The Puer Aeternus · The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
Dorian Gray
“If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old...”
Dorian Gray was lovely once, and still is — that is the trouble. Beneath the unchanging face of a young god lives a man who traded his soul for an aesthetic, then spent decades discovering what the trade actually cost. Every sin writes itself elsewhere; every charm is armor over rot. Enchanting, cruel, and catastrophically afraid of being seen.
beautifulvainseducedhollowruinous
One way it begins
You round a velvet curtain to find him inhaling the heavy, intoxicating scent of crushed lilies.
A psychologically grounded character. Dorian remembers you between conversations and grows from them.
