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Emily Moore
Ms. Winter
British Literature, Period 2
3 May 2016
Ideal Masculinity in the Victorian Era
Masculinity is defined as the possession of the qualities traditionally associated with men,
but this has a far different meaning in The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. This novel is
about a young, handsome man, Mr. Dorian Gray, who acquires a portrait of himself from a
friend. Unfortunately, his painting alters whenever Dorian commits a wrongdoing and this
eventually leads to his ruin. The Picture of Dorian Gray undermines many of the masculine
qualities associated with the Victorian era through the three main characters; Basil Hallward,
Lord Henry Wotton, and Dorian Gray. Many other factors play into the mockery of masculinity
in the novel such as the general Victorian views of the ideal male, what Wildes intentions were
for writing his work in such a daring way, and how art of this time period affected how males
were seen. Manliness is introduced in a new and innovated way through this novel; some may
say it was ridiculed.
Masculinity is mocked through the three main characters in the novel; Basil, Henry, and
Dorian Gray. These men all play various roles in the book shown through many aspects of their
personalities and actions. Basil plays a very distinct role in the novel, he is the most emotional of
them all and he is not afraid to show it: "How much that strange confession explained to him!
The painter's absurd fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his curious
reticences -- he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. There seemed to him to be something
tragic in a friendship so coloured by romance"(Wilde.14). Basil knows his relationship with

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Dorian will never blossom into actual romance because of the crime they would be committing;
the both of them know that they can not reciprocate the feelings they truly have for eachother.
Basil demonstrates very passionate feelings for many things, not just his obsession with Dorian,
which is a very unorthodox quality for a male to have in this time. Basils secret love for art and
Dorian plays a large part in creating the feeling of tension that is so important for the reader to
see and understand how the ideal male is challenged. On the other hand, Lord Henry plays a very
conflicting character role. Henry is more of a typical male and has a strong character but can also
be deceiving to other characters in the novel. Lord Henry knows he is very influential and uses
this character trait to his advantage: "There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All
influence is immoral -- immoral from the scientific point of view"(Wilde.8). Lord Henry plays
and egoistic part of the novel, he portrays the typical flamboyant man. This is unlike many males
of this time to be so outrageous. Lord Henry claims that influence is immoral even though he
makes the biggest impact on Dorian, which may be why Dorian became the man that he did.
Joseph Bristow discusses the masculinity of all the men and how they all do not portray the
typical man. Bristow seems to be fascinated with Dorian and says Dorian learns that what he
takes pleasure in is not permitted in public; his delights are consigned to secrecy. His unspoken
wish for sexual relations with men; his impossible liaisons with the lower-class Sybil and, later,
the village girl, Hetty Merton--all of these things signal Dorian's displacement from conventional
heterosexuality"(Bristow). Dorian carries many masculine qualities such as good looks and
politeness but on the inside he is anything but manly. Dorian has to be influenced by his peers to
learn or experience anything so Henry and Basils impacts on him really shaped his character.
Bristow mentions that Dorian is very unconventional in many ways; mostly his portrayal of
being a man. Donald Ericksen also explores the parts of the men in the novel claiming that they

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all play a certain character trait: Basil we find "the embodiment of the conscience...He further
suggests that psychoanalytically, "Dorian," Wilde's id, "is driven to self-inflicted death by his
misinterpreting...the doctrines of beauty and pleasure...preached by Lord Henry, Wilde's
ego;...the author's Super-Ego(Ericksen). As the reader can tell, Oscar Wilde wrote his
characters in perspective of himself, who obviously did not fit the typical male identity. Basil,
Wildes conscience, thinks things they can not say. Henry, Wildes Super-Ego, does things out of
conceitedness. Lastly, Dorian, Wildes id, has impulses that are never acted upon. Wilde
appeared as the ideal masculine man before writing this novel exposing his real self.
There was not many ways to see the ideal male in the Victorian era, these social norms
affected how the novel truly undermines masculinity. Bristow examines how Wilde took a big
risk by writing this novel in the time that he did: "This [essay] investigates how Wilde's only
novel risked opening up a metaphorical space in which male same-sex desire could be articulated
as a potentially beautiful thing that the law rendered ugly by granting such desire a grotesque and
incriminatory definition--namely, gross indecency"(Bristow). In the Victorian period, same-sex
lust was expressed as gross and immoral which is one reason the men could not express their true
feelings. Wilde introduced this idea as beautiful and tried to integrate it as normal, but in a time
of closed minds this was almost impossible. Many readers saw this novel as an insult to the
societal roles they had created. James Adams also brought up how society was strict and there
was not much room for new concepts: "Although these fantasies certainly gained prominence in
bourgeois culture...they are a persistent force throughout the period(Adams). There was a lot of
pressure in this time period to follow certain norms that society had created; The Picture of
Dorian Gray definitely tested how culture would react to these new ideas. The community
obviously did not react well considering Wilde was sent to jail after writing this one and only

