Leiden University Student Repository

Put, Ruben van de (2021)

Sebastian Melmoth: A Biographical Approach to Oscar Wilde's Catholic in The Picture of Dorian Gray

Master thesis | Literary Studies (MA)

This thesis analyzes the Catholic themes within Oscar Wilde’s 1890 novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. In order to accurately do so it will establish proper definitions of gothic fiction and Catholicism. Moreover, within this analysis on Catholicism and gothic fiction, it will also establish which Catholic themes are significant within the analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray. After these definitions and particular themes are established, an inquiry into Wilde’s personal life, and his relationship to Catholicism, will be executed. Eventually, an analysis of the novel itself, combining the Catholic themes and the biographical information presented in the earlier chapters, will be carried out. After these analyses are carried out, this thesis will establish that The Picture of Dorian Gray illustrates Wilde’s fear of being completely liberated. The judgment he received from the Marquess of Queensberry, the heteronormative Protestant community he grew up in, and even his lover Lord...Show moreThis thesis analyzes the Catholic themes within Oscar Wilde’s 1890 novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. In order to accurately do so it will establish proper definitions of gothic fiction and Catholicism. Moreover, within this analysis on Catholicism and gothic fiction, it will also establish which Catholic themes are significant within the analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray. After these definitions and particular themes are established, an inquiry into Wilde’s personal life, and his relationship to Catholicism, will be executed. Eventually, an analysis of the novel itself, combining the Catholic themes and the biographical information presented in the earlier chapters, will be carried out. After these analyses are carried out, this thesis will establish that The Picture of Dorian Gray illustrates Wilde’s fear of being completely liberated. The judgment he received from the Marquess of Queensberry, the heteronormative Protestant community he grew up in, and even his lover Lord Alfred Douglas would eventually turn his desires to feel as liberated as his mother into a phobia of being completely free, which is depicted in his own conviction of Dorian Gray.Show less

Oscar Wilde

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Catholicism

Homosexuality

Gothic Fiction

Author

Put, Ruben van de

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Supervisors

E.J. van Leeuwen

ECTS Credits

20

Language

en