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Excerpt from Act 1 Dialogue: Lady Bracknell and Jack Worthing

 

LADY BRACKNELL

Now to minor matters. Are your parents living?

JACK

I have lost both my parents.

LADY BRACKNELL

To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness. 

Read the full dialogue.
 

 

Understanding the Given Circumstances

  • Lady Bracknell has arrived for afternoon tea at her nephew Algernon Montcrieff’s apartment at Half Moon Street, West, an elegant neighborhood in Victorian London. Accompanying her is Gwendolen Fairfax, her only daughter, who is in love with Ernest Worthing, Algernon’s friend and guest at the tea.
  • Both women are unaware that the men have created alternate identities to engage in fun and avoid social obligations. “Ernest Worthing” is actually the fictitious younger brother of Jack Worthing, who becomes “Ernest” when in London. Algernon creates “Bunbury,” an imaginary invalid who provides his excuse to visit the country.
  • While Algernon and Lady Bracknell are in another room, Jack proposes to Gwendolen, who accepts. 
  • After Lady Bracknell learns of the proposal, she orders Gwendolen to wait in the carriage and proceeds to interrogate Jack on a number of topics regarding his suitability as a husband. Without Lady Bracknell’s approval, the marriage will not happen.

 

Blocking and Movement

In theater, blocking is the process of planning the actors’ physical movements and positions. Be sure to show respect and establish trust when working with scene partners. As you prepare to block this scene, ask yourself the following questions:

  • Wilde describes the room as luxuriously furnished with afternoon tea ready on a table. Besides two chairs or a sofa and chair, what furniture is necessary for this scene? Where is the door that leads outside?
  • Lady Bracknell has a small notebook and pencil. Are they in a pocket or a small handbag? What other hand props might Lady Bracknell use for emphasis? Does Jack have any props?
  • Where is Lady Bracknell when she begins her interrogation? Where is Jack?
  • Jack wants to make a good impression and responds honestly. Does he remain in place or move around the room? Does his physicality and line delivery display nervousness, thoughtfulness, or determination? How does this change during the scene? Does Jack keep his distance? Is there a point when he relaxes?
  • Jack describes Lady Bracknell as “a monster without being a myth, which is rather unfair.” Self-serving with an excessive concern for appearances, she considers herself to be the expert on social etiquette and morality. What is her physicality? Are her gestures forceful, reserved, condescending, or something else?
  • Until Lady Bracknell brings up parentage, Jack seems acceptable to her. Is she giving Jack one last chance, or does she come to a decision? How does this affect her attitude, speed of line delivery, and emphasis on keywords like “hand-bag?”

 

Historical Context

The British tradition of afternoon tea served as a perfect vehicle for The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde’s subversive comedy of frivolous pursuits and questionable manners. With the advent of the Industrial Revolution and the invention of gas lighting, working hours could extend beyond sunset. For the upper classes, this meant the gentlemen could meet in their clubs during the afternoon, as dinnertime started fashionably at 8 p.m. Meanwhile, women endured growling stomachs until dinner. In 1840, Anna Maria Russell, the Duchess of Bedford, decided snacks were in order. She requested an afternoon tea, with bread-and-butter sandwiches and cake, around 5 p.m. Other ladies of the Court joined her, and soon Queen Victoria adopted the custom, as did others throughout her kingdom.

Afternoon tea allowed women to share ideas, discuss politics, show off new fashions, and catch up on the latest gossip. Arranged with only a few days’ notice, afternoon tea provided women a socially acceptable way to entertain mixed company without their husbands present. A proper afternoon tea enforced strict etiquette with witty conversation as entertainment. With expensive teas, porcelain cups, silver teapots, and fine linens, it became a way of showing wealth, culture, and often ostentation. Against this backdrop of upper-class gentility, Lady Bracknell found her calling as the self-appointed arbiter of social propriety and taste.

 

Full Act 1 Dialogue: Lady Bracknell and Jack Worthing

 

LADY BRACKNELL

[Sitting down.] You can take a seat, Mr. Worthing.

[Looks in her pocket for note-book and pencil.]

JACK

Thank you, Lady Bracknell, I prefer standing.

LADY BRACKNELL

[Pencil and note-book in hand.] I feel bound to tell you that you are not down on my list of eligible young men, although I have the same list as the dear Duchess of Bolton has. We work together, in fact. However, I am quite ready to enter your name, should your answers be what a really affectionate mother requires. Do you smoke?

JACK

Well, yes, I must admit I smoke.

LADY BRACKNELL

I am glad to hear it. A man should always have an occupation of some kind. There are far too many idle men in London as it is. How old are you?

JACK

Twenty-nine. 

LADY BRACKNELL

A very good age to be married at. I have always been of opinion that a man who desires to get married should know either everything or nothing. Which do you know?