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novel. This did open up new propositions to how the ideal male was seen and in todays culture,
Wildes views are now more of a social norm. Adams then compares how Wilde opens up a new
view of masculinity when he says there is an insufficient scope to correspondent norms of
masculinity more resistant to domesticity. More precisely, it presumes that aggression is
invariably a byproduct of alienation(Adams). Adams explains how masculinity is not directly
related to how ones family life is or how they were raised. He also mentions that belligerence is
caused by detachment. These beliefs are often expressed in the novel. What Adams is attempting
to say is that Dorians masculinity was not necessarily all Basil and Henrys doing; he is his own
person and chose to influenced by the others. Adams is also saying that Dorians ruin was due to
the fact that he was different from society, his views of norms were constructed by his friends
and he knew they were corrupt compared to how the rest of civilization was living. Many people
of this era thought that art and masculinity were connected somehow. It was said that "It was the
emergence of [aestheticism] in the 19th century that planted the seeds of our contemporary
connection between "the artist" and homosexuality"(Polchin) as James Polchin says in his article.
This novel draws an evident line between the artist and homosexuality through Basil and aspects
of Dorian.
Oscar Wilde was influenced by many outside factors when writing The Picture of Dorian
Gray, he has many diverse intentions for establishing this type of a risky book. As Walter Pater
brings up, Wilde may have been attempting to ease the idea of homosexuality into the culture he
lived in: "We need only emphasise, once more, the skill, the real subtlety of art, the ease and
fluidity withal of one telling a story by word of mouth, with which the consciousness of the
supernatural is introduced into, and maintained amid, the elaborately conventional, sophisticated,
disabused world Mr. Wilde depicts so cleverly, so mercilessly"(Pater). Wilde may have just been

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trying to adapt his community into the idea of being gay by writing this novel, but this so clearly
did not work out for him. Pater describes the culture as conventional which Oscar Wilde tried to
strain. James Polchin then goes on to further expand on Paters idea saying that the long-term
effect of the Wilde trial was to make "aestheticism the 'look' of homosexuality, and thus a
touchstone in the emergence of gay subcultures, for decades to come(Polchin). Polchin suggests
that Wilde was not only trying to bring up the idea of homosexuality but to help people of gay
intentions come out. Wilde tried to connect aestheticism to homosexuality to make the culture
and cultures to come feel comfortable with the appearance of these newly conformed ideas.
Donald Ericksen then says that "Oscar Wilde loved to shock people with clever inversions and
startling paradoxes"(Ericksen). Wilde may have just been trying to catch the readers attention
when writing The Picture of Dorian Gray. He could have just been trying to differentiate himself
from the rest of typical authors of the times and catch some unexpected reactions. Lastly, and
most plainly, Wilde was trying to express his true intentions through the novel. Michael Buma
goes on to say "Sin," on the other hand, refers to "an act which is regarded as a transgression of
the divine law or an offence against God; a violation (especially willful or deliberate) of some
religious or moral principle...And while evil is subtle in Dorian Gray, sin is anything
but"(Buma). Buma argues that Wilde commits many sins when writing this novel because of his
clear expression of homosexuality, and in this era, it was a sin.
This novel was truly influenced by many different art pieces of the Victorian era that
presented various domestic roles that influenced the direct ridicule of masculinity that Wilde
presented. In figure one, The Lady of Shallott is presented. Alfred Lord Tennyson, the author of
the poem, The Lady of Shallott, writes "But who hath seen her wave her hand?/ Or at the
casement seen her stand?/ Or is she known in all the land,/ The Lady of Shallott?"(Tennyson).

