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= = = Act II = = =
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The Garden of the Manor House , Woolton
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Cecily is 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 ( a name she , like Gwendolen , is apparently particul... |
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 .
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Gwendolen now enters , having run away from home . During the temporary absence of the two men , she meets Cecily , each woman indignantly declaring that she is the one engaged to " Ernest " . When Jack and Algernon reappear , their deceptions are exposed .
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= = = Act III = = =
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Morning @-@ Room at the Manor House , Woolton
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Arriving in pursuit of her daughter , Lady Bracknell is astonished to be told that Algernon and Cecily are engaged . The revelation of Cecily 's trust fund soon dispels Lady Bracknell 's initial doubts over the young lady 's suitability , but any engagement is forbidden by her guardian Jack : he will consent only if L... |
The impasse is broken by the return of Miss Prism , whom Lady Bracknell recognises as the person who , twenty @-@ eight 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 absentmindedly put the m... |
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 henc... |
= = Themes = =
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= = = Triviality = = =
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Arthur Ransome described The Importance ... as the most trivial of Wilde 's society plays , and the only one that produces " that peculiar exhilaration of the spirit by which we recognise the beautiful . " " It is " , he wrote , " precisely because it is consistently trivial that it is not ugly . " Ellmann says that T... |
= = = As a satire of society = = =
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The play repeatedly mocks Victorian traditions and social customs , marriage and the pursuit of love in particular . In Victorian times earnestness was considered to be the over @-@ riding societal value , originating in religious attempts to reform the lower classes , it spread to the upper ones too throughout the ce... |
Wilde managed both to engage with and to mock the genre , while providing social commentary and offering reform . The men follow traditional matrimonial rites , whereby suitors admit their weaknesses to their prospective brides , but the foibles they excuse are ridiculous , and the farce is built on an absurd confusio... |
JACK : Gwendolen , it is a terrible thing for a man to find out suddenly that all his life he has been speaking nothing but the truth . Can you forgive me ?
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GWENDOLEN : I can . For I feel that you are sure to change .
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In turn , both Gwendolen and Cecily have the ideal of marrying a man named Ernest , a popular and respected name at the time . Gwendolen , quite unlike her mother 's methodical analysis of John Worthing 's suitability as a husband , places her entire faith in a Christian name , declaring in Act I , " The only really s... |
Wilde embodied society 's rules and rituals artfully into Lady Bracknell : minute attention to the details of her style created a comic effect of assertion by restraint . In contrast to her encyclopaedic knowledge of the social distinctions of London 's street names , Jack 's obscure parentage is subtly evoked . He de... |
= = = Suggested homosexual subtext = = =
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It has been argued that the play 's themes of duplicity and ambivalence are inextricably bound up with Wilde 's homosexuality , and that the play exhibits a " flickering presence @-@ absence of … homosexual desire " . On re @-@ reading the play after his release from prison , Wilde said : " It was extraordinary readin... |
The use of the name Earnest may have been a homosexual in @-@ joke . In 1892 , three years before Wilde wrote the play , John Gambril Nicholson had published the book of pederastic poetry Love In Earnest . The sonnet Of Boys ' Names included the verse : " Though Frank may ring like silver bell / And Cecil softer music... |
Sir Donald Sinden , an actor who had met two of the play 's original cast ( Irene Vanbrugh and Allan Aynesworth ) , and Lord Alfred Douglas , wrote to The Times to dispute suggestions that " Earnest " held any sexual connotations :
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Although they had ample opportunity , at no time did any of them even hint that " Earnest " was a synonym for homosexual , or that " bunburying " may have implied homosexual sex . The first time I heard it mentioned was in the 1980s and I immediately consulted Sir John Gielgud whose own performance of Jack Worthing in... |
A number of theories have also been put forward to explain the derivation of Bunbury , and Bunburying , which are used in the play to imply a secretive double life . It may have derived from Henry Shirley Bunbury , a hypochondriacal acquaintance of Wilde 's youth . Another suggestion , put forward in 1913 by Aleister ... |
= = Dramatic analysis = =
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= = = Use of language = = =
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While Wilde had long been famous for dialogue and his use of language , Raby ( 1988 ) argues that he achieved a unity and mastery in Earnest that was unmatched in his other plays , except perhaps Salomé . While his earlier comedies suffer from an unevenness resulting from the thematic clash between the trivial and the... |
Lady Bracknell 's line , " A handbag ? " , has been called one of the most malleable in English drama , lending itself to interpretations ranging from incredulous or scandalised to baffled . Edith Evans , both on stage and in the 1952 film , delivered the line loudly in a mixture of horror , incredulity and condescens... |
= = = Characterisation = = =
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Though Wilde deployed characters that were by now familiar — the dandy lord , the overbearing matriarch , the woman with a past , the puritan young lady — his treatment is subtler than in his earlier comedies . Lady Bracknell , for instance , embodies respectable , upper @-@ class society , but Eltis notes how her dev... |
= = = Structure and genre = = =
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Ransome argues that Wilde freed himself by abandoning the melodrama , the basic structure which underlies his earlier social comedies , and basing the story entirely on the Earnest / Ernest verbal conceit . Now freed from " living up to any drama more serious than conversation " Wilde could now amuse himself to a full... |
The genre of the Importance of Being Earnest has been deeply debated by scholars and critics alike who have placed the play within a wide variety of genres ranging from parody to satire . In his critique of Wilde , Foster argues that the play creates a world where “ real values are inverted [ and ] , reason and unreas... |
= = Publication = =
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= = = First edition = = =
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Wilde 's two final comedies , An Ideal Husband and The Importance of Being Earnest , were still on stage in London at the time of his prosecution , and they were soon closed as the details of his case became public . After two years in prison with hard labour , Wilde went into exile in Paris , sick and depressed , his... |
On 19 October 2007 , a first edition ( number 349 of 1 @,@ 000 ) was discovered inside a handbag in an Oxfam shop in Nantwich , Cheshire . Staff were unable to trace the donor . It was sold for £ 650 .
