Before the release of The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde's editor, J.M Stoddart made some edits that consisted of approximately 500 words being taken out. Most of these deletions were acts of censorship, both homosexual and heterosexual content was deleted. Many of the censored acts were those that made the homoerotic nature of Basil's feelings for Dorian more explicit and vivid. Stoddart even deleted references to Dorians female lovers as his "Mistresses", suggesting that Stoddart was worried about the novel's influence on everyone, including women. Stoddart is quoted saying, "it [Dorian Gray] contained a number of things which an innocent woman would make an exception to" to Craige Lippincott, and assured him that the book would "not go into the Magazine unless it is proper that it shall". 

Wilde was unaware of these changes that were being made and only saw them when he read his censored story in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in June of 1890.