Monday, May 11, 2009

Ten of the best disastrous performances in fiction

At the Guardian, John Mullan named ten of the best disastrous performances in fiction.

One novel on the list:
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Self-adoring Dorian is engaged to Sybil Vane, a young actress. He takes his epicurean role model Lord Henry Wotton to see her perform in Romeo and Juliet. Love has fatally damaged her abilities and she strikes Wilde's aesthetes as "absolutely false". Even "the common, uneducated audience of the pit" begin hissing. Dorian breaks off the engagement and Sybil kills herself.
Read about another disastrous performance on Mullan's list.

--Marshal Zeringue