It is easy to watch a play and enjoy a story, but it is much more to be able to look past the surface to understand the inspirations behind a work and be able to take a look at history from a more involved perspective. The Importance of Being Earnest was written by Irish author Oscar Wilde at the end of the 19th century. In this play Wilde very strongly uses influences from his world to create the characters, dialogue, and overall plot of the story.
Oscar Wilde “...believed that style--in life as well as art--was of utmost importance” (“Oscar Wilde”). This belief was one he epitomized well, and was condemned for because of choices concerning both his writing and personal life. He was born in 1854 in Dublin to a surgeon and a poet and had
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1955). Set in England, it begins with Jack visiting Algernon’s apartment in the city to meet with Algernon’s cousin Gwendolen. Jack explains to Algernon how he tells his family that it is his brother Ernest that he travels to see, when in fact Ernest is the name Jack uses when he leaves the countryside. Similarly, Algernon tells of his own imaginary friend Mr. Bunbury to which he uses in a similar manner. Soon, Algernon’s aunt Lady Bracknell arrives along with Gwendolen. Lady Bracknell then proceeds to interview Ernest for the right to marry her daughter, which she then refuses. The setting soon shifts to Jack’s country home with his adopted sister Cecily. Algernon, now aware of Jack’s guise, visits Jack as Ernest, meets Cecily, and wishes to marry her. Algernon and Jack meet and speak about the wish to be christened with the name Ernest in order to marry Cecily and Gwendolen respectively. Gwendolen then arrives at Jack’s home seeking Ernest. Both Cecily and Gwendolen realize that the men that they are infatuated with are lying about being Ernest. The entire situation is resolved in the end as Jack is revealed to actually be Ernest as well as have a brother. The Importance of Being Earnest, one of Wilde’s most popular work is also one of his plays that, “...most exactly accomplish what they attempt, without sacrificing any part of themselves” …show more content…
The name itself is a mockery of the British attitude towards progress that they have been making in the Victorian Age. Going back to Imperialism and the Industrial Revolution, “the British nation as a whole benefited from these change [but] individuals often suffered greatly” (Schmidt). Many people were moved from the land they owned in order to build factories or, in the case of colonization, were invaded, conquered, and forced to be ruled by the British. This was all done with the honest intent of improving the lives of the people in these places by giving them more opportunities. Although these changes eventually became profitable for England, they came at a price that the wealthy British community did not have to personally pay very much for. As for the actual character in the play, Ernest is a persona that Jack created. However, this soon becomes who both he and Algernon genuinely want to be, as they will get the most benefit from being named Ernest. This is another contradiction to the popular utilitarian ideals of the time that placed importance on action for the benefit of the majority. Here they want to be Ernest for their own personal gain. The ending is a reversal and Jack, who thought he has been lying, has been really telling the truth the entire time, but without his lie probably would not have discovered that he was being
Gwendolen confesses to Jack, or his confidante Ernest, “The moment Algernon first mentioned to me that he had a friend called Ernest, I knew I was destined to love you” (10). That quote proved that Gwendolen’s drive to marry “Ernest” for him having the name Ernest, rather than marrying him for his character. Cecily also confesses something along the same lines as Gwendolen to Algernon, that even though she had never met him before she fell in love with him: “Well, ever since dear Uncle Jack first confessed to us that he had a younger brother who was very wicked and bad, you of course have formed the chief topic of conversation…a man who is much talked about is always very attractive…I daresay it was foolish of me, but I fell in love with you, Ernest” (32). She is led to believe that Algernon’s real name is Ernest. Cecily and Gwendolen are attracted to Jack and “Ernest” because of their histories. Gwendolen was excited to find o...
In Oscar Wilde’s drama The Importance of Being Earnest, he uses light-hearted tones and humor to poke fun at British high society while handling the serious theme of truth and the true identity of who is really “Earnest.” Truth as theme is most significantly portrayed through the women characters, Gwendolen and Cecily but to present serious themes comically, Wilde portrays women to be the weaker sex of society, despite the seriousness of the subject—the identity of the men they want to marry.
The death of Willie Starks and the circumstances force Jack to rethink the way he thinks. He rethinks a belief that no one can ever be responsible for the evil actions of another individual over time. In a way Jack feels responsible for Willie’s death. Jack eventually marries Anne Stanton and he feels orthodox about his decision to marry her. Jack restarts his long lost hobby of working on a book about Cass Mastern.
Algernon, disagrees with the marriage after Jack fails her test of
Jack’s persona ‘Earnest’ has been described by Miss Prism as “irretrievably weak and vacillating” (701.35). Not only that, but Jack uses his persona of Earnest to make it seem like Jack adheres to notions of duty, honor and respectability all the while getting into mischief in London as his fake brother Ernest. Jack has shown that he will even lie to his loved ones his persona in order to get away with misbehaving and be seen as upright and moral. Later into the play Jack and his double life collide when the woman he loves starts to love his alter ego Earnest, although Ernest was an escape Jack used for his personal life but when his personal life and his real life collide he has to embrace his deception to get the life that he truly
The irony continues to explain how Jack and Algernon were biological brothers. They were pretending to be earlier to play out their game of Bunburyism. Jack had told everybody he had a brother in which was he used as his justification to leave his home in the country and visit his "brother" in the city. Algernon pretends to be Jack brother "Earnest" in order to win over Jack beautiful "niece" Cecily.
