Funny Quotes from Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray?

Yes! Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray is a classic Gothic tale with deep themes, an evocative setting, and a gorgeous telling. It’s also sometimes funny along the way.

Where does the humor come from?

It mostly issues from the lips of the reprehensible Lord Henry—a man with an enchanting musical voice and an aim to influence (especially to influence Dorian Gray).

Wilde uses Lord Henry’s humor in various ways, especially to offer social commentary. But also, near the end of the book, he uses it to open the reader emotionally. (Using humor deftly in an otherwise poignant moment can actually be quite effective for producing a stronger emotional response in a reader. Wilde does this masterfully!)

Top 10 Funny Quotes from Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray

1

“The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have gone there, there have been either so many people that I have not been able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that I have not been able to see the people, which was worse.”

—Lord Henry to the painter Basil Hallward

2

“…for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

—Lord Henry to the painter Basil Hallward

3

“Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. And I don’t think it really matters about your not being there. The audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to the piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people.”

—Lord Henry to Dorian Gray

4

“His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, one of his aunt’s oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book.”

—narration re: Lord Henry at a party

5

“She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest.”

—narration re: Lord Henry’s wife

6

“’People are very fond of giving away what they need most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity.’”

—Lord Henry to Dorian Gray

7

“’But, surely, if one lives merely for one’s self, Harry, one pays a terrible price for doing so?’ suggested the painter.

‘Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays…'”

—Lord Henry to Basil Hallward

8

“’…the only way a woman can ever reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible interest in life…'”

—Lord Henry to Dorian Gray

9

“‘…Yesterday I cut an orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as effective as the seven deadly sins.'”

—Lord Henry to the Duchess of Monmouth

10

“‘…I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner…'”

—Lord Henry to Dorian Gray

Photo by Jacob Townsend, Creative Commons, via Unsplash.

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