Alicante Journal of English Studies 29 (2016): 47-67 Dorian Gray from the page to the screen. A comparative semiotic analysis of The Picture of Dorian Gray (Oscar Wilde, 1891) and The Picture of Dorian Gray (Albert Lewin, 1945) Tomás Costal Criado UNED
[email protected] ABSTRACT Oscar Wilde’s only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), and its homonymous screen adaptation which dates back to the period immediately following WWII, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), directed by Albert Lewin, constitute an interesting example of semiotic transference from the page to the screen. As an audiovisual product, the film will allow the researcher to perceive the ways in which words become alive and add an enormous symbolic and significant wealth to the already abundant information that is conveyed through the connotative and allusive language of the text. This work tries to analyse meticulously a selection of key scenes taken from the film adaptation to later determine with the highest degree of accuracy possible what has been omitted, what has been added, and what has been deemed worthy of modification in the new version of Wilde’s work, where both Lewin and his cast of characters play the role of mediators. Keywords : Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray , semiotics, audiovisual translation 48 Alicante Journal of English Studies 1. Refashioning Wilde: Albert Lewin’s adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) The fate of literary works, as occurs with various other forms of artistic expression, is often uncertain. Some behave just like shooting stars and after a period during which they are adored by the public and the critics alike they vanish and become imperceptible.