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‘A’ Level Literature exam hints

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By Dr Augustine Tirivangana

THE Importance of Being Earnest is often dubbed ‘a trivial comedy for serious people’.
It is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae in order to escape burdensome social obligations.
Working within the social conventions of late Victorian London, the play’s major themes are the ‘triviality’ with which it treats institutions as serious as marriage, and the resulting satire of Victorian ways.
Contemporary reviews all praised the play’s humour, though some were cautious about its explicit lack of social messages, while others foresaw the modern consensus that it was the culmination of Wilde’s artistic career so far.
Its high farce and witty dialogue have helped make The Importance of Being Earnest Wilde’s most enduringly popular play.
Synopsis
Act I is set in (1895) in London.
The play opens with Algernon Moncrieff, an idle young gentleman, receiving his best friend, John Worthing, whom he knows as Ernest. Ernest has come from the country to propose to Algernon’s cousin, Gwendolen Fairfax.
Algernon, however, refuses his consent until Ernest explains why his cigarette case bears the inscription, “From little Cecily, with her fondest love to her dear Uncle Jack.”
John-Ernest is forced to admit to living a double life. In the country, he assumes a serious attitude for the benefit of his young ward, the heiress Cecily Cardew, and goes by the name of John (or Jack), while pretending that he must worry about a wastrel younger brother named Ernest in London.
In the city, meanwhile, he assumes the identity of the libertine Ernest. Algernon confesses a similar deception: He pretends to have an invalid friend named Bunbury in the country, whom he can ‘visit’ whenever he wishes to avoid an unwelcome social obligation.
Jack refuses to tell Algernon the location of his country estate. Gwendolen and her formidable mother Lady Bracknell now call on Algernon.
As he distracts Lady Bracknell in another room, Jack proposes to Gwendolen.
She accepts, but seems to love him very largely for his professed name of Ernest.
Jack accordingly resolves to himself to be rechristened ‘Ernest’. Discovering them in this intimate exchange, Lady Bracknell interviews Jack as a prospective suitor.
Horrified to learn that he was adopted after being discovered as a baby in a handbag at Victoria Station, she refuses him and forbids further contact with her daughter.
Gwendolen, though, manages covertly to swear to him her undying love. As Jack gives her his address in the country, Algernon secretly notes it on the cuff of his sleeve: Jack’s revelation of his pretty and wealthy young ward has motivated his friend to meet her.
Act II moves to Jack’s country house, the Manor House in Woolton, Hertfordshire, where Cecily is found studying with her governess, Miss Prism.
Algernon arrives, pretending to be Ernest Worthing, and soon charms Cecily.
Long fascinated by Uncle Jack’s hitherto absent black sheep brother, she is predisposed to fall for Algernon in his role of Ernest—whose name she’s particularly fond of.
Therefore Algernon, too, plans for the rector, Dr. Chasuble, to rechristen him ‘Ernest’.
Jack, meanwhile, has decided to abandon his double life.
He arrives in full mourning and announces his brother’s death in Paris of a severe chill, a story undermined by Algernon’s presence in the guise of Ernest.
Gwendolen now enters, having run away from home.
During the temporary absence of the two men, she meets Cecily, and in their exchange each woman indignantly declares that she is the one engaged to ‘Ernest’.
When Jack and Algernon reappear, their deceptions are exposed.
Act III moves into the drawing room.
Arriving in pursuit of her daughter, Lady Bracknell is astonished to be told that Algernon and Cecily are engaged.
The size of Cecily’s trust fund soon dispels her initial doubts over the young lady’s suitability, but any engagement is forbidden by her guardian Jack: he will consent only if Lady Bracknell agrees to his own union with Gwendolen—something she declines to do.
The impasse is broken by the return of Miss Prism, whom Lady Bracknell recognises as the person who, 28-years earlier, as a family nursemaid, had taken a baby boy for a walk in a perambulator (baby carriage) and never returned.
Challenged, Miss Prism explains that she had abstractedly put the manuscript of a novel she was writing in the perambulator, and the baby in a handbag, which she had left at Victoria Station.
Jack produces the very same handbag, showing that he is the lost baby, the elder son of Lady Bracknell’s late sister, and thus indeed Algernon’s elder brother.
Having acquired such respectable relations, he is acceptable as a suitor for Gwendolen after all.
Gwendolen, though, still insists that she can only love a man named Ernest.
What is her fiancé’s real first name?
Lady Bracknell informs Jack that, as the first-born, he would have been named after his father, General Moncrieff.
Jack examines the army lists and discovers that his father’s name — and hence his own real name — was in fact Ernest.
Pretence was reality all along. As the happy couples embrace — Jack and Gwendolen, Algernon and Cecily, and even Dr Chasuble and Miss Prism — Lady Bracknell complains to her newfound relative: “My nephew, you seem to be displaying signs of triviality.”
“On the contrary, Aunt Augusta,” he replies, “I’ve now realised for the first time in my life the vital Importance of being Earnest.”
Style
The play is full of symbolism, imagery and allegory. The two imaginary people created by Jack and Algernon symbolize the empty promises or deceit of the Victorian era. Hence the name Earnest is anything but hollow. There is nothing honest in it. Thus the title is a corrective injunction, admonishing society “of the importance of being honest”. The setting too is important.
The two differing locales – the lavish London of the 19th century and an unspoiled countryside estate show readers a marked contrast.
The language is full of ‘witticism and humour’.
The Importance of Being Earnest is a drama because it’s a play.
It’s also a comedy, not only in the modern laugh-out-loud way, but also in the classical sense. We are made to laugh at every turn.
Wilde is an incredibly funny and witty writer.
His humor relies on creating absurd situations and characters whose lack of insight causes them to respond to impetuously and impulsively to different situations.
Even the title depends on a pun between the adjective ‘earnest’, meaning honest or sincere and the first name, ‘Ernest.’
(To be continued)

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