Book review: The picture of Dorian Gray.

  Hi today I'll be reviewing the book I've read for our English class, it's called "The picture of Dorian Gray" by the Irish writer Oscar Wilde. The plot takes place in London around the 19th century, and it tells us the story of Dorian Gray, a young man that is known for his beauty. Dorian's parents were both dead and after his grandfather passes away he receives a huge heritage.

  He then starts to be socially active between the circle of friends of his grandfather and the London high society, and gets to know Basil, a painter who offers to paint a picture of Dorian, and Lord Henry, a man with strong opinions and a great taste for art. Basil then offers the main character to paint his picture, and as the work is finished both of them find themselves staring at it, and Dorian starts seeing the beauty that others always saw in himself and says that he wished the he could always be young and never lose his beauty.

  One day he goes to a small theater with Lord Henry where they watch "Romeo and Juliet" and he falls in love with the Sibyl Vane, the woman who was playing Juliet and asks the theater manager to go to the backstage to talk to the woman. He starts being a frequent presence in the theater and they both fall in love, Dorian asks her in marriage not long after, but once she falls in love with him her acting starts to lose it's magic, as she says that now she feels that everything that she says while acting are lies. The same night Dorian breaks up with her.

  The next morning he wakes up and feels bad by what he did and decides he will marry her anyway, but as he leaves his place Lord Henry is waiting for him to give the news, Sybil had committed suicide the night before. He then starts to cry but Henry convinces him that none of it was his fault and love is a terrible mistake anyway, later on he notices that the picture of him that was on the wall of the living room had changed, and had acquired a cynical smile, he wasn't sure if that was his imagination or if the picture was actually different and he follows his life as if nothing had happened. As the plot goes on Dorian starts to explore the pleasures of life and start to spend his nights in Opium dens with Lord Henry. The time goes on but his appearance never changes, but on the other hand his picture starts to age and get an evil facial expression, so he decides to hide it away.

  One day Basil comes to him, saying that he has been invited to make an exposition of his work in Paris so he asks for the picture for his exposition. Dorian says that the picture can't be shown in public and they start a discussion and Dorian brings him to the attic where the picture is hidden. Dorian then proceeds to kill his friend blaming him for his hate. The crime is never discovered because Basil was expected to get a train to France the same night and no one is sure if he got it or not.

  He then decides to change, that he would no longer sin and that he would not break the hearth of his actual lover, some time later he goes to check if the picture had acquired a better aspect only to found that now it was looking even worse, then he stabs the picture, but as he does it the picture goes back to it's natural form, the picture of a young and beautiful man, but he is the person who was stabbed, and lies dead on the ground looking exactly like his picture.

 I really enjoyed the book, and if you're looking for a good fictional novel this is a good option, the only negative point of it is that since it was written around one hundred years ago some of the language and expressions used on it are no longer currently used, so it can be a bit hard to understand it sometimes, but apart of that it's a good read, I'll leave you guys a small quote of it:

"When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance."
- The picture of Dorian Gray