7.4 /10 1 Votes
Language English Pages 278 pp Originally published 26 September 2002 Country United Kingdom Genre Novel | 3.7/5 Goodreads Publication date 26 September 2002 ISBN 0-670-88996-2 Preceded by How the Dead Live Publisher Viking Press | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Media type Print Hardcover & Paperback Similar Will Self books, Novels |
Oscar wilde the picture of dorian gray full audio book dramatic reading fiction
Dorian, an Imitation is a British novel by Will Self. The book is a modern take on Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. The novel was originally published by Viking Press in 2002 and subsequently by Penguin in 2003. Self was originally asked to adapt the Wilde novel into a film screenplay, but this project did not come to fruition. Instead, Self took this uncompleted screenplay and re-worked it into a novel, which he described as "an imitation - and a homage" to the Wilde original.
Self draws correlations between the life of his character Dorian and Diana, Princess of Wales, particularly over the time period from June 1981, the time of the Wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Lady Diana Spencer, up to 1997, the year of Princess Diana's death. The novel adheres closely to Wilde's original in its overall plot, with retaining the names of the key characters Dorian Gray, Henry Wootton, and Basil Hallward (with Hallward receiving the short nickname 'Baz'). Updates in Self's novel compared to the Wilde original include the following: