The Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, France, is a holy place for all literati.
Because there are many celebrities buried here, such as the musician Chopin, the literary artist Balzac and so on.
Among the solemn tombstones, there is one tombstone that is different, and has left countless lip prints and confessions on it.
Who has such a big charm?
He is the famous British writer Wilde.
Only because he said before he died: "The red lips of a young girl are the best epitaphs." ”
So he caused countless of his admirers to come and offer kisses.
Wilde was loved by readers for publishing the fairy tale "The Happy Prince" and was known as the "Fairy Prince".
But his talents are best exemplified by the plays and novels he has created, and The Portrait of Dowling Gray is one of them.
The novel is full of fantasy, with a Douban score of 8.9, and has been adapted into movies, musicals and dramas many times.
The book tells that the beautiful teenager Dowling Gray has a magical portrait.
No matter what mistakes Dowling made, the portrait would have been punished in his place.
And under the protection of the portrait, he can maintain his youth forever.
So he indulged himself, not only taking drugs, playing with women, but even killing people.
Until one day, the secret of the portrait can no longer be hidden...
Stunning portraits
The aristocratic teenager Dowling Gray had an unusually handsome face that made women scream and men jealous.
His handsomeness impressed a painter friend, for whom the painter painted a full-body portrait of him.
Dowling was amazed by the beauty of the people in the painting, and he didn't care much about his appearance, and he couldn't help but feel vanity.
But another of his friends, Henry, poured cold water on him.
In Henry's view, no matter how young and beautiful the face is, it cannot withstand the ravages of time.
Shaohua is easy to pass away, it is better to take advantage of the young and have fun in time.
After listening to Henry's words, Dowling suddenly developed a sense of crisis, fearing that he would grow old and ugly.
So Dowling made a wish to the portrait:
He was willing to sacrifice his soul, just to be able to maintain his youth forever and let this portrait grow old in his place.
Unexpectedly, this wish would later come true— he would be young forever, but the person on the portrait would grow old for him.
And his fate was also changed by this painting.
The turning point in Dowling's fate began with a romantic love affair.
When he went to the theater to see a play, he became fascinated by the acting talent of the actress Sybil and fell in love with her at first sight.
Despite Sybil's poor family, Dowling became engaged to Sybil despite the disparity in status.
But love comes and goes quickly.
Dowling found that Sybil hadn't had the heart to act since falling in love and had behaved badly in the show.
He suddenly felt that Sybil did not understand art at all, and he had misread her.
Therefore, he ignored Sybil's bitter pleas and coldly proposed to break up.
Fall into the abyss of sin
After breaking up with his lover, Dowling unexpectedly found that his portrait had changed.
Originally, the person in the painting was innocent and sweet, but now there is a little more cruelty in the mouth.
Startled, he immediately took a look in the mirror, but he was still pure and flawless.
Dowling suddenly understood that his crazy wish had really come true:
He will always be young, and the portrait will reflect his heart and bear his sins.
At this time, Dowling is very frightened and wants to convince himself to reconcile with Sibir and restore the portrait to its original innocence.
But the bad news came:
Sybil was overly sad and committed suicide the night they parted.
Upon hearing this unfortunate news, Dowling was initially very guilty and bitter.
But he wanted to open up later, and even if he married Sybil, he wouldn't be happy. He even felt that Sybil's death had nothing to do with him, and he didn't need to feel sorry for it.
Since then, Dowling has no longer pursued so-called sacred love, but has indulged himself and had fun in time.
He also locked up portraits that reflected the ugliness of his heart to prevent others from seeing them.
Anyway, there are portraits that bear the burden of sin and the traces of time for him, and he can squander his youth without scruples.
Dowling not only began to take drugs and play with various women, but also encouraged his friends around him to have fun, which affected many rich children to take the evil road.
Time passed in such a hurry, and the years took away age, but they did not take away Dowling's face.
18 years on, he is still the same as when he was 20 years old, nothing has changed.
The portrait, on the other hand, grew uglier, wrinkled and abominable.
Dowling lived a life of spending time and drinking all day long, so that the painter really couldn't look at it anymore, and specially came to persuade Daolin to change from evil to righteousness.
But Dowling not only did not repent, but blamed the painter for all the blame.
If the painter hadn't painted that painting, he wouldn't have become what he is today.
He simply broke the jar and took the painter to see the ugly portrait.
Sure enough, the painter was horrified when he saw the portrait, accusing Dowling of having turned into a devil.
This made Dowling even more crazy, picked up a knife and stabbed it...
After the killing, he quickly calmed down.
He must dispose of the painter's body immediately so that it will not be discovered.
So Dowling called a friend who was engaged in chemistry.
After some coercion and inducement, he forced the friend to spend 5 hours quietly and completely destroyed the painter's body.
But after the corpse was dealt with without a trace, he encountered new troubles.
The last madness
After the painter died, Dowling couldn't stand the eyes of the other party in front of him, so he had to go to the opium hall to anesthetize himself.
But as soon as he came out of the opium den, he was shot in the head.
After learning the identity of the person who came, Dowling trembled with fear.
This man turned out to be James, Sybil's younger brother.
He was in a hurry and deliberately reminded James to look closely at his 20-year-old face, so that the other party thought that he had found the wrong person.
In this way, he succeeded in deceiving James.
But a few days later, Dowling went on a hunting expedition and again met people he didn't want to see.
Someone accidentally hit a person while hunting.
The man who was killed by stray bullets turned out to be James, who was hiding nearby.
Looking at James's corpse, Dowling could finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Soon he heard another piece of news in his favor.
The friend who was engaged in chemistry suddenly shot himself, but did not reveal the body.
Now all the people who knew Dowling's secrets were dead, and if the portrait was destroyed, the crimes he had committed could be written off.
But just as he poked the portrait with a knife, an incredible scene occurred...
Angel face Devil Heart
The novel Portrait of Dowling Gray is Wilde's only novel.
When the work was first published, it was controversial and was even criticized by the press as "full of the stench of moral and spiritual decay".
However, with the passage of time, the novel was gradually objectively evaluated and accepted by people, and it was recognized as a "masterpiece of aestheticism at the end of the 19th century".
The magical plot of the book is favored by screenwriters and directors from all over the world.
So far, the novel has been remade more than 20 times. The 1945 American version of the film of the same name also won the "Academy Award" and the "Golden Globe Award" respectively.
Dowling in the film has become a classic screen image that combines beauty and evil, which is frightening and fascinating.
Although his face is not old, his heart is already dirty.
His ending was apocalyptic. His tragedy is that he is not punished after making mistakes, resulting in one mistake after another.
As the book says:
What good is it for a man to earn the whole world, but to lose his soul?