30 Matching Annotations
  1. May 2023
    1. secret

      From LAWLER 233: Stoddart cancelled the following lines in the typescript: "There was love in every line, and in every touch there was passion."

      From "Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray, Annotated & Uncensored": This sentiment belongs to an established literary convention: the artistic process is being equated with sexual intimacy. Normally, however, the artist is male and his subject (or model) female. Wilde is adding an unmistakably homoerotic twist to this tradition.

    2. There was something tragic in a friendship so colored by romance.

      From LAWLER 234: Wilde originally had the following before it was changed by Stoddart in the typescript: "There was something infinitely tragic in a romance that was at once so passionate and so sterile."

    3. usually

      From LAWLER 232: Stoddart changed Wilde's "should ever give" to this reading.

    1. Victoria

      From LAWLER 276: Stoddart cancelled the following: "She was desperately in love with you at one time, Dorian. It used to amuse me to watch her paying you compliments. You were so charmingly indifferent. Do you know I really miss her? She never bored me. She was so delightfully improbably in everything that she did."

    2. wretched

      From LAWLER 275: After "wretched," Wilde originally had the following passage: "Upon the other hand, had she become your mistress, she would have lived in the society of charming and cultivated men. You would have educated her, taught her how to dress, how to talk, how to move. You would have made her perfect, and she would have been extremely happy. After a time, no doubt, you would have grown tired of her. She would have made a scene. You would have made a settlement. Then a new career would have begun for her." Stoddart cut this entire section to eliminate ambiguity.

    3. But

      From LAWLER 274: Stoddart canceled "her life is not spoiled" here in the typescript.

    4. I

      From LAWLER 274: Stoddart canceled "said to myself, 'I won't ruin this girl. I won't bring her to shame. And I...'" in the typescript.

    5. week

      From LAWLER 274: Stoddart canceled "Finally, she promised to come with me to town. I had taken a house for her, ad arranged everything." Wilde cancelled Stoddart's emendation: "She would have come away with me."

    6. God

      From LAWLER 262: Stoddart changed the original "Christ!" here, but Wilde put it back into the 1891 text.

    1. Your name was implicated in

      From LAWLER 258: Stoddart changed this from "It was" and then cancelled the next sentence, which read: "He said that he suspected you."

    2. you.

      From LAWLER 258: Stoddart cancelled the following sentence: "It is quite sufficient to say of a young man that he goes to stay at Selby Royal, for people to sneer and titter."

    3. harlot

      From LAWLER 255: Wilde restored "harlot" to the line above after Stoddart had changed it to "one."

    4. ;

      From LAWLER 254: Stoddart cancelled the following line: "that her guilty lover might suck swift death from the dead thing he had fondled."

    5. Vice

      From LAWLER 254: Stoddart changed this from "Love."

    6. chapter

      From LAWLER 254: Changed by Wilde from "passage" in the typescript. In the next line, Stoddart substituted "the hero" for "Raoul."

    7. had caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables, and supped in an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse;

      From LAWLER 254: Stoddart changed what was originally "had drank the live philter of Caesonia, and wore the habit of Venus by night, and a false gilded beard."

    8. and the strange stories that were told about her lovers.

      From LAWLER 253: Wilde added and Stoddart cancelled the following, thus reinstating the original reading: "and the deaths of those whom she had granted her favors."

    9. room

      From LAWLER 252: The conclusion of this paragraph, crossed out by Stoddart in the typescript, was as follows: "It was said that even the sinful creatures who prowl the streets at night had cursed him as he passed by, seeing in him a corruption greater than their own and knowing but too well the horror of his real life." An additional passage in the same spirit, which Wilde blotted out in the manuscript, described Dorian's appeal in terms of his "strange and dangerous charm."

    10. him

      From LAWLER 252: Stoddart also canceled the following marginal insert that ended the sentence: "and in the eyes of some it was a question whether that was an honor or a disgrace."

    11. men

      From LAWLER 252: Stoddart cancelled the following here" who were jealous of the strange love he inspired in women."

    12. until he was driven away.

      From LAWLER 251: This last phrase is Stoddart's. The original read, "till they almost drove him out in horror and had to be appeared with monstrous bribes."

    13. some pearly cell in the brain, or some white nerve in the body,

      From LAWLER 246: Stoddart or another editor at Lippincott's knew anatomy better than Wilde and revised the typescript from Wilde's "ivory cell... or scarlet nerve."

    14. Parisian

      From LAWLER 242: Stoddart's substitute for Wilde's "Raoul."

    15. book's

      From LAWLER 242: Stoddart changed from "Catulle Sarrazin's."

    16. up

      From LAWLER 240: Stoddart cancelled the following here: "Le Secret de Raoul par Catulle Sarrazin. What a curious title." All subsequent references to the title of the notorious yellow book were also removed by Stoddart. The author and title are fictitious, although Wilde knew a Gabriel Sarrazin, a French writer who reviewed for Wilde's Woman's World magazine. The title may have suggested to Stoddart the scandalous French novel by Rachilde (Marguerite Vallette) Monsieur Venus (1899), in which there is a character, M. Raeoule de Vénérande.

  2. Apr 2023
    1. yours

      From LAWLER 200: Was originally "your mistress," but Stoddart changed it. Wilde altered Stoddart's emendation in 1891, making it "I suppose she will belong to you some day."

      ZABROUSKI: I found this specific change interesting, for it seems like such a minor alteration yet makes a big impact in the grand scheme of things. Lawler claimed that the 1891 alteration is "stronger" than what is here. Given the time this was published, that claim rings true; because Victorian women were typically viewed as property or arm candy rather than an actual partner, saying the phrase "belong to" would have been fitting for a heterosexual Victorian man.

    2. "Harry, Sibyl Vane is sacred!"

      From LAWLER 200: Stoddart altered this statement, for it was originally "How dare you suggest such a thing, Harry? It is horrible. Sibyl Vane is sacred!"

    3. Sibyl

      From LAWLER 197: Stoddart changed the spelling from Wilde's "Sybil" here and throughout the text of this edition, and it remained "Sibyl" in the 1891 text.

    4. correctly

      From LAWLER 179: J.M. Stoddart, Lippincott's editor changed the original reading "live with their wives," removing an expression inadmissible to the American public. Wilde let these and similar changes stand even though they are clearly inferior to the original.

    5. And now tell me,—reach me the matches, like a good boy: thanks,—tell me, what are your relations with Sibyl Vane?"

      From LAWLER 200: This is another of the series of bowdlerizations by Stoddart. This line was written by Wilde: "is Sybil Vane your mistress?" Stoddart simply rewrote it in its present form, and although Wilde made an addition in 1891, he did not restore the original reading."