An Analysis Of Consumerism In The Picture Of Dorian Gray

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) is a rare talent in the modern British literary history. He isboth an excellent playwright, novelist and also a great poet and critic. In his lifetime,discussion over his literary works and private life remains intent among the readingpublic. His mystic splendid charm, instead of being effaced by the lapse of time, began toassert itself and gained increasing admiration from more open-minded generations.As Wilde’s only novel, the first show of The Picture of Dorian Gray drew greatcontroversy. Despite all the bitter and unjust attack it incurred when it was published, ThePicture of Dorian Gray survives all the criticism upon it and joins in the rank of worldclassics. The novel not only fully reflects Wilde’s aesthetic ideas but indicates theinsights of contemporary consumer culture theory. The thesis intends to examine theinfluence of consumerism on Wilde’s artistic creation, especially in The Picture ofDorian Gray with the theory of French Marxist sociologist Jean Baudrillard’sconsumerism and consumer culture.The thesis consists of three parts: an introduction, the main body and conclusion.Introduction is a brief overview of Oscar Wilde’s life and literary achievements as well asscholars’ research results about Wilde’s works in China and abroad and thus elicit thisthesis’s research methodology and significance.The main body is composed of four chapters：Chapter I generally introduces the emergence of Victorian consumer society andBaudrillard’s theory of consumerism. He concludes that what was formerly a society ofproduction has now (after World War II) become one of consumption. One noteworthyfeature of modern consumerism is being obsessed with the power of signal. Throughconsuming behavior, people’s lifestyles and worldviews are changed subtly and thosetraditional traits built on fragile emotional relationship are eroded by the golden rule ofmass consumption. The worst of all is that art, originally independent from others,irreversibly becomes a consuming item in the process of mass production. Theemergence of consumer society is a prominent theme in Wilde’s work. The GreatExhibition of1815in London is a ceremonial signal for the beginning of a new age ofconsumerism which gradually became the justification for the free market, and the new route to the common goods. After two industrial revolutions, people’s thinking tended tobe increasingly commercialized. The idea that material desires dominate and money iseverything was the only pursuit at that time. The middle class especially welcomed animprovement in their standard of living, thus a consumer society was established.Chapter II expounds how consumerism enters into Wilde’s literary experience andWilde’s reaction to it. As an aristocratic intellectual, a cultural elite, Wilde expresses hisdissatisfaction and resentment towards increasingly commercialized western society inthe late19th century. He couldn’t help expressing his contempt for commodity culture.He raises value of art consciously, not only promoting it as an ideology but regarding itas a lifestyle to compete with consuming trend. He uses artistic form to save and enhancelife, allocating a piece of soil for soul free from the contamination of the commodityworld. However, this religious belief in artistic form inevitably shows its limitation seenfrom today. On the one hand, Wilde and other aesthetes build a brilliant artistic world; onthe other hand, their “new aesthetics” focused on form is inevitably tinged with certainconsumerism color. Wilde’s theory about art is a mode of “self-realization”, hisconsuming experience of sound, color, images, etc in his commentary critics, hisparticular concern and pursuit of images and appearances in art and life, and his feelingfor the instant aesthetics are more or less affected by the consumer culture at that time.Chapter III focuses on illustrating the convergence of consumerism and aestheticismin The Picture of Dorian Gray from three aspects: the Oriental mania, the consumption ofaesthetic body and self-realization through hedonism. In the level of art, Wilde’sobsession of oriental art is due to an impressionistic art style which emphasizes color,visual effects and other sensory stimulation. In the level of consumption, Wilde’s orientalartistic objects ultimately become commodities with “industrialized” meaning,circulating and consumed by the commercial market in the late19th century.Disillusioned with a human nature distorted by capitalization and commercializationpervading in19th century British society, aesthetes led by Wilde take hedonism as aspiritual refuge in their pursuit of life ideals. The key role hedonism plays in Wilde’saestheticism could be discerned from his portrayal of Dorian Gray, the symbol of beautywho pursues a life of exquisite or perverse sensation and exhausts passions for acatalogue of sensory disciplines from interior design to exotic cuisine. Chapter IV critically examines Wildean dandies’ consumerist lifestyle through thecharacters’ pursuit of sensuous pleasure, unique time experience andsentimentality-opposing attitude on death. Influenced by dandy Lord Henry’s “newhedonism”, Dorian in his budding life spends his days on nothing but luxurious sensuousenjoyment, leading a lifestyle “morally” intolerable in an industrial and utilitarian societyyet welcomed by aesthetes who take superb sensuous pleasure as a form ofself-fulfillment. But evidently, the hedonism meant for the “redemption of mankind’ssouls” as claimed by aesthetes is in essence escapism that can’t bear fruits in the end.Through the above analysis, the final conclusion is that under such social realities inwhich industrial production, market economy, commodity culture grow prosperously,consumerism appears as the new theory of the world, destroying the balance of Europeanthought dated from ancient Greece and devastating a certain foundation of human’sexistence. At the mercy of consumption, aesthetic culture encountered an unprecedentedembarrassing situation and it’s hard for aesthetic writers represented by Oscar Wilde toget rid of consumerism trap, which has penetrated into every aspect of his literaryexperience with The Picture of Dorian Gray as an example. Today when the fog ofcommodity culture comes back to fascinate our eyes, analysis of Oscar Wilde and earlyconsumer culture is of realistic meaning.