Key Facts
full title · The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for
Serious People
author · Oscar Wilde
type of work · Play
genre · Social comedy; comedy of manners; satire; intellectual
farce
language · English
time and place written · Summer 1894 in
Worthing, England
date of first production · February 14, 1895.
In part because of Wilde's disgrace, the play was not published
until 1899.
publisher · L. Smithers
tone · Light, scintillating, effervescent, deceptively flippant
setting (time) · 1890s
setting (place) · London (Act I) and Hertfordshire, a rural county not
far from London (Acts II and III)
protagonist · John Worthing, known as “Ernest” by his friends in
town (i.e., London) and as “Jack” by his friends and relations in
the country
major conflict · Jack faces many obstacles to his romantic union with Gwendolen.
One obstacle is presented by Lady Bracknell, who objects to what
she refers to as Jack's “origins” (i.e. his inability to define
his family background). Another obstacle is Gwendolen's obsession
with the name “Ernest,” since she does not know Jack's real name.
rising action · Algernon discovers that Jack is leading a double life
and that he has a pretty young ward named Cecily. The revelation
of Jack's origins causes Lady Bracknell to forbid his union with Gwendolen.
Identifying himself as “Ernest,” Algernon visits Jack's house in
the country and falls in love with Cecily.
climax · Gwendolen and Cecily discover that both Jack and Algernon have
been lying to them and that neither is really named “Ernest.”
falling action · Miss Prism is revealed to be the governess who mistakenly abandoned
Jack as a baby and Jack is discovered to be Algernon's elder brother.
themes · The nature of marriage; the constraints of morality;
hypocrisy vs. inventiveness; the importance of not being “earnest”
motifs · Puns; inversion; death; the dandy
symbols · The double life; food; fiction and writing
foreshadowing · In stage comedy and domestic melodrama, foreshadowing
often takes the form of objects, ideas, or plot points whose very existence
in the play signals to the audience that they will come up again.
The fact that Jack was adopted as a baby, for instance, predicates
a recognition scene in which Jack's true identity is revealed and
the plot is resolved by means of some incredible coincidence. Miss
Prism's “three-volume novel” is another example: Her very mention
of it ensures that it will be important later. An instance of foreshadowing
that operates in the more usual way is Jack's assertion that Cecily
and Gwendolen will be “calling each other sister” within half an
hour of having met, followed by Algernon's that “[w]omen only do
that when they have called each other a lot of other things first.”
This is literally what happens between Cecily and Gwendolen in Act
II.
