《道林·格雷的画像》中道林·格雷悲剧命运的原型分析

《道林·格雷的画像》中道林·格雷悲剧命运的原型分析［摘要］《道林·格雷的画像》讲述了一个外表俊朗，内心单纯的年轻人道林·格雷如何为了永葆青春与自己的画像互换身份故事。

道林·格雷的一生是充满了悲惨和惶恐的一生。

肖像代替他承担了岁月的重负和心灵的重负，他却没有因此而获得真正的解脱和幸福，相反他出卖了自己，出卖了灵魂，所到之处只留下悲剧。

本文以荣格的原型理论为出发点分析了导致格雷悲剧的原因。

得出结论：导致他悲剧主要原因是他没有完成个性化的成熟的过程，即认识到阴影和丑陋是人性的一部分，阿尼玛是男性内心深处的女性要素，而阿尼玛斯是女性心灵中的男性要素，缺失了就是人性的不完整，自己眼中，和他人眼中完美的自己并非真正的自己，而只是荣格笔下的人格面具。

［关键词］道林·格雷；阴影；阿尼玛；人格面具；个性化［Abstract］Dorian Gray is a very pathetic story about how a handsome young man exchanges status with his portrait in order to keep young and vital forever, and at the end he is thoroughly destroyed, corrupted and dead. This paper is ananalysis of Dorian Gray’s tragedy from Jung’s archetypal point of view. And it comes to the conclusion that Dorian’s catastrophic ending is mainly caused by his immaturity and failure to realize his individuation which is a process that is specified by admitting shadow as part of humanpsyche, adjusting the feminine aspect (anima) of men’s mind or the masculine side (animus) of women’s inner world, and by wearing a social mask (persona) that meet the expectation of the society.［Key words］Dorian Gray,shadow,anima,persona,individuationI. IntroductionThe Picture of Dorian Gray is the only published novel of Oscar Wilde. Since it first appeared in the Lippincott’s monthly magazine, it gained public attention of both pleasant comment and unpleasant reaction. The critical appreciation of Dorian Gray mainly concerns the themes of homosexuals, Hedonism, aestheticism nassicisim and the Faustian theme etc. From the point of view of style, it has been analyzed as a paradoxical work, a gothic fiction, a work of decorative art and so on. This paper mainly does the analysis from the perspective of Jung’s psychological theory. According to Jung, “The shadow, the persona and the anima are structural components of the psyche that human beings have inherited.”(Gurein, 181) That is to say, everyone carries within him all the three archetypal aspects: the first is shadow. It is considered as the secret darkness of the unconsciousness that everyone processes and everybody tries to suppress and hide. To Dorian Gray, the shadow that bears all his crimes and vicious life is his hidden portrait. The second archetype which is influential to human psyche is the persona. The persona is defined byCarl Jung as “a social mask” (Gurein, 182) that people wish to show to the public, or a “conformity archetype” (Stevens, 63) as a “kind of shop window in which we like to display our best wares” (Stevens, 63). Dorian Gray’s innocent, handsome and elegant self is actually not his real self, but the persona he wears and wishes to present. The third archetypal element humans essentially possess is anima (the femininity of men) or animus (masculinity of woman). Jung says “Every man carries with in him the eternal image of the woman” (Steven, 71). This woman is called his anima. The incarnation Dorian Gray’s anima is his first love — Sibyl Vane. He worships her feverishly at the beginning of their relationship, because of her acting talent represents his ideal to experience all kinds of life.Dorian Gray finally stabs his portrait in order to destroy the record of his evil life, but instead of causing damage to the picture, he ends his own life and the picture is reborn with radiant beauty and youth. This is a very pathetic ending, however, not just the ending is pathetic, Dorian Gray’s whole life is full of sufferings from the agony that is caused by his anxiety and fear of the danger that his secret portrait may be revealed. On the basis of Jungian theory, it can be concluded that Dorian Gray is a typical patient of neuroses, because “Jung theorizes that neuroses are the results of the person’s failure to confront and accept some archetypal component of the unconscious.”(Guerin, 180). This process ofconfronting and accepting is defined by Jung as individuation which is a “psychological growing up” (Guerin, 180) Dorian Gray fails to become mature psychologically — that is the root cause of his tragedy.Ⅱ. Dorian Gray’s Failure to Realize his Individuation2.1 His failure to realize shadow as a part of human natureBeauty plays a very holy role in the works of Oscar Wilde. To his heroes, ugliness is one of the unbearable sins, as Henry Wotton pointed out: “I think that it is better to be beautiful than to be good.” (154), “Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins” (154) Dorian Gray also exclaims that “beauty is the wonder of wonders.”(21) Therefore, to Dorian Gray, ugliness is one important characteristic of his shadow. When he first sees his portrait, he becomes “listless, motionless” (23) —he was astonished by the revelation of his own beauty, but immediately after that, he realizes that “there would be a day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim and colorless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed… he would become dreadful, hideous and uncouth”(24) —that is the most unbearable sin to him! A person with healthy psyche will learn to accept it as natural routine with composure. They will confront it as an essential part of the self, as any other dark aspect in human nature. However, Dorian Grey finds it impossible to take it as something agreeable. One typical symptom of neuroses is “instead ofassimilating this unconscious element into their consciousness, neurotic individuals persist in projecting it upon so me other person or object” (Guerin, 180). Dorian Gray projects his shadow upon his portrait which bears all his ugliness and sins. That is why he couldn’t treat it calmly and suffers from endless anxiety and fear. He is extremely worried that his secret picture may be discovered some day. When Basil asks to exhibit the picture, he is so worried “there were beads of perspiration on his hand” (91). His first action to avoid this from happening is to hide it. At the beginning he hid it behind a screen, then he finds it not safe, and the “portrait must be hidden away at all costs” (94). So he decides to keep it in an old school room which is full of dust. Nevertheless, it is safe just for the time being. So he takes the second action: the creator of his picture —Basil Hallward seems to be the producer of all his shames and despair. Out of hatred, he kills him. He hated him because he is the other incarnation of his shadow — he hates him because he hates himself. But he couldn’t find peace after the murder is committed, and then he takes the third and final action