Hello Friends,
This blog is my response to the task assigned to us by our Prof.Dr.DilipSir on the play Importance of being Earnest by Oscar Wilde. So read and enjoy.
The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is a play by Oscar Wilde. First performed on 14 February 1895 at the St James's Theatre in London, it is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae to escape burdensome social obligations. Working within the social conventions of late Victorian London, the play's major themes are the triviality with which it treats institutions as serious as marriage, and the resulting satire of Victorian ways. Some contemporary reviews praised the play's humour and the culmination of Wilde's artistic career, while others were cautious about its lack of social messages. Its high farce and witty dialogue have helped make The Importance of Being Earnest Wilde's most enduringly popular play.
The successful opening night marked the climax of Wilde's career but also heralded his downfall. The Marquess of Queensberry, whose son Lord Alfred Douglas was Wilde's lover, planned to present the writer with a bouquet of rotten vegetables and disrupt the show. Wilde was tipped off and Queensberry was refused admission. Their feud came to a climax in court, where Wilde's homosexuality was revealed to the Victorian public and he was sentenced to imprisonment. Despite the play's early success, Wilde's notoriety caused the play to be closed after 86 performances. After his release from prison, he published the play from exile in Paris, but he wrote no further comic or dramatic work.
The Importance of Being Earnest has been revived many times since its premiere. It has been adapted for the cinema on three occasions. In The Importance of Being Earnest (1952), Dame Edith Evans reprised her celebrated interpretation of Lady Bracknell; The Importance of Being Earnest (1992) by Kurt Baker used an all-black cast; and Oliver Parker's The Importance of Being Earnest (2002) incorporated some of Wilde's original material cut during the preparation of the original stage production.
Named after Queen Victoria of England, who reigned from 1837 to 1901, the context in which Oscar Wilde was writing was characterized by Victorian values and society, which saw increased wealth, political stability and strict cultural norms. The rules of conduct that developed during this time had a strong influence on one's social standing, motivating people to behave in a socially acceptable way in public.
Women were seen as weaker, but more nurturing than men, and were therefore expected to run the household. Men were seen as stronger and more rational, and they were therefore considered better suited to the world of business and politics. Within each of these realms, a strict set of rules dictated how both sexes were expected to behave in order to be considered moral.
Class-division was also particularly apparent during this time. With the increase in industry, many middle-class families were starting to move into higher society. In order to do so, the need to conform to the expectations of this society became even more pronounced. In sharp contrast, people from the lower classes were viewed as 'deservingly poor' and were treated badly based on the perspective that their poverty was the result of improper conduct.
Oscar Wilde and the Victorian Era
Although he was born in Ireland, Oscar Wilde moved to England during his studies and became known there for his extravagance and decadence. Like many others, he noted the differences in the high moral standards that people displayed in social contexts, and the less proper behavior that took place when people were outside of the public eye. Perhaps due to the fact that he himself had to put on an act in public (since his sexual orientation was illegal at the time), Wilde came to see social interaction as a farce and wrote several social satires to highlight the strange perspectives and behaviors of the aristocracy.
Satire, in the time and context of the novel The Importance of Being Earnest, refers to a comedic style in which the behaviors and beliefs of a particular social class are made fun of. In The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde pokes fun at the upper class by showing them to be fickle, dishonest and snobbish. Let's look at how he does this by considering the various aspects of the Victorian life that he ridicules.
Proper Social Conduct
In the Victorian era, people were very focused on how one behaved in public. Both Algernon and Jack make up false identities in order to get away with some of their less than ideal behaviors. Calling cards and formal invites formed a part of everyday social life in those times, and we find mention of these in the play. Algernon even goes as far as to state that Jack's 'carelessness' in not sending him a dinner invitation when he wants to avoid dinner at Lady Bracknell's, is foolish and annoying.
The British at this time considered themselves vastly superior to the French (which is why several novels at the time had villainous French characters). The play pokes fun at the idea of French promiscuity when Jack refers to 'corrupt' French Dramas.
Victorian Era and Double Life
Victorian Norms
For much of this century the term "Victorian", which literally describes things and events in the reign of Queen Victoria (1837 -1901), was associated with ideas of people being "prudish", "repressed" and "old fashioned". Although such associations have some basis in fact, they do not adequately indicate the nature of this complex, paradoxical age that was seen as a second English Renaissance. Like Elizabethan England, Victorian England saw great expansion of wealth, power and culture. Wilde engaged with and mocked the forms and rules of society. His stance as a dandy and outsider let him use the conventions of a social world for his social drama, which mirrored its values by reinforcing social circumstances and showing the consequences of maintaining ideals. Examples of the Victorian double moral are the concepts of a "harmonic marriage" and the “Age of ideals”: “ You don ’ t seem to realise, that in married life three is company and two is none ” .
