The importance of being earnest essay

The importance of being earnest essay

 · The Importance of Being Earnest is a trivial comedy for serious people written by Oscar Wilde and set in late Victorian London. The comedy is made purposely to criticise the aristocratic. The play’s crucial themes are the triviality with which it treats institutions as serious as marriage, and the satire of the Victorian system and their strong beliefs at the time.4/5(1) Essay Sample: The Importance of Being Earnest is a play written by Oscar Wilde. The story is about Jack, a man who lives a double life in pursuit of pleasure that he +1 () Oscar Wilde Importance of Being Earnest Essay. The Importance Of Being Earnest By Oscar Wilde. Words | 7 Pages. Hidden Symbols in The Importance of Being Earnest The Importance of Being Earnest written by Oscar Wilde takes place in and exposes the hypocritical social expectations of the end of the Victorian era

Gender in the importance of being earnest Free Essay Sample

The aristocratic Victorians valued duty and respectability above all else. Earnestness — a determined and serious desire to do the correct thing — was at the top of the code of conduct.

Appearance was everything, and style was much more important than substance. So, while a person could lead a secret life, carry on affairs within marriage or have children outside of wedlock, society would look the other way as long as the appearance of propriety was maintained. For this reason, Wilde questions whether the more important or serious issues of the day are overlooked in favor of trivial concerns about appearance. Gwendolen is the paragon of this value. Her marriage proposal must be performed correctly, and her brother even practices correct proposals.

Gwendolen's aristocratic attitude is "In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity is the vital thing. The tea ceremony in Act II is a hilarious example of Wilde's contention that manners and appearance are everything. The guise of correctness is the framework for war. Both women, thinking they are engaged to the same person, wage a civilized "war" over the tea service while the servants silently watch.

When Gwendolen requests no sugar, Cecily adds four lumps to her cup. Although she asks for bread and butter, Gwendolen is given a large slice of cake. Her true feelings come out only in an aside that Cecily supposedly cannot hear: "Detestable girl!

Wilde gives examples again and again of the aristocrat's concern for propriety, that everything is done properly no matter the importance of being earnest essay those good manners might be camouflaging. 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. Health is the primary duty of life.

Gwendolen, learning from her mother, is totally self-absorbed and definite about what the importance of being earnest essay wants.

She tells Cecily, "I never travel without my diary, the importance of being earnest essay. One should have something sensational to read in the train. 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 The importance of being earnest essay 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.

Wilde's satire here is gentle and humorous, chiding a society for its self-importance. 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, the importance of being earnest essay, 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. They do it so well in the daily papers. 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, the importance of being earnest essay bigotry, thoughtlessness and blind assumptions.

Because Victorian norms were so repressive and suffocating, Wilde creates episodes in which his characters live secret lives or create false impressions to express who the importance of being earnest essay 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. 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.

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.

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 passionand 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 the importance of being earnest essay life must be lived earnestly. 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. 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. The strict Victorian class system, in which members of the same class marry each other, perpetuates the gulf between the upper, middle and lower classes.

Snobbish, aristocratic attitudes further preserve the distance between these groups. Jack explains to Lady Bracknell that he has no politics. He considers himself a Liberal Unionist. Lady Bracknell finds his answer satisfactory because it means that he is a Tory, or a conservative. Jack's home in London is on the "unfashionable side" of Belgrave Square, so "that could easily be altered.

Education is not for learning to think; it is for mindlessly following convention. Lady Bracknell approves of ignorance. In fact, she explains, "The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever.

If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes, and probably lead to acts of violence in Grosvenor Square. That simply will not do. One might think aristocrats would see the error of their ways and try to be more virtuous in a moral sense. However, they see their attitudes as the virtuous high ground and believe that other classes should conform to aristocratic attitudes and see the error of their own ways.

When Miss Prism seems to chide the lower classes for producing so many children for Chasuble to christen, she appears to see it as a question of thrift. But they don't seem to know what thrift is, the importance of being earnest essay. He mentions a sermon he gave for the Society for the Prevention of Discontent Among the Upper Orders.

To the Victorians, reform means keeping the current social and economic system in place by perpetuating upper-class virtues and economy. Every page, every line of dialogue, every character, each symbol, and every stage direction in The Importance of Being Earnest is bent on supporting Wilde's contention that social change happens as a matter of thoughtfulness.

Art can bring about such thoughtfulness. If the eccentric or unusual is to be replaced with correct behavior and thought, the importance of being earnest essay, human sympathy and compassion suffer. If strict moral values leave no room for question, a society loses much of what is known as humanity. Previous Oscar Wilde Biography. Next Quiz. Removing book from your Reading List will also remove any bookmarked pages associated with this title.

Are you sure you want to remove bookConfirmation and any corresponding bookmarks? My Preferences My Reading List. Literature Notes Test Prep Study Guides, the importance of being earnest essay.

The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde. Home Literature Notes The Importance of Being Earnest Themes in The Importance of Being Earnest. Critical Essays Themes in The Importance of Being Earnest. Adam Bede has been added to your Reading List! Ok Undo Manage My Reading list ×. Ok Manage My Reading the importance of being earnest essay ×.

Remove Cancel ×.

Top 10 Notes: The Importance of Being Earnest

, time: 8:57

The Importance of Being Earnest - Free Essay Example | blogger.com

Essay Sample: The Importance of Being Earnest is a play written by Oscar Wilde. The story is about Jack, a man who lives a double life in pursuit of pleasure that he +1 () The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde Essay. Words6 Pages. In The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde revealed that animalistic traits can tint a character’s intellectual attributes. All of the characters possess an overwhelming desire which seems to diminish their morality. Wilde uses Jack Worthing’s animalistic behaviors to reveal that his animal self is damaging his  · The Importance of Being Earnest’ is used to stand for a contradictory and hypocritical society. Oscar Wilde uses the text to reflect his ain experience with an nescient society ; Oliver Parker does non retroflex this in the movie version of ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’ as he does non hold the emotional influences that Wilde had