Dorian Gray

UPDATED: Since writing the following post I've learned that Hollywood is taking Wilde's novel to the silver screen (again). Unfortunately, most of what's come from filmdom of late has left the screen mostly pewter.

Here's what I anticipate: Rather than the measured, use-your-imagination prose of Wilde, we'll be treated to something that borders on the pornographic. Rather than get a spectacular movie with three-dimensional characters and with a profound moral message, we'll get an engorgement of pointless hedonism that leaves us wondering "Why?"

Wilde, the homosexual, Wilde, the adulterer, concludes that endless pleasure, the endless satisfying of the libido, will not bring us to betterment, will not elevate us to a higher state of consciousness. Likely through his own unsatisfying experiences, Oscar Wilde exposes the reality that our pursuit of self, that our endless quenching of any desire, will only rot the soul (and I might add, only drive us further from the God who created us and will provide that ultimate completion to our soul).

The original post:
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The last few days, God saw fit to move me away from computers (for the most part). No Letterman digging to new depths for a laugh. No government taking more of my money. No anarchists taking law and hatred into their own hands. No international hoodlums threatening nuclear annihilation. Just nine hours of highway.

In driving from Wichita Falls, Texas to Pueblo, Colorado, I got to transit one of my favorit pieces of highway in America, US 87 between Dalhart, Texas and Raton, New Mexico, where dormant volcanoes poke their slumbering peaks out of vast seas of sun-leeched grassland. Cattle meander across the plain annoyed from time to time by the roving pronghorns. Descending out of Des Moines (yeah, they have one in NM, too) toward the Capulin volcano, the Rockies darkening the horizon bring the sprawling sea to an abrupt halt.

Since I had no one with which to chat on my drive, I checked out "The Picture of Dorian Gray" (unabridged) from the local library. Playwright Oscar Wilde penned only one novel, that being Dorian Gray. He's known primarily for his wry wit, exhibited in spades in "The Importance of Being Earnest." He's also known, despite being married and siring a few children, for his blatant homosexuality, quite the scandal in Victorian England.

That said, you'd think Dorian Gray would be either a laugh-a-minute or a vehicle to laud nineteenth century debauchery. It's neither. I have never read (or heard, in this case) a more vivid description of the corruption of the human soul. Despite Wilde's distaste for the church surfacing from time to time, he paints a detailed portrait of the rot that comes to the spirit when he follows after pleasure. He provides as biblical a picture as an exegetical sermon.

He has captured the world as it is, and unlike most "Christian" novelists, he does so without the bludgeoning subtlety of a jackhammer. If the storyteller has to tell you what he's telling you, he's not telling his story very well. Wilde draws you in with deft depiction and a well set scene.

I'll not spoil it for you. I hate when folks tell me what's going to happen in a movie. But what would do if you could savor whatever your heart desired with no implication to you? Would it be the be-all, end-all?

And what is so rare today, Wilde illustrates utter corruption without even nearing a PG-rating. He crafts crass and course characters without a single foul word. Again, subtlety. Surprising. Refreshing.

To my shame, I'd only known of Dorian Gray through a terrible film, "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen." I don't know what I'd read that piqued me toward giving it a look, but I'm glad I did. After listening to it, I will have to go back and read it at some point to better savor the irony, the nuance, and decoration Wilde provides to each scene, and to gnaw upon the empty philosophies espoused by the foundationally bankrupt Lord Henry.

As you drive into your summer, if you're thinking of sinking your teeth into a book and don't know which way to turn, "The Picture of Dorian Gray" will give you plenty upon which to chew. A satifying read!