventually published as De Profundis.

Released in 1897, Wilde left for France under the name Sebastian Melmoth, a pseudonym combining a martyred saint with a Faustian hero of Gothic romance. A poem based on his prison experience, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, was published in 1898. His health destroyed, and bankrupted by his legal expenses, Wilde lived in Paris for three years, making a conversion to Roman Catholicism just before his death in November 1900. He is buried in the cemetery of Pere Lachaise.

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