In the opening of The Importance of
Being Earnest, a bunch of
characters are already thrown at you. The whole play revolves around
Jack Worthing, the guardian to a pretty girl named Cecily Cardew.
Jack has operated for many years under a secret alias, “Ernest,”
who is a scandalous, free spirited socialite. Because Jack has so
many responsibilities, I guess you could say Ernest is his way of
escaping those responsibilities to go to London and do whatever he
wants. Jack is in love with his best friend Algernon's cousin,
Gwendolen, who Jack plans to propose to at the beginning. This is
really where all the love triangles started and if you don't keep
track of them, you might end up back at square one. One of the
obviously interesting things is the play being about the importance
of being earnest, when it tells the story of a man who is quite the
opposite and leading a double life, and the consequences of that
dishonest and deceptive choice.
I
took one central idea of the play to be deception and lying to get
what you want. The first example of this is Jack taking on the alias
Ernest to participate in a scandalous lifestyle and escape from his
responsibilities. Other examples are obviously when Jack and
Algernon pretend they are Ernest in order to gain the affections of
Gwendolen and Cecily. It's pretty crazy to think that if Jack told
the truth at the beginning of the play, things would have turned out
a LOT differently and events would have transpired a lot less
chaotically. When Algernon first accuses “Ernest” of being
someone else, Jack/Ernest counter-accuses Algernon of being
“ungentlemanly” (1736); to me this is a little juvenile and
definitely shows Jack's weakness as a character, since he doesn't
really properly defend himself, he just focuses on insulting the
other person. The fact that both Algernon and Jack attempt to be
Ernest shows some kind of connection in character. The two women are
also operating under lies as well, so they definitely aren't innocent
either. Also, by the end they all end up with who they want, despite
all the lies that have been thrown around, showing that honesty isn't
really a necessary virtue, even in a huge event such as marriage
(even though I would claim the opposite). This might also hint at
some kind of corruption/flaw in the idea of marriage, and using it
not for the romantic part but for the furthering of a family.
Another
theme I noticed was the reoccurring idea of social class division.
To me, Algernon represented the higher class aristocrat; he comes off
very greedy and careless on 1734, when he is talking about Lane's lax
views on marriage. He believes that the lower class should set an
example for the higher class, because he knows aristocrats are
corrupt, yet he doesn't seem to be very concerned with fixing this
corruption...jerk. Jack represents the lower class, he doesn't know
very much about his family history, and is placed at a lower social
ranking after Lady Bracknell calls him out for this lack of knowledge
to further accentuate the difference in social status. Lady Bracknell
plays a role in the display of this idea, as respect of elders and
upholding social class seems very important to her.
Going
back to being honest and the desire to continue the family name, I
think this play overall reflects characteristics and motives of
Victorian marriages, as well as the idea of reputation (appearing yet
again!). Reputation back then came from family name alone, not
character, so throughout the play the two men don't really have any
motivation to further the quality of character, just their family
names, making their sincerity and honesty not too important to them
both. Gwendolen is clearly obsessed with reputation as well, shown in
Act II. Her trivial exchange with Cecily in the garden about sugar
in tea vs no sugar in tea, and bread and butter vs cake, shows how
much she values being fashionable and up to date on trends, therefore
hinting at her obsession with status, an idea that mirrors that of
her cousin Algernon.
To
zoom out a bit, I always like to look at the big picture and
determine what the work says about the author's attitudes. The
Importance of Being Earnest showed
me that he almost poked fun at the idea of aristocracy; the whole
play was about corruption of marriage and general etiquette of the
high class, yet the work maintained a light hearted mood, suggesting
that he doesn't think this corruption is going to change, nor does he
seem to be taking action on it, he's just poking a little fun at it.
Overall I did really like the play and the ideas it presented about
societal values.
I loved reading your post because I agreed with many of your points. First of all you're totally right about all the complicated love triangles, I actually had to read this twice to get everything figured out in my head.. :P Also, I loved how the author conveyed his point about being earnest. He told a story in which the characters acted the complete opposite of the point he was trying to teach.. its genius really, sort of goes along with that saying.. you learn from you're mistakes, or in this case the author hopes we learn from his characters mistakes.. haha.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I was upset to see everything work out just fine and dandy for these people, after all of the lies and corruption that occurred. I'm just going to blame that on the author, who probably had some sort of twisted view on marriage and relationships, like you said.
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ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your post because I think you hit the nail on the head with Wilde’s intention poke fun at the aristocrat’s tendency to make mountains out of molehills—and in such a callous way! Wilde also brings up the “lower class” a few times—one of the more noticeable places is when Algernon criticizes the divorces in the lower class (in the first scene_ because they need to be an example for the upper class. Even though this part of the scene is short, I kind of liked it because it does demonstrate the very subtle bottom-up flow of influence. Aristocrats like Algernon (who is a bit older, and has been around the block a few times) would know that for all the wealth and privilege divisions, there is some influence being exerted upon the upper class by the lower.
The whole play reminded me (for some reason) of a Mel Brooks quote I heard the other day, “Tragedy is when I cut my finger, comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.” While this quote is probably not particularly appropriate for the play, I feel like it is the theme for all of the conversations that take place in the play, particularly any one that Algernon is involved with.
Speaking of Algernon, I love this character. Not because he is a particularly good guy (I probably love him because he is not), but because he reminds me so much of Lord Henry Wotton from Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray. He’s snarky and pessimistic. I would love to see Robert Downey Jr. play him.
I really enjoyed your blog post on this. I thought this play was absolutely hilarious (but I imagine it wouldnt be quite so funny for the upperclass society that it is making fun of. Then again, the humor might have been lost on them...). I especially agree with your point about the "central idea of the play to be [about] deception and lying to get what you want." It seems to me like this play is making fun of the values of society and how corrupt it has become over time. Deception is such a major part in this play because of the way people value maintaining their appearance over their virtue (seems to echo some of our past readings as well...). Cecily's little narrative about already being engaged to "Ernest" is quite the example of this. She creates a whole fake love story just to maintain this allusion to herself and others that this great love affair existed. It followed out all of the typical grand love gestures of the time even though absolutely none of these things happened once.
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