I will analize the extract taken from the beginning of the eleventh chapter of Oscar Wilde's novel The Picture Of Dorian Grey. The extract is arranged in five paragraphs. The first paragraph presents the scenary: a evening in Dorian Grey's house. Wilde describes in a very detailed way the routine in Grey's house: Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each Wednesday evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the world his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the day to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. Dorian Grey uses to cook nice food himself for his selected guests, to decorate the table with a great taste and precious elements (antique plate of gold and silver) and to invite nice musicians for the dinner. The narrator describes Dorian Grey as a model for many young people, the perfect combination of culture and grace.
The second chapter deals with the artistic vision of life. Dorian Grey has a particular wearing style which has been copied by all young people of Pall Mall strret (famous for its clubs). Fashion becomes Grey's prioity and it aquires a universal meaning.
The third chapter deals with the attemptative of Dorian Grey to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization.This quotations creates the link between the third and the fourth chapter of the extract. The fourth extract deals with the importance of senses and feelings: mankind has ever tried to understand the meaning of what its senses perceive, people share fears and passions with other people. Dorian Grey's reflection continues through the whole fourth chapter and it finds conclusion into the fifth chapter where the character finally understands to live every moment of his life which is itself a moment (But it was to teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is itself but a moment.).