Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Le Portrait De Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

152 reviews

katewhite77's review against another edition

challenging dark informative mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A queer classic 

I can't remember a book that has surprised me so much with all its twists and turns. Elements of the super natural also appear. 

This is my first time reading Wilde and it won't be last. There are so many famous quotes in this novel alone. 

There are some racial slurs which are of their time. The internalised hemophobia drips off most pages but that is why it is such an important book to read now.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia and Murder

Moderate: Antisemitism

Minor: Blood, Body horror, and Suicide

larseneiii's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

top ten books that would not exist if an elitist man knew when to shut up (fuck lord henry all my homies hate lord henry!!)

ps i put adult/minor relationship in the trigger warnings as a way to say there is a pederastic relationship that made me uncomfy

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Toxic relationship, Antisemitism, Blood, and Classism

Moderate: Colonisation, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

Minor: Adult/minor relationship

alyssapusateri's review against another edition

dark informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Blood, Body horror, Death, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Addiction, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicide, Drug use, Classism, Drug abuse, Misogyny, and Sexism

Minor: Infidelity and Antisemitism

lucyford's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective relaxing medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

There are lots of things I liked and did not like about this book, but I overall enjoyed it and think it’s worthy of at least 4 stars. At first I didn’t like it that much because it was a bit difficult to read in the sense that so much talking was being done about things I couldn’t really understand, but once I started reading it from a more chill perspective I enjoyed it 10x as much. When reading it you’ll come to realize that the beauty of the book lies in the writing itself, which is just amazing. I also really liked how the plot progressed and how Dorian’s character gradually changed so horribly due to Henry’s influence (which I’m so mad about). Overall, this book is literally art and I will probably read it again in the future.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism

Moderate: Gore, Murder, Suicide, and Blood

Minor: Emotional abuse

noniesrose's review

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.25

Alright, I didn't like it. The constant misogyny is insufferable and the philosophical aspect gets quickly annoying. And the story isn't that much interesting to me. I like the gothic elements though.
On the other hand, I loved the prose (I read a 1958 French translation).

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, Antisemitism, Blood, Classism, and Misogyny

Moderate: Suicide

Minor: Drug use

fe_aye's review against another edition

lighthearted mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Bullying, Classism, Misogyny, Death, Suicide, and Animal death

kananineko's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I loved this! Great classic. Probably one of the most digestible bc of its relatively short length. My only complaint would be that some sections dragged in the middle to me (all the super long descriptions of what Dorian was learning)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Blood, Murder, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Death, Gun violence, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Stalking, Classism, Misogyny, and Sexism

Minor: Abandonment, Addiction, Colonisation, Drug abuse, Xenophobia, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Antisemitism, Drug use, Infidelity, Racism, and Death of parent

kiran__'s review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Makes you think and reflect. There's a lot of twist and turns that you don’t expect 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Suicide, Death, and Murder

Moderate: Gun violence

seapotatohowisitalrtaken's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Murder, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic relationship, Alcohol, Toxic friendship, Blood, and Violence

Moderate: Gun violence

Minor: Sexual content, Domestic abuse, Addiction, Death of parent, and Emotional abuse

thequeercaseofmarius's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

Dark, bewitching, and so very gay. 

‘Why is your friendship so fateful to young men?’ 

In The Picture of Dorian Gray; Oscar Wilde crafts a narrative of Queer love, desire, vanity, and fear, embodied in a twink who wishes to remain young and beautiful forever. Wilde’s only novel is one that is both frighteningly fantastical, but also harrowingly personal. In Dorian we see the picture of the dark version of ourselves; the Hyde to our Jekyll, and it is his ability to transform with each reader that makes The Picture of Dorian Gray so enduring as a staple of Queer Literature, and one of the bestselling titles in Penguin’s Classics series.

Wilde’s writing and descriptions are breathtakingly beautiful, so much so that I would find myself rereading the same sentences over and over again. Wilde’s genius and intellect is also evident in the text, and his use of Queercoding through historical and art references is very clever.

Our main cast of characters are so very gay, and it’s crazy because it’s almost like Wilde met my gay friends and acquaintances and wrote a book about us (I like to think that I am Basil). But I also see each character as a different side to the Queer experience; Basil being the Queer artist who represents the beauty and tenderness of love between men, Lord Henry as the witty sass Queen that gay men are often viewed as from the outside, and Dorian represents Queer fears and anxieties that most of us have experienced some point in our life. The result is one of the most ingenious Queer horror stories ever written. 

The Picture of Dorian Gray should be a (not-so) straight five-stars, however it does contain some racism and anti-semitism that I can’t ignore. It is a book of it’s time, but I’m also aware of writers and people from Wilde’s time who tried their best at not being racist. I think it’s important to appreciate this novel for everything good about it, but also to recognise it’s faults rather than excuse them, so that we as the readers can grow as people. 

‘Each man sees his own sin in Dorian Gray. What Dorian Gray’s sins are no one knows. He who finds them has brought them.’

-Oscar Wilde 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Violence, Body horror, Drug use, Murder, Addiction, Alcoholism, Blood, Drug abuse, and Death

Moderate: Racial slurs, Suicide, Antisemitism, Classism, and Racism

Minor: Misogyny and Sexism

This novel is VERY dark as it covers a lot of internalised homophobia and fear of your own Queerness.