in order to destroy the record of his sinful life thoroughly. He thinks that without its hideous warnings, he would be at peace and “when that was dead he would be free” (177). But what he is not aware of is that shadow is part of himself, destroying it equals committing suicide. The picture becomes young and beautiful; he lied there “withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage.” (177)Everybody processes evils and sins, Dorian Gray’s tragedy tells the readers that, the stronger people want to deny it, the more monstrous the evil becomes. Humans become mature in the process of learning to confront the dark aspect in their psyche and finally become an independent individual.2.2 Dorian Gray’s anima: He commits the murder of her indirectlySibyl Vane is an extraordinarily talented and beautiful actress who is Dorian Gray’s first love. When they first meet, Dorian Gray is innocent, simple and chaste; he sees in Sibyl Vane all his ideals. When he confesses to h is friend his feeling toward her, he “leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes.”(43), and exclaims “Harry, Sibyl Vane is sacred!” (43) She is so shy, so gentle, and “there is something of a child about her” (44). Dorian Gray also presents h is innocence. They are so alike, that she is the other half of him: “they stood looking at each other like children.”(45) Her mere existence demonstrates all the outstanding characteristics of a famine being. She is the specification of the definite feminine image in his ideal —she is his anima. Unfortunately, anima, this archetypal image is the partly incarnation of himself. Actually he doesn’t really love Sibyl Vane — she is the symbol of his dream — that is to “live the lives of all who had passed across the stage of the world” (XXIX). That explains why he becomes so disappointed when she losesher acting ability —when she finds pleasure in experiencing love in reality, portraying fictional love turned to be unbearable to her. He cares nothing about what she is, he only loves the excitement when she leads him to experience different lives of different people: “you realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art” (71). And when she makes such a confession that touched everyone deeply in the heart “You have made me understand what love really is … You are more to me than all art can ever be … (70). He answers her very cruelly:” You are shallow and stupid … you are nothing to me now … how mad I was to love you” (71). The se words hurt her so deeply and her heart breaks into pieces. He kills her unintentionally and indirectly that is to say, he kills the first incarnation of his anima —his simple, angelic feminine self. His psyche has lost the balance —that will cause perturbation and disturbance of mind, the consequence of which is neurosis.2.3 Dorian Gray’s persona: a soulless mask“His beauty had been to him but a mask,His youth a mockery” (175)When Dorian Gray is first confronting with his portrait his immediate re action is a mixture of amazement and pleasure: “The senseof his own beauty came on him like a revelation.”(23) But to the surprise of the painter, Dorian’s joy soon disappears and is taken place by the facial expression of pain, sadness even anger, because his is filled with jealousy toward the portrait. He even exclaimed his wish to exchange his status with the picture: “Oh, if it were only the other way! If the picture could change, and I could be always what I am now!”(25). The picture is the symbol of his persona — the social mask we expect to show to the world. In Dorian Gray’s case it should be amazingly beautiful and young and perfect. However, persona is never real, it is “that which in reality one is not, but which oneself as well as others think o ne is” (Stevens, 63). Therefore, when Dorian exchanges his status with the picture, he has lost his human identity and becomes a beautiful but soulless corpse. The picture, instead, becomes his real self and keeps the record of the age, his crimes and his guilty conscience. That is why when he destroys the picture, he kills himself — the picture is the real self of Dorian Gray. In other words, he is dead since the day he transforms his position with the picture.Ⅲ. ConclusionAs it is analyzed above, Dorian Gray’s tragedy is caused by his failure to realize his individuation — a process to grow up and become mature psychologically. This has mainly been examined from threeperspectives:First, he fails to accept shadow as part of human nature. In order to keep his shadow as his ultimate secret, he has made every possible effort to hide it and deny it. The consequence of this is the infinite expansion of his desire to committing crimes and his insufferable pain out of fear and anxiety.Second, he kills the incarnation of his anima, which equals the killing of the kind, sincere and gentle half of himself. He turns to be cruel and heartless gradually since then. Imbalance is the root of restlessness.Third, his persona experiences a process of transforming. At the beginning of the story; his persona is represented by his portrait —beautiful, spotless, and glamorous. However, when his wish to exchange his status with the portrait is magically answered, he is no longer a soulful person; he becomes his persona without spiritual bolster. How can a person feel satisfied when his has no content but just a frame? When people feel empty they will try everything they can to fill themselves. Dorian Gray finds temporary release in committing violence and indulging in pleasure-seeking. But instead of feeling contented, he turns out to be emptier.In Jungian theory,“the archetypes most clearly characterized form the empirical point of view are those which have most frequent and the most disturbing influence on the ego, there are the shadow, the anima and the animas.”(Zhu, 132)Dorian Gray has both his shadow and anima lost or failed. That explains why he couldn’t get any feelings of satisfaction, happiness comfort or fulfillment.【References 】［1］Guerin, Willfred L. 2005. A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature［M］.Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.[2] Stevens, Anthony. 2007. Jung A Very Short Introduction ［M］.Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.[3] Wilde, Oscar. 2001. The Picture of Dorian Gray［M］.London: Wordsworth Classics.[4] Zhu Gang. 2000. Twentieth Century Western Critical Theories ［M］.Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.。