Dorian Gray Idealism

The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Garden Party, and The Red Badge of Courage each incorporate the complex relationship between the ideal and the real. The Picture of Dorian Gray is concerned with art and life, The Garden Party with a single coming-of-age moment, and The Red Badge of Courage incorporates the coming of age of its protagonist with an emphasis of art as a realistic portrayal of life. In both The Picture of Dorian Gray and in The Garden Party the primary characters are very young. Idealism is often associated with youth and inexperience, and so it makes sense that the authors would choose to tell their stories with young characters. Stephen Crane's young man starts off to war with lofty ideals, but then confronts the much less sublime

Dorian, under the careful influence of Lord Henry, becomes aware of his state of life and exclaims, "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older than this particular day of June. . . . If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old!" (Wilde, 19). His wish is granted and the painting of Dorian Gray becomes subject to the ravages of time and vice, while Dorian Gray himself remains untouched. In a sense, the ideal is corrupted while the real remains untouched. This reversal brings about ruin and despair in the course of the

Physical discomfort, the power of animal instinct, witnessing men break under stress and fear and uncertainty and be changed fundamentally by conflict... none of these were things that he anticipated. The red badge of courage is something he desires in an ideal state, but the reality means that it is nothing more than a painful inconvenience at best, a threat to his very being at worst. Step by step the novella breaks down the youth's ideals, but then displays very real courage in the final battle where the youth and a compatriot take up the Union flag and bear the standard for a rousing victory. It is not that true courage and strength of character do not exist, far from it it. But they are very different from what our elementary school primers would have us believe. Mothers do not provide rousing speeches about returning with the shield or on it, they provide some parting advice and trust their offspring with the task of upholding the family name. Not all soldiers hold firm when confronted with their first taste of the battlefield, and they will injure themselves and their companions in the confusion of a rout or fight. Sometimes a soldier doesn't stop firing simply because he didn't realize that he was supposed to stop, and sometimes a soldier does something that appears noble merely because he wanted to be admired by his