As previously stated, I do not think that Harry is to blame for Dorian's behavior. Harry only awakens in Dorian the "degenerate, rotten" person within. I think that person within was created by Dorian's grandfather and from the very beginning Dorian has lived his life of debauchery owning up to the image that his grandfather created. His relationship to Sibyl Vane was similar to that of his mother to a poor man, the murder of Basil symbolizing and indeed signifying for Dorian, the murder of his evil grandfather.
He hated his grandfather (wincing at the utterance of his name by a household servant) and Harry's influence forced him to remember that "there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. He understood them now."
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I'm not sure I would agree that Harry had NO impact on Dorian, since Dorian shares so many of Harry's opinions, especially at the beginning of the novel, as shown when Dorian meets Harry's wife and she comments how she often hears Harry's opinions form Harry's friends. However, I would agree that Dorian's relationship, or lack thereof, greatly influenced who he ended up becoming. But I also think that Dorian himself held within himself that which created the monster. Though his grandfather may have neglected him as a younger child, and Dorian's family life was almost non-existent, his grandfather did not murder and wreak havoc on society as whole.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Lisa, I think Harry had a huge impact on how Dorian's fate ultimately turns out. I think that we as the reader see a transformation in Dorian's persona before and after Harry's influence. At the beginning of the novel, we see that Dorian is much more reluctant of Dorian. Progressively he favors Dorian and begins to share his opinions, but as his contact with Harry increases, his actions and self-righteousness progresses; a progression I don't believe would have happened in Harry's absence.
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