¨ Agony Aunt, Literary edition—page

DEAR AGGIE

By Aggie Nyarnt

Dear Aggie, I crave for my beauty to be immortalised; I have been enlightened by Lord Henry Wotton that it shall fade yet beauty is the only aspect of life worth pursuing. Thus, I wished for my portrait to age instead of me, however it seems to reflect every supposed sin I commit. Henry lent me a French novel which in fact stated that my exploration of sensuality was not morally sinful, however my portrait does not show the same, decaying all the more. How am I to reverse this decay? Yours, Dorian Gray

Dear Dorian, Have you considered following a more moral path? It seems to be that your problem is a skewed moral compass, as this ‘exploration into sensuality’ that you mention clearly is your excuse for living a hedonistic lifestyle. Perhaps read some of Jeremy Bentham’s work on morality and utilitarianism to get a more diverse impression of the effect of actions. However, I must question where your wish to reverse the decay stems from. If it is solely out of pure vanity and a wish to be seen as better, it will never work. You need to act this way out of a pure willingness to truly be better rather than just selfishness. From Aggie