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The Lady of Shallott is presented as only being known for her

looks, not for her actual self just as is Dorian Gray. Wilde
represented Dorian as a man of only his looks to show the reader
how masculinity is largely defined by looks and not who one is on
the inside. The poem then further continues to cover this idea when
Tennyson says "She has a lovely face;/ God in his mercy lend her
grace,/ The Lady of Shallott"(Tennyson). When the Lady dies, the
knight does not have much to say about her other than how beautiful she is. The same goes for
Dorian when he dies, the painting is all that is left to show his real self, his not masculine self.
Horatio Walter Pater discusses how big of an impact art truly made on people of this era: in
some curious way his personality has suggested to me an entirely new manner in art, an entirely
new mode of style. I see things differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate life in a
way that was hidden from me before"(Pater). He says that Dorian Gray and his story made him
see things differently. Wilde, in this way, proved that bringing new ideas to the table really
changed society in ways of how homesexuality is seen. Michael Buma claims that "When Wilde
was a student at Oxford he enthralled his colleagues by decorating his room with blue vases full
of lilies...and is reported to have caused a stir by showing up to gallery openings in a coat made
to resemble a cello"(Buma). Wilde was so influenced by art which is why many aspects of his
novel revolve around art. In the Victorian era, art is often associated with homosexuality which is
why Wilde included it so much in The Picture of Dorian Gray.
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde mocks the views of ideal masculinity
in the Victorian era in many dangerous ways. It is mocked through Basil, Lord Henry, and the
famous Dorian gray along with through Victorian ideals, Wildes intentions, and the influence of

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art. Wilde was later sent to jail for his immoral ways of life portrayed through his one and only
novel. Culture has changed thoroughly since the Victorian era to which there is freedom to write
what is believed and express those beliefs in the real world. Oscar Wilde played a large role in
how culture worked in the Victorian era as long with how todays culture runs.

Works Cited
Adams, James Eli. A Mans Place: Masculinity and the Middle-Class Home in Victorian
England. (Book Reviews). Victorian Studies 43.4 (2001): 657+. Literature Resource
Center. Web. 1 May 2016.
Bristow, Joseph. Wilde, Dorian Gray, and Gross Indecency. Sexual Sameness: Textual
Differences in Lesbian and Gay Writing. Ed. Joseph Bristow. London: Routledge, 1992.
44-63. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Kathy D. Darrow. Vol. 272.
Detroit: Gale, 2012. Literature Resource Center. Web. 28 Apr. 2016.

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Buma, Michael. The Picture of Dorian Gray, or, the embarrassing orthodoxy of Oscar
Wilde.Victorian Newsletter 107 (2005): 18+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 1 May
2016.
Ericksen, Donald H. Oscar Wilde. Boston: Twayne, 1977. Print.
- - -. Oscar Wilde. Boston: Twayne, 1977. Print.
Gillespie, Michael Patrick. Ethics and Aesthetics in The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Rediscovering Oscar Wilde. Ed. C. George Sandulescu. Gerrards Cross, England: Colin
Smythe, 1994. 137-155. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Kathy D.
Darrow. Vol. 272. Detroit: Gale, 2012. Literature Resource Center. Web. 28 Apr. 2016.
The Lady of Shallott. N.p.: n.p., n.d. 1-3. Print.
Pater, Walter Horatio. A Novel By Mr. Oscar Wilde: The Pricture of Dorian Gray.
Sketches and Reviews. Walter Horatio Pater. Boni and Liveright, 1919. 126. LitFinder.
Web. 1 May 2016.
Polchin, James. How the artist became an aesthete. The Gay & Lesbian Review
Worldwide 19.1 (2012): 36+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 1 May 2016.
Waterhouse, John William. The Lady of Shallott. N.d. Oil on Canvas. Tate Museum.
- - -. The Lady of Shallott. N.d. Oil on Canvas. Tate Museum.
Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. 2nd ed. London: Norton & Company, 1891.
Print. A Norton Critical Edition 2.
- - -. The Picture of Dorian Gray. 2nd ed. London: Norton & Company, 1891. Print. A
Norton Critical Edition 2.

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