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Wilde's Masterpiece

The Importance of Being Earnest
a play by Oscar Wilde


Algernon Moncrieff is visited by his best friend Ernest Worthing, who wants to propose to Algernon's cousin, Gwendolen. But he refuses to grant Ernest his wish until he explains why he owns a cigarette case that bears an inscription to dear Uncle Jack. As it turns out Ernest is leading a double life: in the country, he goes by the name of Jack and pretends to have a brother named Ernest living in London. By this he can assume a serious attitude for the benefit of his young ward Cecily and lead a free live in the city. After hearing this story, Algernon admits that he engages in a similar lifestyle: he pretends to have an invalid friend named Bunbury in the country, so whenever Algernon wants to avoid social obligations, he pretends to visit him instead.
When Lady Bracknell finally arrives with her daughter Gwendolen, Jack proposes to her. Gwendolen accepts happily, but confesses to only love him for his name: Ernest. Because of this Jack decides to be christened as Ernest. After Lady Bracknell finds out about the engagement she forbids her daughter to ever see him again.
A few days later at Jack's country house, Algernon arrives and announces himself as Ernest Worthing in order to propose to Cecily. As it turns out, Cecily has for some time imagined herself in love with her Uncle Jack's wicked younger brother and Algernon easily sweeps her off her feet. But like Gwendolen, Cecily loves her fiancé for his name so Algernon decides to be christened as Ernest as well. Something Jack is not very happy about.
To make matters worse Gwendolen arrives from London. When she and Cecily meet and they discover that they are both engaged to Ernest, Jack and Algernon are in trouble.

The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is the last and most popular play by Oscar Wilde. Set in late Victorian England, the humorous play is brimming with witty and nonsensical dialogues and even though the play was written over a hundred years ago the wit is still entertaining and fascinating up to date. What fascinated me the most was that below the surface of the light, brittle comedy, Wilde hides a serious subtext that takes aim at self-righteous moralism and hypocrisy, the very aspects of Victorian society that would play a part in Oscar Wildes downfall shortly after the first staging of his play. Moreover he accomplishes this without affecting the light atmosphere surrounding it. One is perfectly capable of reading the play without having to notice its deeper meaning while still getting an enjoyable read out of it.

It is also important to mention, that The Importance of Being Earnes is a nonsense play. This means that the characters say the opposite of what is normal or expected, everything is turned upside down and reminds us of the innocence of childhood, the paradise of innocence. For example, when Jack announces the death of his brother and Miss Prims replies: What a lesson for him! I trust he will profit by it. or when little Cecily says that, It is always painful to part from people whom one has known for a very brief space of time. The absence of old friends one can endure with equanimity. But even a momentary separation from anyone to whom one has just been introduced is almost unbearable.. The play is full of such statements that make us smile and or even laugh out loud at their absurdity. Sometimes we even have to read them again, not understanding what the character is trying to say, only to find out that they were really saying nonsense. Some might find lines like these annoying, others hilarious, I find them simply fascinating.

As we have already heard, the characters in the play act like children - they are doing and saying things with such innocence, unaware of possible consequences. One point of critique is that the character of Algernon and Jack, as well as Gwendolen and Cecily are very similar. They act and think in the same way and it might be argued that it would have been more interesting if the couples were at least in some points opposing or unique, leading to different approaches and solutions to their problem.

The last point of my review will deal with the name Earnest and its double meaning in this play. The book does not only deal with the fact that it is important for Algernon and Jack to be Ernest but also with the character trait earnest. If a person is earnest it means he or she is serious and sincere, something that is not a desired trait in The Importance of Being Earnest. It can present as boringness, smugness, a sense of duty and other similar traits that were associated with the Victorian character. Being earnest is something that has to be avoided at all costs in the play, so it is quite interesting that the name Earnest is so popular with Gwendolen and Cecily.

To sum it all up, The Importance of Being Earnes is without a doubt one of the best plays of its time. The story, even though it is in parts predictable, is written to perfection. The dialogues are witty, entertaining and well thought out. After reading the book the wish arises in the reader to see it performed on stage, as Wilde intended his masterpiece to be experienced.



The Importance of Being Earnest
- A Trivial Comedy for Serious People

The Persons of the play:
John Worthing, J.P.; Algernon Moncrieff; Rev. Canon Chasuble, D.D.; Mr. Gribsby, Solicitor; Merriman, Butler; Lane, Manservant; Moulton, Gardener; Lady Bracknell; Hon. Gwendolen Fairfax; Cecily Cardew; Miss Prism, Governess

First perfomed:
London: ST. Jamess Theatre
February 14th, 1895

Besser als Erwartet!

