in which an ambitious and beautiful young man makes a pact with the Devil to retain his youth and beauty while engaging in a debauched life. He is so good looking that an artist paints his portrait, and the young man (Dorian Gray) falls in love with his own portrait and cries out that he would sell his soul to continue looking as beautiful as this throughout his life. He proceeds with a life in which aesthetics and pleasure are his only values. He becomes heartless, cruel and ultimately murderous. Meanwhile the painting begins to record the ravages of Dorian's debauched and hedonistic life, while Dorian himself doesn't age. He ends up killing the artist who painted his portrait, and ripping up the portrait with the same knife and thus killing himself, with his body reverting to the true decrepit state of his soul, when he dies.
I was deeply impressed with the 1945 movie of this novel, which I saw on TV as a youngster. I've since read the novel and the story now strikes me as absurd, and as a very confused effort by Wilde to deal with the hidden aspect of his life (he was gay) in Victorian society which was severely restricted on sexual matters and on anything unconventional at all. Homosexuality was literally a hanging offense. It is a very "dark" story in that Dorian is unable to redeem himself (though he tries)--as if Wilde were saying that not even the religion of Victorian society provides him with any comfort (he is not redeemable). It also contains the peculiar and unexamined Victorian idea (unexamined by Wilde) that the physical ravages of old age and disease are somehow equivalent to "debauchery" (sins, crimes). The Victorians had a particularly maudlin and hypocritical attitude toward "innocence" (young children of the upper class; virginal young women) and were obsessed with platitudes such as "cleanliness is next to Godliness". Wilde seems to accept this notion in his story (or perhaps was brilliantly satirizing it?).
However, as a concept of how evil can be hidden behind appearances, the story still has great power. And this photo of Bush instantly brought Wilde's story to my mind. It's as if Bush's many crimes had suddenly become visible. It's quite a shocking photo (the first one, above). How can he have aged so much in such a short time? Were his handlers giving him steroid treatments or something, to keep him looking like "Mr. Codpiece Mission Accomplished" while he was still president--and now he's off his meds?
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Picture_of_Dorian_Grayhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptations_of_The_Picture_of_Dorian_Gray
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