Shakespeare in a box//Human in a box

“The nineteenth-century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.” —Foreword by Oscar Wilde to “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” What do we have in common with Caliban and/or Dorian Gray? Our image or ourselves is continuously constructed by the outside gaze; we are thus constantly forced to confront ourselves. A look in the mirror: do we like what we see? Am I beautiful? What am I? Where does my performative persona begin and where does my authentic self end? I’m inside this skin I can’t get out of. I would so like to be . . .