How Does Wilde Present The Change In Dorian Gray

Dorian Gray Essay task plan: Change in Dorian
‘A Look had come into lad’s face that he had never seen before’. How does Wilde represent the change in Dorian’s character in the opening of the novel?
Throughout the novel ‘A picture of Dorian Grey’ , Wilde explores the ways in which Dorian is influenced by other characters to change his expressions and speech tones and the general way he acts in the opening chapters of the book.
Dorian is introduced in the book as a youngster, a beautiful boy unspoiled by life or sin. But he is about change. When he meets Lord Henry, Dorian soon adapts his theories on hedonism, sinning and pleasure. This changed Dorian. It altered his views on the world He started to love himself, thinking above others because of his unmatched beauty.
We can see how Wilde alters Dorian’s mind
frame due to Henry as Wilde changes the speech patterns of Dorian cleverly to represent the change in Dorian’s character in the opening of the novel. We can clearly see that Dorian’s pattern of speech changes as Lord Henrys presence persists; Dorian’s speech becomes longer as time passes which can represent his anxiety to be around Lord Henry Wotton and simple sentences are unnecessarily elongated possibly due to his presence ‘I promised to go to a club in white chapel last Tuesday… I am far too frightened to call’.
As we know Lord Henry Wotton has high moral standards as we can see in his exquisite tone of speech. Dorian seems to catch onto this tone of speech throughout the start of the novel and beings to adapt to it as we know Dorian sees Henry as an attractive figure which is the case of Dorian’s adaption to a more respectable tone of language. “My dear Harry.” Wilde utilises change in Dorian’s structure of speech to present change in his character throughout novel and is expanded upon further later on. Immediately we can see the ways in which Dorian is becoming more childish in the presence of Henry as Dorian forgets his self confident, mature and proud self as conceived by Basil in the start of the novel describing him ‘The face of Antinous was to late Greek sculpture.’ We can understand that Antinous was a role model and a favourite among the people in Greece at the time.
We know how he changes into chapter 2 as he becomes defensive of Lord Henry as he looks to him as a role model in a childish and immature way ‘If Lord Henry Wotton goes I shall go too ‘Cried Dorian. The way Dorian cries this statement also indicates his immaturity.
Dorian also becomes divulged in immoral attitudes whch is another example of how and why Dorian’s character changes from being described as Antinous at the start to where he is by having been influenced by Lord Henry. Wilde’s reference to Dorian inheriting the idea of hedonism (Hedonism is a school of thought that argues that pleasure is the only intrinsic good) from Lord Henry which changes Dorian’s immoral thought patterns relates to Wilde’s real life homosexuality as the word hedonism descends from the Greek word
delight
Dorian’s view on the very nature of life changes throughout the opening chapters. Henry manages to totally change Dorian’s perspective on the world. From that point on, Dorian’s previously innocent point of view is dramatically different as he begins to see life as Lord Henry does, as a succession of pleasures in which questions of good and evil are irrelevant.
Wilde presents change in Dorian Gray through inserting an alteration in Dorian’s character, through the lack of complete influence that Lord Henry has over Dorian, as represented by his proposal to Sibyl Vane. Dorian announced this not long after Lord Henry explicitly warned Dorian “Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired, women, because they are curious: both are disappointed.” This demonstrates change in Dorian’s character to the reader because Dorian is not completely influenced by Lord Henry, which is certainly different to Dorian’s first encounter with Lord Henry where he ‘ate up’ every word he said.
Wilde leaves the reader to decide how good or bad Dorian’s mind frame change in the opening of the novel; it is predominantly down to the theoretical disease of sin Lord Henry passes to Dorian upon their first encounter which revolves into something much greater later on within the book.