Oscar
Wilde,
“The importance of being Ernest”, comedy in three acts, 1895, London.
“The importance of being Ernest” is
a funny play about two young men who pretends get married with girls whose only
condition to it is doing with someone called Ernest. The two young men are Jack
and Algernon and the young girls are Gwendolen
and Cecily.
The
play happens into three different places in three acts:
-The first act is in the Algernon flat. It’s a luxurious
interior space where the characters are introduced.
-In
the second act, whose place is the garden at the Manor House,
some of the characters who didn’t know between them, are going to know and they
are going to be met themselves in a entanglement.
-Later,
in the third act, which happens in the drawing-room at the Manor
House, the entanglement will be explained.
The
characters belong to the English upper social class (Algernon:
pag.254: “good society”; Gwendolen:
pag.292: “It is obvious that our social
spheres have been widely different”; pag.293: “Cake is rarely seen at the best houses nowadays”.).
The
relationships between them are close however they don’t know between some of
them:
-Jack
( Mr. Worthing/ Ernest), Algernon’s fellow, is a serious man who is in
love with Gwendolen and who is the Cecily’s uncle.
-Gwendolen:
a smart young girl cousin of Algernon and daughter of Lady Bracknell.
-Lady
Bracknell: aunt of Algernon. She is an aristocratic, snobbish,
prejudiced woman.
-Algernon:
friend of Jack, Lady B’s nephew and Gwendolen’s cousin. He’s in love with
Cecily when he’s going to met her. He’s a joyful and unromantic man (255) and a
hardly serious enough (258). He’s always doing or saying things nonsense (256,
260, 269, 270, 273, 298).
-Cecily:
is a eighteen years old girl and she’s Mr. Worthing’s ward (290).
-Lane:
manservant in the Algernon’s house.
-Miss
Prism: Cecily’s governess (258).
-Merriman: Butler.
-Dr. Chasuble: Reverend.
The
play begins when Algernon is in his flat and he receives the visit of his
friend Jack. Algernon is waiting for his aunt Augusta (Lady Bracknell) and
Gwendolen.
Jack
wants to engage with Gwendolen however Algernon won’t give him his consent
unless Jack “clear up the whole question
of Cecily” (256).
Then
Jack explains Algernon that he’s her guardian and he explains him why he’s
Ernest in town and Jack in the country (Jack: pag.259: “I have always pretended to have a younger brother of the name of
Ernest”; pag.260: “If Gwendolen
accepts me,…I am going to get rid of Ernest”).
However, when Lady B. and Gwendolen arrive to the Algernon’s flat and
they are introduced, Gwendolen tells Jack that her “ideal has always been to love someone of the name of Ernest”
(263).
After that, Lady B. interviews Jack to consider him as boyfriend of her
daughter. Through Lady B., in this interview, we can see reflected an affluent
sector of the society and all kind of characteristic aspects of it
(pags.266-269: Lady B: “What is your
income?”; “In land, or in investments?”; Jack: “In investments, chiefly”; Lady B: “That is satisfactory”.
The
purpose of Jack hasn’t success because Lady B. considers “to be born….in a hand-bag…a contempt for the ordinary decencies of
family life…” (268).
Later, Algernon decides to go to know Cecily to the Manor House. There
Cecily is taking lessons from Miss Prism when Dr. Chasuble arrives. Then
Algernon also arrives and he’s announced by Merriman. Algernon is introduced
himself to Cecily as Ernest, the Jack’s brother. She tells him that they are
already engaged each other and that “it
had always been a girlish dream of mine to love some one whose name was Ernest”
(288).
Jack and Algernon talk with Dr. Chasuble to be christened with the name
of Ernest while Gwendolen and Cecily are introduced and they realize that both
are engaged with Ernest.
When
all of them are together, Miss Prism recognizes the bag that Jack shows her.
Jack discovers that his true name is Ernest John and he realizes “for
the first time in my life the vital Importance of Being Earnest”.
The
play is a comedy that shows us the double meaning of the name Ernst (Earnest)
through a funny entanglement with irony and light-hearted satire and dazzling
mood criticizing people who take themselves too seriously.
Oscar Wilde does it through the English upper class, which through Lady
Bracknell, appears in a odd and extravagant way.