The Importance Of Being Earnest Identity Essay

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Oscar Wilde was one of the most successful playwrights of the late nineteenth century, but even today he still remains as somewhat of an enigma; full of peculiarities and seemingly full of contradictions. He was born in Dublin with the name Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wils Wilde, in 16 October 1854. Wilde’s mother was a revolutionary poet, his father was a surgeon. He went to Trinity College in Dublin and then to Magdalen College in Oxford. After graduating, he went on a lecture tour throughout the United States, London and Canada to teach aesthetic values in 1879; he also became a pioneer for the aesthetic movement whose maxim was ‘art for art’s sake’. He married in 1884 and had two sons.
He wrote three collections of short stories in his early career, but had little success. Wilde began to gain fame when he published the essay …show more content…

The Importance of Being Earnest is a play concerned with double identities and a question of what is true. Jack and Algernon adopt another identity in order for them to lead a double life and win the love of an attractive woman. The dualistic theme is present throughout the play including its language; the name ‘Ernest’ being a pun and the huge amount of double entendres hidden in the woven lines of the play.
The most evident example of duality of identity in The Picture of Dorian Gray is Dorian himself. Dorian faces a struggle of good and evil; he appears youthful, whereas his portrait depicts ugliness. However, it is revealed that appearances can be deceiving so Dorian does not seem as good as his appearance suggests, he is simply a human being that can be good yet evil at times. Wilde proves the existence of the dual nature of man by having both good and evil work in conflict with each other as Dorian and the portrait are both good and

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