The Importance of Being Earnest is regarded as one of the most successful plays written by Oscar Wilde, a great 19th century playwright. Oscar Wilde deals with something unique about his contemporary age in this drama. It addresses Victorian social issues, French theatre, farce, social drama and melodrama. All these factors influenced the structure of the play in a large scale. This play is basically a Victorian satirical drama showcasing the social, political, economic and religious structural changes that affected 18th century England. It was the time when British Empire had captured most part of the world including Oscar Wilde’s homeland, Ireland. The aristocrats of England had become dominant over the middle and poor class people and Wilde wrote plays with the motivation to encourage people to think against the English aristocracy and artificiality.
Throughout The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde plays around with the standard expectations along with the absence of compassion of a Victorian society in the 1890’s, he demonstrates this through several genres of comedy such as Melodrama, Comedy of Manners, Farce, dark humour and Irony, as well as portraying the themes, death and illness, in this play in a brilliance of unusual amount of references.
Similarly, in “The Importance of Being Earnest”, Jack and Algernon both begin their marital lives based on deception and lies. As a matter of fact, Gwendolen and Algernon both know Jack as Ernest. When Jack proposes to Gwendolen, she becomes overly attached to the idea of marrying someone called Ernest. Gwendolen exclaims: “My ideal has always been to love someone of the name Ernest/There is something in that name that inspires absolute confidence/It is a divine name/It has a music of its own/It produces vibrations” (Wilde 106), and Cecily is of the same opinion “it had always been a girlish dream of mine to love someone whose name was Ernest/I pity any poor married woman whose husband is not called Ernest” (Wilde 116). Jack and Algernon never admits to Gwendolen and Cecily that they are living a double life, their relationships are based on lies. They are more occupied with the name Ernest than the fact of actually being earnest. In spite of leading a deceptive and double life, both men
In conclusion, The Importance of Being Earnest strongly focuses on those of the upper class society and the vanity of the aristocrats who place emphasis on trivial matters concerning marriage. Both Algernon and Jack assume the identity of "Ernest" yet ironically, they both are beginning their marital lives based on deception and lies. Lady Bracknell represents the archetypal aristocrat who forces the concept of a marriage based on wealth or status rather than love. Through farce and exaggeration, Wilde satirically reveals the foolish and trivial matters that the upper class society looks upon as being important. As said earlier, a satirical piece usually has a didactic side to it.
Two adolescent women who incorrectly consider the men’s names to be Ernest, and who are passionate about the men for this very reason think highly of both Jack and Algernon. In relating the story of mix-ups and mistaken identities, the ideals and manners of the Victorian society are satirized in a comedy where the characters "treat all the trivial things of life seriously and all the serious things of life with sincere and studied triviality"(Wilde, Oscar). Oscar Wilde’s amusing scenes often take their source in societal satire and unconventional (Baselga 15). All the way through his play, The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde satirizes education, women, and morality.
...ngagement, their re-engagement. Cecily is not the natural country girl. She possesses the self-assurance of the experienced woman. Without being cynical she makes her desires clear. And when Gwendolen and Cecily discover that their Earnests are impostors whose names are Jack and Algernon they decide that love can be restored only if Jack and Algy christen themselves Earnest.
Jack is attempting to prove to Algernon that he is not a liar, ¨I'm not a bunburyist at all...¨ 124. Denying the fact that he has a made up brother that he used to get out of certain events, Jack is the definition of a bunburyist. He is taking advantage of his friend’s blindness to the situation to get unnecessary time away from them. Explaining to Lady Bracknell that he cannot attend her dinner party because. ¨… my poor friend Bunbury is very ill again. They seem to think I should be with him.¨ 127. The amount of times Algernon uses his ill, imposure brother bunburying, goes to show how selfish he is. Putting his own personal needs before making an effort to meet with his family. They only see their family when it is beneficial and convenient for
Although Jack and Algernon are completely different kinds of people, they both hold strong ties with each other. Jack and Algernon both live double lives through nonexistent characters named Ernest and Bunbury. They are always searching for pleasure in their lives. For example when Algernon asks, “How are you, my dear Ernest? What brings you up to town?” Jack replies “Oh, pleasure, pleasure! What else should one bring anywhere”(Wilde 1427)? Algernon also states “My duty as a gentleman has never interfered with my pleasures”(Wilde 1456). Nothing gets in the way of these men pursuing their loved ones.
Sometimes, people may not be the best in character, and their values may be superficial in nature. Although this may be the case, these people may have a reason for their questionable character. These people may have been treated poorly before, or their influences make them poor characters. Such is Gwendolen Fairfax in Oscar Wilde’s play, The Importance of Being Ernest. To the audience, she may seem to be someone shallow, dishonest, or even insincere. The audience is most likely correct, although if one pays attention, one may realize the reason why Gwendolen has such a character. Throughout the play, Wilde shows how Gwendolen’s trivial and insincere character is influenced by her mother and the people around her, as well as the result of