Dorian, an Imitation Dorian, an Imitation Dorian, an Imitation is a British novel by Will Self. The book is a modern take on Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray". The novel was originally published by Viking Press in 2002 and subsequently by Penguin in 2003. Self was originally asked to adapt the Wilde novel into a film screenplay, but this project did not come to fruition. Instead, Self took this uncompleted screenplay and re-worked it into a novel, which he described as "an imitation - and a homage" to the Wilde original. Self draws correlations between the life of his character Dorian
The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945 film) moral leprosy was eating him away", Hallward encourages Gray to reform his life. However, Gray panics, murders his friend and seals his body in the school room next to the portrait. Dorian blackmails an old friend, Allen Campbell (Douglas Walton), to dispose of Hallward's body. He then starts a romance with Hallward's niece, Gladys (Donna Reed), who was a child when the portrait was painted. Though Gladys had always loved Dorian, and is overjoyed when he proposes marriage, those close to Gray find him suspicious and changed. Allen Campbell, distraught at his role in destroying Hallward's corpse, commits suicide. Gray