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= = = In translation = = =
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The Importance of Being Earnest 's popularity has meant it has been translated into many languages , though the homophonous pun in the title ( " Ernest " , a masculine proper name , and " earnest " , the virtue of steadfastness and seriousness ) poses a special problem for translators . The easiest case of a suitable ... |
Four main strategies have been used by translators . The first leaves all characters ' names unchanged and in their original spelling : thus the name is respected and readers reminded of the original cultural setting , but the liveliness of the pun is lost . Eva Malagoli varied this source @-@ oriented approach by usi... |
= = Adaptations = =
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= = = Film = = =
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Apart from multiple " made @-@ for @-@ television " versions , The Importance of Being Earnest has been adapted for the English @-@ language cinema at least three times , first in 1952 by Anthony Asquith who adapted the screenplay and directed it . Michael Denison ( Algernon ) , Michael Redgrave ( Jack ) , Edith Evans... |
= = = Operas and musicals = = =
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In 1960 , Ernest in Love was staged Off @-@ Broadway . The Japanese all @-@ female musical theatre troupe Takarazuka Revue staged this musical in 2005 in two productions , one by Moon Troupe and the other one by Flower Troupe .
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In 1963 , Erik Chisholm composed an opera from the play , using Wilde 's text as the libretto .
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In 1964 , Gerd Natschinski composed the musical Mein Freund Bunbury based on the play , 1964 premiered at Metropol Theater Berlin .
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According to a study by Robert Tanitch , by 2002 there had been least eight adaptations of the play as a musical , though " never with conspicuous success " . The earliest such version was a 1927 American show entitled Oh Earnest . The journalist Mark Bostridge comments , " The libretto of a 1957 musical adaptation , ... |
Gerald Barry created the 2011 opera , The Importance of Being Earnest , commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Barbican Centre in London . It was premiered in Los Angeles in 2011 . The stage premiere was given by the Opéra national de Lorraine in Nancy , France in 2013 .
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= = = Radio and television = = =
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There have been many radio versions of the play . In 1925 the BBC broadcast an adaptation with Hesketh Pearson as Jack Worthing . Further broadcasts of the play followed in 1927 and 1936 . In 1977 , BBC Radio 4 broadcast the four @-@ act version of the play , with Fabia Drake as Lady Bracknell , Richard Pasco as Jack ... |
To commemorate the centenary of the first performance of the play , Radio 4 broadcast a new adaptation on 13 February 1995 ; directed by Glyn Dearman , it featured Judi Dench as Lady Bracknell , Michael Hordern as Lane , Michael Sheen as Jack Worthing , Martin Clunes as Algernon Moncrieff , John Moffatt as Canon Chasu... |
On 13 December 2000 , BBC Radio 3 broadcast a new adaptation directed by Howard Davies starring Geraldine McEwan as Lady Bracknell , Simon Russell Beale as Jack Worthing , Julian Wadham as Algernon Moncrieff , Geoffrey Palmer as Canon Chasuble , Celia Imrie as Miss Prism , Victoria Hamilton as Gwendolen and Emma Field... |
A 1964 commercial television adaptation starred Ian Carmichael , Patrick Macnee , Susannah York , Fenella Fielding , Pamela Brown and Irene Handl .
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BBC television transmissions of the play have included a 1974 Play of the Month version starring Coral Browne as Lady Bracknell with Michael Jayston , Julian Holloway , Gemma Jones and Celia Bannerman . Stuart Burge directed another adaptation in 1986 with a cast including Gemma Jones , Alec McCowen , Paul McGann and ... |
It was adapted for Australian TV in 1957 .
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= = = Commercial recordings = = =
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Gielgud 's performance is preserved on an EMI audio recording dating from 1952 , which also captures Edith Evans 's Lady Bracknell . The cast also includes Roland Culver ( Algy ) , Jean Cadell ( Miss Prism ) , Pamela Brown ( Gwendolen ) and Celia Johnson ( Cecily ) .
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Other audio recordings include a " Theatre Masterworks " version from 1953 , directed and narrated by Margaret Webster , with a cast including Maurice Evans , Lucile Watson and Mildred Natwick ; a 1989 version by California Artists Radio Theatre , featuring Dan O 'Herlihy Jeanette Nolan , Les Tremayne and Richard Erdm... |
= Lloyd Mathews =
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