Dorian Gray arcképe - avagy, amikor boldogok vagyunk, akkor mindig jók vagyunk, de amikor jók vagyunk, nem mindig vagyunk boldogok.

Dorian Gray arcképét már régen el akartam olvasni. Amikor tavaly év vége felé, megláttam egy olcsóbb angol kiadását nem is gondolkoztam sokat, csak megvettem. Aztán amikor éppen nem volt mit olvasnom a villamoson, ezt vettem le a polcról, be a táskámba, mivel vékonyka volt, nem kellett nagyot cipelnem.

A könyv nem volt egy könnyed olvasmány, de mondjuk nem is számítottam rá (emlékeimben még élt amikor megnéztem néhány éve az új kiadását a filmnek). A könyv főszereplője Dorian Gray, aki híres a fiatal üdeségéről és szépségéről. Barátai bókolnak neki, egyik barátja pedig képet fest róla. A könyv középpontjába ezek után a festmény kerül.

Melyik ember szeretné, ha legféltettebb titkai, lelkiismerete tisztasága napvilágra kerülne? Nos, Dorian Gray sem szerette volna. Ám ez a festmény úgy szolgált neki, mint egy ablak a lelkiismeretébe, tükör, hogy láthassa, hogy néz ki belülről. Minden rossz, amit elkövetett egy foltot hagyott rajta. A képen lévő ember megöregedett és megcsúnyult, minden egyes elkövetett tettével. És Doriannak volt néhány. Nem meglepő, hogy a képet elzárta egy szobába, letakarta, és nem engedte, hogy bárki is meglássa. Míg a kép az évek során csúnyult, ő továbbra is megőrizte fiatalságát.

Jó kis könyv volt, szerintem nagyon sok mondanivalóval, és néhány embernek ezt különösen ajánlanám, hogy olvassa el. Mondjuk én is el szeretném olvasni újra magyarul is, mert angolul nem volt egy könnyed vasárnap délutáni olvasmány.

Lássuk az idézeteket, amelyek szintén magukért beszélnek, és szerintem mélyen jellemzik a könyvet, mert a legnagyobb mondanivalói. Sajnos sokkal többet szerettem volna leírni, de így is szelektálnom kellett.

• “Conscience and cowardice are really the same things. Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.”
• “The value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices.”
• “Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know love’s tragedies.”
• “But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind, and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what is monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the brain and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also. “
• “Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul.”
• “You know more than you think you know, just as you know less than you want to know.”
• “Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes.”
• “Nowadays people know the price of everything, and the value of nothing.”
• “…Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over morals.”
• “…There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.”
• “Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to their mistakes.”
• “But there was no motive in experience. … All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, and with joy.”
• “Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves.”
• “When we are happy we are always good, but when we are good we are not always happy.”
• “Nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all.”
• “It is only shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure.”
• “They get up early, because they have so much to do, and go to bed early because they have so little to think about.”
• “I like men who have a future, and women who have a past.”
•  “…a burnt child loves the fire.”
• “It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet of sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak.”
• “…anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often. That is the most important secrets of life. One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner.”