GWENDOLEN. ( … ) We live, as I hope you know, Mr Worthing, in an age of ideals. The fact is constantly mentioned in the more expensive monthly magazines, and has reached the provincial pulpits, I am told ( … )
Victorian norms which are mentionable in this context are for instance:
- gentlemanly appearance
- being patronizing
- winning women's hearts
- independence and individuality
- that it was better to seem good than to be good
- social obligations, table manners and close social ties
- pleasure (one had it secretly for a conventional social appearance)
The combination of adaptation of and distancing from these norms and moral rules can both result in a well-accepted member of society and promote double moral standards.
Double Life
Oscar Wilde knew much about the late-Victorian high society, because he was an outsider of the world of elegant fashion and society that he frequented. An Irishman of middle -class origin among the English, he gained access to the upper-class worlds of London through his sheer intellectual and artistic brilliance, but he constantly wore the mask of the dandy and the aesthete, and he wrote plays about the impenetrability of the very society that he lived in.
The dualities of society are well reflected in the play. Jack Worthing, a respectable provincial judge of peace, needs to invent a depraved younger brother to justify his frequent trips to his bachelor rooms in London. The reader/spectator can guess how he spends the time in London when he is not with Gwendolyn, and where Algernon goes on his "bunburying" expeditions after he has got out of his dinner engagements. We can see that Aunt Bracknell is particularly concerned about Gwendolyn's prospective fiancé's qualification for marrying into the family from her constant stream of questions; she wants to know whether Jack smokes, how old he is, how much money he earns, if he possesses his own property and so on.
In the same way that Oscar Wilde attempted to live a double life, many people of the Victorian Age, even highly ranking personalities of the public, cultivated their own double lives. The motif of leading a double life in "The importance of Being Ernest" is an escape from the constricting social façade into the freedom of secret pleasures. What makes the play so special is the double occurrence of this leading of double lives and the similarity between Algernon's and Jack's way of fleeing social restrictions. " Throughout the play Wilde's characters have been striving single-mindedly to construct an idealized world which satisfies equally their wishes and their sense of form,... the desired may be a question of nomenclature (Ernest) or of behaviour (wickedness), but it is invariably one of expression ."
Comedy of Manner and Social Drama
The comedy "The Importance of Being Ernest" was a social comedy about life in St. James for audiences who lived or shopped there. Society dramas are a mirror in which fashionable audiences could see fashionable images of their own fashionable worlds of homes, dinner parties, country-house weekends, dressing, talking and interclass marriage. Oscar Wilde anticipated the major development in the 20th century of using farce as a way of reflecting peculiarities of society. A classical Comedy of Manners satirizes the vain behaviour and hypocritical double moral standards of the upper class, but is at the same time a realistic representation of society and morals. Wilde does not include the aspect of realism, he did not want to verify the social conditions and manners of the Victorian Age. The play is, according to critics, a Comedy of Manner which Wilde transforms into a trivial comedy.
Composition
The play reveals much about the habits and manners of the Victorian Age. The reader/spectator gains an insight into Victorian social roles, what people do and how people used to behave. But that is of course not the reason for the great success of the play. Oscar Wilde has satirized lots of things that he has found to be hypocritical or even outrageous. Wilde knew how to make fun of people without offending them, whilst amusing them with the characters they watched on stage.
The central point of the play regarding different identities and double lives is the sudden change of roles which is not only restricted to the main protagonists, but concerns all characters of the play. Playing roles occurs in so far that the characters of the play behave according to social rules and concepts on one side, but adopt inappropriate manners in a very overacted way on the other side. The exaggeration of the roles’ original pertinence to exorbitant situations creates the comic effect. Sudden changes of roles, unexpected reactions in various situations, the earnest involvement of all participants in senseless conversations are closely linked and make the play witty, lively, dynamic, surprising and comic.
The Absence of Compassion
Two areas in which the Victorians showed little sympathy or compassion were illness and death. When Lady Bracknell hears that Bunbury died after his doctors told him he could not live, she feels he has — in dying — acted appropriately because he had the correct medical advice. "Illness of any kind is hardly a thing to be encouraged in others. Health is the primary duty of life." Lady Bracknell, like other aristocrats, is too busy worrying about her own life, the advantages of her daughter's marriage, and her nephew's errors in judgment to feel any compassion for others. Gwendolen, learning from her mother, is totally self-absorbed and definite about what she wants. She tells Cecily, "I never travel without my diary. One should have something sensational to read in the train." Wilde seems to be taking to task a social class that thinks only of itself, showing little compassion or sympathy for the trials of those less fortunate.
Religion
Another serious subject — religion — is also a topic of satire. While concerns of the next world would be an appropriate topic for people of this world, it seems to be shoved aside in the Victorian era. Canon Chasuble is the symbol of religious thought, and Wilde uses him to show how little the Victorians concerned themselves with attitudes reflecting religious faith. Chasuble can rechristen, marry, bury, and encourage at a moment's notice with interchangeable sermons filled with meaningless platitudes. Even Lady Bracknell mentions that christenings are a waste of time and, especially, money. Chasuble's pious exterior betrays a racing pulse for Miss Prism: "Were I fortunate enough to be Miss Prism's pupil, I would hang upon her lips." Quickly correcting his error, the minister hides his hardly holy desires in the language of metaphor. Wilde's satire here is gentle and humorous, chiding a society for its self-importance.
