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/lit/ - Literature

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1173561 No.1173561 [Reply] [Original]

I want to be like Lord Henry Wotton. I want to rouse people from their oblivious complacency, raise questions, breed discord and generally turn people's lives upside down just by getting them to question themselves and everything else. How do I go about cultivating this ability?

>> No.1173575

>>1173561
I'd imagine it involves actively questioning everything about yourself first, dragging people along, and generally doing weird and eccentric for its own sake.

>> No.1173584

You need the intellect and experience to understand what makes great art, and then the bravery and grit to live your actual life according to those principles. Good luck with that.

>> No.1173608

>>1173584
But isn't 'great art' largely subjective? Or am I just an idiot?

>> No.1173619
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1173619

Become Socrates, or at least master the socratic method of argument.

>> No.1173625

>>1173561
Henry never really corrupted or changed anyone in The Picture Of Dorian Gray. All he did was think out loud - restate the ruminations of those around him, which was quite frowned upon as those sorts of views and philosophies were viewed as tasteless during that time.

In the end, Dorian did what Henry - or anyone else for that matter - could not: he actually acted upon those philosophies. As a result, Dorian managed to know more about the world than any other character in the novel. Hell, by the end, Dorian is superior to Henry himself, as even Henry is slightly perplexed by Dorian's mysterious "enlightened" nature.

tl;dr: You should strive to be like Dorian instead. He was Alpha As Fuck by the end of the novel.

>> No.1173803

>>1173608
Yeah, and I wasn't talking about the aestheticist quality of Lord Henry. Just the effect he had on Dorian. I wanna do that. -OP

>> No.1173807

>>1173625

Are you kidding?? Alpha?? Dorian was spat on and shat on by the end of the novel, philosophically speaking...