Can a book corrupt?

[hfischbach]

The main point of this post was to see if anyone knows what book it was that Lord Henry gave Dorian that so fully changed him? Was it purely ficticious or a partially fictionilized yet real book? I would love to know.
Also, though, as I side note... when lord henry claimed that books cannot corrupt, that they are infact steryl, it started me on a very interesting train of though... i was wondering if anyone else was struck by this...
To sum it up:
Name that book
Are books steryl?

[mazz]

that book you are asking about is discussed in other threads if you want to look. What do you mean by steryl ? Is it a "barren cow"?

[dotk]

"His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord HEnry had sent him."

Originally Wilde invented a name-THe secrets of Raoul- for the book that has such an influence over Dorian, but in the final version, the book is never named.

At his trial however, Wilde acknowledged that he had modeled the book on
A Rebours ("Against nature") by the frnech art critic Joris-Karl Huysmans.
Wilde read this darkly erotic comedy shortly after it was published in 1884.
It tells the stiory of a waelthy aesthete, the duc Jean des Esseintes, who lives cloistered in his house. experimenting with every artificial pleasure, without ever finding fulfilment.
Although Huysmans's book is certainly very similar to the one Dorian reads, Wilde adapted it to his own purposes. Des Esseintes never suffers from the "grotesque dread of mirrors" that Wilde mentions haunts the hero of the yellow book.

hope i answered ur queries.
i found d ans frm "the whole story" edition of Dorian.

[nps_marina]

I don't think books can corrupt, but yesterday I was leafinf through Northanger Abbey and there's that whole thing about novels being bad for the soul in there, you know. There's The Monk (I have that book, stopped reading it pretty soon, it was so absurdly complicated and soap-opera-ish), and they also mention Udolpho a lot.

[motherhubbard]

I think books can corrupt. When you read a book and allow yourself to fall into it your thoughts mingle with the thoughts of the author. They influence and touch so they can corrupt. I try to stay away from books that feel like they are hurting my soul (for lack of a better word). I had to read “Barn Burning” by Faulkner last semester and I had nightmares for months. The disgust I felt for Abner and the character of that man just got all over me.

[Flora]

I agree with that; anything that influences can corrupt. However, everything influences, not only books, and so everything has the potential ability to corrupt. We can't escape being influenced, and therfore risking corruption.

[dotk]

actually wat puzzles me most.
is wat secret about alan? that Dorian used to threaten that
chemist, so that he would help Dorian annihilate Basil's dead body.
ans anyone?

[dmoretta]

Nathaniel Hawthorne said “Words - so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them”. With every book written comes the potential for good and evil. Characters in “Fahrenheit 451”, “Nineteen Eighty- Seven”, and “A Brave New World” find literature to be possibly dangerous. Literature has a propensity to be incredibly persuasive to the reader. Even if a reader has one idea before reading a book, their opinion may be completely altered after reading the novel.

[coofee]

"The main point of this post was to see if anyone knows what book it was that Lord Henry gave Dorian that so fully changed him? Was it purely ficticious or a partially fictionilized yet real book? I would love to know."

while doing research for a book report on The picture of Dorian Gray i read that the teaching of the new hedonism with which Lord henry spoils Dorian is rooted in the closing words of the padre in "Renaissance", the book Wilde wrote about in De Profundis.

[andave_ya]

Originally Posted by Flora

I agree with that; anything that influences can corrupt. However, everything influences, not only books, and so everything has the potential ability to corrupt. We can't escape being influenced, and therfore risking corruption.

I agree thoroughly with you.

[s.santa]

I agree too. Book are made to corrupt indeed.
As Rudyard Kipling said "Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind" (hope the quote is right!)

[SimplePoet]

Originally Posted by s.santa

I agree too. Book are made to corrupt indeed.
As Rudyard Kipling said "Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind" (hope the quote is right!)

If books are made to corrupt, then why do you read them? You must be one corrupted person then, right?!

I don't mean to sound harsh, but you cannot be corrupted unless you let yourself be. By a book. Other people. Music. Whatever. If you have your own thoughts, ideas, etc., and you stand by them strongly, then no one can corrupt you. No one!

[rimbaud]

Originally Posted by s.santa

I agree too. Book are made to corrupt indeed.
As Rudyard Kipling said "Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind" (hope the quote is right!)

Why does anyone do drugs?
A book, word, verse can take you higher that you imagined you could rise and lower than you tough you could fall.

Books can corrupt and books can save! the risk is yours

[Bancini]

Corruption is merely negative influence. Books can be influential and should be. That is the whole reason I read them. I am looking for new concepts, thoughts, and arguments. These will influence me. It is up to me to make sure it is in a positive way...

[JCamilo]

Drugs do not corrupt either. THey have effects on your body depending the quatity or method used for consumption.
Books do not corrupt because they are, as text, flawed as object of command: you are the ultimante will when reggarding to what is said in the book and what will be perceived by you. Interpretation is the key, hence the power (otherwise a book would always cease to be powerful once the intented public finish reading it, which means, the public in a give age and place. And we know that is not what happens). Kipling quotes must be used under context.