JACK

[After some hesitation.] I know nothing, Lady Bracknell.

LADY BRACKNELL

I am pleased to hear it. I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance. Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone. The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever. If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes, and probably lead to acts of violence in Grosvenor Square. What is your income?

JACK

Between seven and eight thousand a year.

LADY BRACKNELL

[Makes a note in her book.] In land, or in investments?

JACK

In investments, chiefly.

LADY BRACKNELL

That is satisfactory. What between the duties expected of one during one’s lifetime, and the duties exacted from one after one’s death, land has ceased to be either a profit or a pleasure. It gives one position, and prevents one from keeping it up. That’s all that can be said about land.

JACK

I have a country house with some land, of course, attached to it, about fifteen hundred acres, I believe; but I don’t depend on that for my real income. In fact, as far as I can make out, the poachers are the only people who make anything out of it.

LADY BRACKNELL

A country house! How many bedrooms? Well, that point can be cleared up afterwards. You have a town house, I hope? A girl with a simple, unspoiled nature, like Gwendolen, could hardly be expected to reside in the country.

JACK

Well, I own a house in Belgrave Square, but it is let by the year to Lady Bloxham. Of course, I can get it back whenever I like, at six months’ notice.

LADY BRACKNELL

Lady Bloxham? I don’t know her.

JACK

Oh, she goes about very little. She is a lady considerably advanced in years.

LADY BRACKNELL

Ah, nowadays that is no guarantee of respectability of character. What number in Belgrave Square?

JACK

149.

LADY BRACKNELL

[Shaking her head.] The unfashionable side. I thought there was something. However, that could easily be altered.

JACK

Do you mean the fashion, or the side?

LADY BRACKNELL

[Sternly.] Both, if necessary, I presume. What are your politics?

JACK

Well, I am afraid I really have none. I am a Liberal Unionist.

LADY BRACKNELL

Oh, they count as Tories. They dine with us. Or come in the evening, at any rate. Now to minor matters. Are your parents living?

JACK

I have lost both my parents.

LADY BRACKNELL

To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness. Who was your father? He was evidently a man of some wealth. Was he born in what the Radical papers call the purple of commerce, or did he rise from the ranks of the aristocracy?

JACK

I am afraid I really don’t know. The fact is, Lady Bracknell, I said I had lost my parents. It would be nearer the truth to say that my parents seem to have lost me . . . I don’t actually know who I am by birth. I was . . . well, I was found.

LADY BRACKNELL

Found!

JACK

The late Mr. Thomas Cardew, an old gentleman of a very charitable and kindly disposition, found me, and gave me the name of Worthing, because he happened to have a first-class ticket for Worthing in his pocket at the time. Worthing is a place in Sussex. It is a seaside resort.

LADY BRACKNELL

Where did the charitable gentleman who had a first-class ticket for this seaside resort find you?

JACK

[Gravely.] In a hand-bag.

LADY BRACKNELL

A hand-bag?

JACK

[Very seriously.] Yes, Lady Bracknell. I was in a hand-bag—a somewhat large, black leather hand-bag, with handles to it—an ordinary hand-bag in fact.

LADY BRACKNELL

In what locality did this Mr. James, or Thomas, Cardew come across this ordinary hand-bag?

JACK

In the cloak-room at Victoria Station. It was given to him in mistake for his own.

LADY BRACKNELL

The cloak-room at Victoria Station?

JACK

Yes. The Brighton line.

LADY BRACKNELL

The line is immaterial. Mr. Worthing, I confess I feel somewhat bewildered by what you have just told me. To be born, or at any rate bred, in a hand-bag, whether it had handles or not, seems to me to display a contempt for the ordinary decencies of family life that reminds one of the worst excesses of the French Revolution. And I presume you know what that unfortunate movement led to? As for the particular locality in which the hand-bag was found, a cloak-room at a railway station might serve to conceal a social indiscretion—has probably, indeed, been used for that purpose before now—but it could hardly be regarded as an assured basis for a recognised position in good society.

JACK

May I ask you then what you would advise me to do? I need hardly say I would do anything in the world to ensure Gwendolen’s happiness.

LADY BRACKNELL

I would strongly advise you, Mr. Worthing, to try and acquire some relations as soon as possible, and to make a definite effort to produce at any rate one parent, of either sex, before the season is quite over.

JACK

Well, I don’t see how I could possibly manage to do that. I can produce the hand-bag at any moment. It is in my dressing-room at home. I really think that should satisfy you, Lady Bracknell.

LADY BRACKNELL

Me, sir! What has it to do with me? You can hardly imagine that I and Lord Bracknell would dream of allowing our only daughter—a girl brought up with the utmost care—to marry into a cloak-room, and form an alliance with a parcel? Good morning, Mr. Worthing!

[Lady Bracknell sweeps out in majestic indignation.]

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