Popular Culture
The popular attitudes of the day about the French, literary criticism, and books are also subjects of Wilde's humor. Wilde wittily asserts that Victorians believe that nothing good comes from France, except for (in Wilde's mind) the occasional lesbian maid. Otherwise, France is a good place to kill off and request the burial of Ernest. As the good reverend says, "I fear that hardly points to any very serious state of mind at the last." Literary criticism is for "people who haven't been at a University. They do it so well in the daily papers." Modern books are filled with truths that are never pure or simple, and scandalous books should be read but definitely in secret. Again Wilde criticizes the Victorians for believing that appearance is much more important than truth. He takes the opportunity to insert many examples of popular thought, revealing bias, social bigotry, thoughtlessness and blind assumptions.
Secret Lives
Victorian norms were so repressive and suffocating, Wilde creates episodes in which his characters live secret lives or create false impressions to express who they really are. Jack and Algernon both create personas to be free. These other lives allow them to neglect their duties — in Algernon's case — or to leave their duties and pursue pleasure — in Jack's case. Very early in Act I, Wilde sets up these secret lives, and they follow through until the final act. When Jack and Algernon realize their marriages will end their pursuit of pleasure, they both admit rather earnestly, "You won't be able to run down to the country quite so often as you used to do, dear Algy," and "You won't be able to disappear to London quite so frequently as your wicked custom was." Marriage means the end of freedom, pleasure, wickedness, and the beginning of duty and doing what is expected. Of course, Jack and Algernon could continue to don their masks after they marry Gwendolen and Cecily, but they will have to be cautious and make sure society is looking the other way.
Passion and Morality
Wilde's contention that a whole world exists separate from Victorian manners and appearances is demonstrated in the girlish musings of Cecily. When she hears that Jack's "wicked" brother Ernest is around, she is intensely desirous of meeting him. She says to Algernon, "I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being really good all the time." The thought of meeting someone who lives outside the bounds of prudery and rules is exciting to naïve Cecily. Even using the name Ernest for his secret life is ironic because Algernon is not being dutiful — earnest — in living a secret life.
Various characters in the play allude to passion, sex and moral looseness. Chasuble and Prism's flirting and coded conversations about things sexual, Algernon stuffing his face to satisfy his hungers, the diaries (which are the acceptable venues for passion), and Miss Prism's three-volume novel are all examples of an inner life covered up by suffocating rules. Even Algernon's aesthetic life of posing as the dandy, dressing with studied care, neglecting his bills, being unemployed, and pursuing pleasure instead of duty is an example of Victorians valuing trivialities. Once Algernon marries he will have suffocating rules and appearances to keep up. Wilde's characters allude to another life beneath the surface of Victorian correctness. Much of the humor in this play draws a fine line between the outer life of appearances and the inner life of rebellion against the social code that says life must be lived earnestly.
Courtship and Marriage
Oscar Wilde felt these Victorian values were perpetuated through courtship and marriage, both of which had their own rules and rituals. Marriage was a careful selection process. When Algernon explains that he plans to become engaged to Jack's ward, Cecily, Lady Bracknell decides, "I think some preliminary enquiry on my part would not be out of place." When Lady Bracknell pummels Jack with questions about parents, politics, fortune, addresses, expectations, family solicitors, and legal encumbrances, his answers must be proper and appropriate for a legal union between the two families to be approved. Fortune is especially important, and when Jack and Cecily's fortunes are both appropriate, the next problem is family background. Because Jack does not know his parents, Lady Bracknell suggests he find a parent — any with the right lineage will do — and find one quickly. Appearance, once again, is everything. Duty (not joy, love or passion) is important, further substantiating Algy's contention that marriage is a loveless duty: "A man who marries without knowing Bunbury [an excuse for pleasure] has a very tedious time of it." Marriage is presented as a legal contract between consenting families of similar fortunes; background, love, and happiness have little to do with it.
2,960 Words.
Works Cited
1. The Importance of Being Earnest." - Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 12 Jan. 2021, en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Importance_of_Being_Earnest. Accessed 1 Feb. 2021.
2. "Social Role and Double Life in Oscar Wilde`s "The Importance of Being Ernest"." GRIN | Publish Your Bachelor or Master Thesis, Term Paper, Dissertation and Essay for Free, m.grin.com/document/105201.
3. study.com/academy/lesson/victorian-values-society-in-the-importance-of-being-earnest.html.
4. "Themes in The Importance of Being Earnest." CliffsNotes Study Guides | Book Summaries, Test Preparation & Homework Help | Written by Teachers, www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/i/the-importance-of-being-earnest/critical-essays/themes-in-the-importance-of-being-earnest.