“I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being good all the time. That would-be hypocrisy.” (Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest)
Jamie Lessells
Life in the 21st century has moved on from past events and stereotypes, and celebrities have never been more in the spotlight. Despite all this change, some ideas, attitudes and values constructed in The Importance of Being Earnest are still relevant in society today. Themes such as marriage and living double lives are strongly represented in Wilde’s play and will be talked about more in depth through this article. Oscar Wilde was a literary provocateur born in Dublin on the 16th of October 1854. Wilde wrote four plays, these included, Lady Windermere’s …show more content…
Characters like Jack and Algy prove this when they choose to change their names and live double lives to find happiness and ‘love’.
The whole plot of the play is about the importance of being Earnest, and this evolves around the two main male characters. In order to influence Gwendolen and Cecily of their love to Jack and Algernon, they both profess their name to be ‘Earnest’. For Jack this is when he is with Gwendolen in town, and for Algernon it is when he is out at Jack’s country house with Cecily. Living these double lives as Ernest creates the concept of ‘Bunburying’ as said in the play. Used as a means by which people escape from the stifling routine and responsibilities of a rigid society.
In the play both Cecily and Gwendolen speak about how their “ideal has always been to love someone of the name Ernest. There is something in that name that inspires absolute confidence” (Gwendolen, p.15). This clever use of language from Wilde depicts how the two women are acknowledging what a delightful name ‘Earnest’ is, whilst being unaware the name signifies ‘honesty’. This displays satire in that Jack and Algy’s living of double lives is ironically of an opposite view to the meaning of their
Jamie Lessells
Life in the 21st century has moved on from past events and stereotypes, and celebrities have never been more in the spotlight. Despite all this change, some ideas, attitudes and values constructed in The Importance of Being Earnest are still relevant in society today. Themes such as marriage and living double lives are strongly represented in Wilde’s play and will be talked about more in depth through this article. Oscar Wilde was a literary provocateur born in Dublin on the 16th of October 1854. Wilde wrote four plays, these included, Lady Windermere’s …show more content…
Characters like Jack and Algy prove this when they choose to change their names and live double lives to find happiness and ‘love’.
The whole plot of the play is about the importance of being Earnest, and this evolves around the two main male characters. In order to influence Gwendolen and Cecily of their love to Jack and Algernon, they both profess their name to be ‘Earnest’. For Jack this is when he is with Gwendolen in town, and for Algernon it is when he is out at Jack’s country house with Cecily. Living these double lives as Ernest creates the concept of ‘Bunburying’ as said in the play. Used as a means by which people escape from the stifling routine and responsibilities of a rigid society.
In the play both Cecily and Gwendolen speak about how their “ideal has always been to love someone of the name Ernest. There is something in that name that inspires absolute confidence” (Gwendolen, p.15). This clever use of language from Wilde depicts how the two women are acknowledging what a delightful name ‘Earnest’ is, whilst being unaware the name signifies ‘honesty’. This displays satire in that Jack and Algy’s living of double lives is ironically of an opposite view to the meaning of their