The picture of Dorian Gray : [n.p.] : autograph manuscript signed, [1890].

With its memorable tale of ageless beauty and a concealed portrait, The Picture of Dorian Gray stands as one of Oscar Wilde's most enduring and widely read literary works. Inspired at once by gothic horror fiction, French decadent literature, and contemporary aesthetic theory, the novel incited a storm of controversy in the late nineteenth century for its moral ambivalence and veiled references to queer sexuality. One of the Morgan's great literary treasures is the earliest surviving manuscript of The Picture of Dorian Gray, the text of which forms the basis for the novel's first printed edition.
The Picture of Dorian Gray debuted as a cheaply printed novella, published in the July 1890 issue of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, and sold for twenty-five cents to American readers (simultaneously issued in London by Ward, Lock & Co.). Prior to publication Wilde prepared an annotated typescript of his novella for the Philadelphia editor of Lippincott's, J.M. Stoddart, who in turn made numerous corrections and changes to the text. But before producing the typescript (preserved at UCLA's William Andrews Clark Memorial Library), Wilde worked with a manuscript draft that is now held at the Morgan and digitized here. Written in pencil on the manuscript's first page is the address "J.B. Lippincott Comp., 10 Henrietta St., Covent Garden"; the inscription points to the manuscript's role in establishing the text published in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine.
The manuscript of The Picture of Dorian Gray entered the Morgan's collection in 1913, when it was acquired from the collector and fellow financier Eugene Meyer Jr. (1875-1959) for $2,500. The manuscript had previously been held in Louis I. Haber's book collection, which sold at auction in 1909.