Linguistic Gymnasium №20Sarapul

Udmurtia

presents….

• First name: Elena

• Last name: Кapustina

• Age: 14

• Town: Sarapul

• Region: Udmurtia

• School: Linguistic gymnasium№20

• Form: 8 «B»

• Hobbies: basketball, scuba diving and reading books of different genres: mystical horror, fantasy, and novels.

Our Team

• First name: Valeria

• Last name: Makshakova

• Age: 14

• Town: Sarapul

• Region: Udmurtia

• School: Linguistic

gymnasium№20

• Form: 8 «B»

• Hobbies: skiing, reading novels and fantasy.

• First name: Polina

• Last name: Teplyakova

• Age: 14

• Town: Sarapul

• Region: Udmurtia

• School: Linguistic

gymnasium№20

• Form: 8 «B»

• Hobbies: skiing, playing the guitar , reading adventure stories and novels.

• First name: Alina

• Last name: Tolstikova

• Age:14

• Town: Sarapul

• Region: Udmurtia

• School: Linguistic

gymnasium№20

• Form: 8 «B»

• Hobbies: playing basketball and reading books of different genres: mystical horror, fantasy, and novels.

• First name: Natalia Vladimirovna

• Last name: Samarina

• Age: 30

• Town: Sarapul

• Region: Udmurtia

• Work place: Linguistic

gymnasium№20

• An English teacher

• Hobbies: reading books in English, listening to music and learning new foreign languages.

As you can see, all of us enjoy reading. We have just read a very interesting fiction novel, written by O. Wilde and we’d like to tell you about it!

Oscar Wilde

“Beauty is a form of genius -- is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. “

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde was born on October 16, 1854, in Dublin, Ireland. He was educated at Trinity College in Dublin and at Magdalen College, Oxford, and settled in London, where he married Constance Lloyd in 1884. In the literary world of Victorian London, Wilde fell in with an artistic crowd.

The Picture of Dorian Gray is the only published novel by Oscar Wilde, appearing as the lead story in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine on 20 June 1890. It was immediately criticized as scandalous and immoral. Wilde revised the novel the following year, adding a Preface and six new chapters.

Character List

A radiantly handsome,

impressionable, and wealthy

young gentleman.

Dorian Gray

Lord Henry Wotton

A nobleman who plays a vital

role in Dorian Gray’s

development.

Basil Hallward

The painter who creates the picture and who

becomes obsessed with Dorian after meeting him at

a party.

Sibyl Vane

A poor, beautiful, and

talented actress with

whom Dorian falls in

love.

James Vane

Sibyl’s brother, a

sailor bound for

Australia. James

cares deeply for his

sister and worries

about her relationship

with Dorian.

The plot

Lord Henry Wotton meets Dorian Gray at the house of the artist Basil Hallward who is painting the portrait of the handsome young man.

After he sees the picture, Dorian Gray makes a wish: to remain forever young.

“How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and

dreadful. But this portrait will remain always young”.

Dorian falls in love with an actress, Sybil Vane, his first and only love, who eventually commits suicide.

After Sybil’s death her brother James promises to find and kill Dorian.

The life of Dorian Gray reaches all levels of depravity.

His sins leave marks on his portrait: the man remains young but the picture grows older and older day by day.

The man makes a last attempt to change his life , but when he finds out that there are no changes in his portrait, he destroys the picture.

The portrait comes back to its original form.

The body of old, horrible and dreadful man lefts lying on the floor. Only rings on his fingers tell us who he is.

Key factsSetting (time) · 1890sSetting (place) · London, EnglandProtagonist · Dorian GrayMajor conflict ·Dorian Gray, having promised his soul in order to live a life of perpetual youth, must try to reconcile himself to the bodily decay and dissipation that are recorded in his portrait.

Outcome· Dorian stabs his portrait, thereby killing himself.

Exposition · Dorian notices the change in his portrait after ending his affair with Sibyl Vane;

Climax · Dorian kills Basil Hallward;

The problem of Influence

Influence is a recurring theme throughout the book. All people are influenced and act as influences, and ironically, the book itself may influence its reader.Dorian Gray is influenced toward his life of decadence by the hedonist philosophy of Lord Henry.

The problem of Influence

Dorian's painting also influenced him, though it was merely a work of art. Basil, too, was influenced by his own painting of Dorian.

The problem of Evil

The theme of evil is very much reflected by the book's setting, plot structure and characterization. It shows how individuals can slowly deteriorate because of the evil lying within themselves. The evil of this book is the evil created by one's self and trusted upon one's self.

The author was very successful in finding the right means to represent the evil in this book. The book ends on more of a good note than a bad; that there is hope in stopping evil, we just have to have a want for it.

The problem of Evil

Our reviewThe Picture of Dorian Gray is a hard book to review. After reading such eloquent, beautiful, and rich writing, we are at a loss for how to command our ability to use words to express how we felt about this book.We felt several things as we read this book: interest, curiosity, disgust, sadness, and ultimately, a sense that justice had been done, in a very strange, but fitting way.

Our reviewThis book was an excellent choice because it had a very interesting way of looking at life. At the beginning we thought it would be the usual story, but then as the plot unwraps, all of us can't leave the book for a second. You always want to know what will happen to Dorian Gray. Gray is an amazing character, at the start he was just blooming like a flower, but under the influence of Lord Henry, he matures and becomes a creature of evil. He realizes his mistakes and wants to change them, but it is too late.

This story shows us that you can't have everything forever, one has to live life as one is. Dorian tried to stay young forever and it brought him nothing but pain. We can't make such mistakes because we only live once, we have to take Dorian's example and make our lives better, and worth living.

Our review

We fully recommend this classic as both Oscar Wilde's only novel and as a moral warning.

This is an excellent work and we think most will find it enjoyable. It is not only a well written and deeply characterized book...it carries an understated and pervasive type of horror that might just require the reader to think.

Our review

P.S.Dorian Gray Syndrome (DGS) denotes a cultural and societal phenomenon characterized by an excessive preoccupation with the individual's own appearance accompanied by difficulties coping with the aging process and with the requirements of maturation.The syndrome was first described at a symposium on lifestyle drugs and aesthetic medicine.