Als ich das Buch bestellt habe, wusste ich nur, dass es zum Kanon gehört und stellte mich schon auf ein eher langatmiges Lesevergnügen ein. Nun weit gefehlt. The Importance of Being Earnest ist ein sehr kurzweiliges Lesevergnügen mit interessanten Wendungen. Viel Spass beim Genießen!!

Großartig!

Es scheint unmöglich, Oscar Wilde nicht zu lieben.
Er beweißt, daß Schreiben tatsächlich eine Kunst ist, und er ihr Meister.
The Importance of being Earnest ist unterhaltsam, klug und ziemlich böse - genau so wie man es von Wilde kennt.

The wittiest play ever written in the English language

"The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for Serious People" is one of the first plays written in English since the works of Shakespeare that celebrates the language itself. Oscar Wilde's comedy has one advantage over the classic comedies of the Bard in that "The Importance of Being Earnest" is as funny today as it was when it was first performed at the St. Jame's Theater in London on February 14, 1895. After all, enjoying Shakespeare requires checking the bottom for footnotes explaining the meaning of those dozens of words that Shakespeare makes up in any one of his plays. But Wilde's brilliant wit, his humor and social satire, remain intact even though he was a writer of the Victorian era.

Wilde believed in art for art's own sake, which explains why he emphasized beauty while his contemporaries were dealing with the problems of industrial England. "The Importance of Being Earnest" is set among the upper class, making fun of their excesses and absurdities while imbuing them with witty banter providing a constant stream of epigrams. The play's situation is simple in its unraveling complexity. Algernon Moncrieff is an upper-class English bachelor who is visited by his friend Jack Worthing, who is known as "Ernest." Jack has come to town to propose to Gwendolen Fairfax, the daugher of the imposing Lady Bracknell and Algy's first cousin. Jack has a ward named Cecily who lives in the country while Algernon has an imaginary friend named "Bunbury" whom he uses as an excuse to get out of social engagements.

Jack proposes to Gwendolen but has two problems. First, Gwendolen is wiling to agree because his name is Ernest, a name that "seems to inspire absolute confidence," but which, of course, is not his true Christian name. Second, Lady Bracknell objects to Jack as a suitor when she learns he was abandoned by his parents and found in a handbag in Victoria Station by Mr. Thomas Cardew. Meanwhile, Algernon heads off to the country to check out Cecily, to whom he introduces himself as being her guardian Jack's brother Ernest. This meets with Ceclily's approval because in her diary she has been writing about her engagement to a man named Ernest. Then things get really interesting.

Wilde proves once and for all time that the pun can indeed be elevated to a high art form. Throughout the entire play we have the double meaning of the word "earnest," almost to the level of a conceit, since many of the play's twists and turns deal with the efforts of Jack and Algernon to be "Ernest," by lying, only to discover that circumstances makes honest men of them in the end (and of the women for that matter as well). There is every reason to believe that Wilde was making a point about earnestness being a key ideal of Victorian culture and one worthy of being thoroughly and completely mocked. Granted, some of the puns are really bad, and the discussion of "Bunburying" is so bad it is stands alone in that regard, but there is a sense in which the bad ones only make the good ones so glorious and emphasize that Wilde is at his best while playing games with the English language.

But if Wilde's puns are the low road then his epigrams represent the heights of his genius, especially when they are used by the characters in an ironic vein (e.g., "It is very romantic to be in love. But there is nothing romantic about a definite proposal" and "I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance"). Jack is the male lead, but it is Algernon who represents the ideal Wilde character, who insists he is a rebel speaking out against the institutions of society, such as marriage, but with attacks that are so flamboyant and humorous that the cleverness of the humor ends up standing apart from the inherent point.

In the end, "The Importance of Being Earnest" is the wittiest play every written, in English or any other language, and I doubt that anything written in the future will come close. Wilde was essentially a stand-up comedian who managed to create a narrative in which he could get off dozens of classic one-liners given a high-class sheen by being labeled epigrams. Like a comedian he touches on several topics, from the aristocracy, marriage, and the literary world to English manners, women, love, religion, and anything else that came to his fertile mind. But because it is done with such a lighthearted tone that the barbs remain as timely today as they were at the end of the 19th-century and "The Importance of Being Earnest" will always be at the forefront of the plays of that time which will continue to be produced.

wrongly labeled, but still worth being bought

This book does not contain "some of Oscar Wilde's best known plays", but only "The Importance of Being Earnest". That's a substantial different!
But that single play is alone more than worth the small trifle it costs - It's really an excellent book, and very funny and amusing, with a very subtle kind of humour, in spite of its easily understandable vocabulary.