LITERARY GENIUS
Generally considered the best stage comedy of all time, The Importance of Being Earnest is a classic “comedy of manners,” a type of play that satirizes the mannerisms of a particular class. Typically, the dialogue in such a play is more important than the plot itself. Earnest is also considered Oscar Wilde’s best play. It opened in St. James’ Theatre in London on February 14, 1895 to a packed house, only a month after Wilde’s successful An Ideal Husband was first released. The play is masterful in its use of epigrams (short, witty sayings) and its satire of vaunted Victorian-era social customs, especially marriage.
        The play’s protagonist, Jack Worthing, is Wilde’s main satirical conduit. More than any other character, Jack ostensibly represents the conventional Victorian values of duty, honor, and respectability. In reality, Jack hypocritically flaunts these values through his alter-ego Ernest, a fictitious younger brother who engages in exactly the type of conduct Jack pretends to disdain. As the play progresses, Jack realizes he must embrace his alter-ego’s lifestyle (and his name), since the woman he wants to marry is fixated upon it. The name of the play is thus a play on words: the name Ernest implies its bearer is earnest, when in fact this is not always the case (thus reflecting Wilde’s views on the muddled values of Victorian society).
       Wilde described his play as “exquisitely trivial, a delicate bubble of fancy, and it has as its philosophy that we should treat all the trivial things of life seriously, and all the serious things of life with sincere and studied triviality.”

FROM THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST
by Oscar Wilde

FIRST ACT

Morning-room in Algernon’s flat in Half-Moon Street. The room is luxuriously and artistically furnished. The sound of a piano is heard in the adjoining room.

[Lane is arranging afternoon tea on the table, and after the music has ceased, Algernon enters.]

Algernon. Did you hear what I was playing, Lane?

Lane. I didn’t think it polite to listen, sir.

Algernon. I’m sorry for that, for your sake. I don’t play accurately—any one can play accurately—but I play with wonderful expression. As far as the piano is concerned, sentiment is my forte. I keep science for Life.

Lane. Yes, sir.

Algernon. And, speaking of the science of Life, have you got the cucumber sandwiches cut for Lady Bracknell?

Lane. Yes, sir. [Hands them on a salver.]

Algernon. [Inspects them, takes two, and sits down on the sofa.] Oh! . . . by the way, Lane, I see from your book that on Thursday night, when Lord Shoreman and Mr. Worthing were dining with me, eight bottles of champagne are entered as having been consumed.

Lane. Yes, sir; eight bottles and a pint.

Algernon. Why is it that at a bachelor’s establishment the servants invariably drink the champagne? I ask merely for information.