Sunday, April 2nd | 3pm
YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY (York, Maine)
YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY (York, Maine)
Part I
The Picture of Dorian Gray with Introduction by Ron McAllister
Featuring Matt McTighe, Greg Trzaskowski, Alex Davis & David Newman
Part II
De Profundis with Helen Winebaum & David Newman
Discussion following the reading.
The Picture of Dorian Gray with Introduction by Ron McAllister
Featuring Matt McTighe, Greg Trzaskowski, Alex Davis & David Newman
Part II
De Profundis with Helen Winebaum & David Newman
Discussion following the reading.
A truth in art is that whose contradictory is also true, Wilde wrote in 'The Truth of Masks.' And the object of life is not to simplify it. As our conflicting impulses coincide, as our repressed feelings vie with our expressed ones, as our solid views disclose unexpected striations, we are all secret dramatists. In this light Wilde's works become exercises in self-criticism as well as pleas for tolerance.
Helen Winebaum leads a distinguished cast in this performance of Wildean ironies and paradox. As the villainous hero in Dorian Gray remarks, The aim of life is self-development. To realize one’s nature perfectly, that is what each of us is here for.
Helen Winebaum leads a distinguished cast in this performance of Wildean ironies and paradox. As the villainous hero in Dorian Gray remarks, The aim of life is self-development. To realize one’s nature perfectly, that is what each of us is here for.
A Soul's Progress – Director's Note:
When The Picture of Dorian Gray first appeared (in 1890) the general opinion was that it was an immoral, prurient, unethical and dangerous book. But there was a nearly-hysterical outcry over the fact that an evil protagonist was allowed to escape the consequences of his actions by an easy death. (We did not include it in our reading, but Dorian dies mysteriously by stabbing his own portrait). To the Victorian reader, however, Dorian should have been forced to suffer many years with his horribly deformed face. Of course, Oscar Wilde had no idea, in 1890, that he himself would be punished with a terrible stigma which would last for the rest of his life. The irony of that fatal coincidence might explain why Wilde returned to the same theme in De Profundis that he had articulated in Dorian Gray. To wit: “The aim of the artistic life is self-development,” Lord Henry tells Dorian. “To realize one's nature perfectly – that is what each of us is here for.” In De Profundis Wilde writes: “The artistic life is simply self-development... Nothing seems to me of the smallest value except what one gets out of oneself. That is all I am concerned with. The supreme vice is shallowness. Whatever is realized is right.” So what does Wilde mean by “the artistic life?” And is his “self-development” in De Profundis the same as Harry's in Dorian Gray? Not quite. The artistic life that Lord Harry aspired to – and mistakenly believed that Dorian had achieved -- is described in the last lines of our playlet: “You have never done anything,” Harry moons, “never carved a statue or painted a picture, or produced anything outside yourself. Life has been your art.” The fact that Dorian's face never changes is proof that he has become a work of art... beautiful... and useless. Wilde's goal, in De Profundis, is to retake possession of himself: “What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion. I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day to cry aloud on the housetop. I ceased to be lord over myself, and did not know it. I allowed pleasure to dominate me. There is only one thing for me now, absolute humility.” What both works have in common is the absoluteness of the intention. “To realize one's nature perfectly – that is what each of us is here for.” (Dorian Gray) And, “The supreme vice is shallowness. Whatever is realized is right.” (De Profundis) In a strange way, one cannot truly understand what Wilde meant in either work without considering the other. Once again, from De Profundis: “I do not, for a single moment, regret having lived for pleasure. I did it to the full, as one should do everything that one does. I threw the pearl of my soul into a cup of wine. I went down the primrose path to the sound of flutes. But to have continued the same life would have been wrong because it would have been limiting. I had to pass on. The other half of the garden had its secrets for me also.” |