The Uncensored Picture of Dorian Gray

Now, for the first time, we can read the version that Wilde intendedBoth the text and Nicholas Frankels introduction make for fascinating reading. Paris Review

More than 120 years after Oscar Wilde submitted The Picture of Dorian Gray for publication in Lippincotts Monthly Magazine, the uncensored version of his novel appears here for the first time in a paperback edition. This volume restores all of the material removed by the novels first editor.

Upon receipt of the typescript, Wildes editor panicked at what he saw. Contained within its pages was material he feared readers would find offensiveespecially instances of graphic homosexual content. He proceeded to go through the typescript with his pencil, cleaning it up until he made it acceptable to the most fastidious taste. Wilde did not see these changes until his novel appeared in print. Wildes editors concern was well placed. Even in its redacted form, the novel caused public outcry. The British press condemned it as vulgar, unclean, poisonous, discreditable, and a sham. When Wilde later enlarged the novel for publication in book form, he responded to his critics by further toning down its immoral elements.

Wilde famously said that The Picture of Dorian Gray contains much of me: Basil Hallward is what I think I am, Lord Henry what the world thinks me, and Dorian what I would like to bein other ages, perhaps. Wildes comment suggests a backward glance to a Greek or Dorian Age, but also a forward-looking view to a more permissive time than his own repressive Victorian era. By implication, Wilde would have preferred we read today the uncensored version of his novel.