Mina Repice | January 24, 2024
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You’re going to have to hear me out on this one.
I hate Victorian-era writing just as much as the next person, but when I tell you that the play, The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde shocked me to my core, I mean it!
No, despite the misleading name, this great piece of writing was not a drag in the mud lecture about honesty. When I picked up this short (and I mean, delightfully short) book, I really had expectations to be bored out of my mind. Yet, after a couple of pages into the first act (and skipping the 70 pages of introduction to the play in my copy), I was hooked. The book did not leave my hands for the next hour or two;
I read through dinner,
I read in my living room,
I read on my dining room floor,
I read in my bed,
and yes, I read on the toilet.
I really didn’t think that an author born in the year 1854 would have it in him to be funny, but I was truly so wrong. The writing is so lively and witty I found myself (embarrassingly) laughing aloud as I read. It is so tough to get humor across in a genuine way in written form, yet Wilde seems to have mastered it in this very play.
The concept of the play is as follows:
Two bored and wealthy men, Algernon Moncrieff and Jack Worthing, both happen to assume the identity of a fully imaginary man named Ernest, which becomes a sticky situation when both find themselves falling in love with separate women under the same title. So yes, “The Importance of Being Earnest” is both referring both to their dishonesty and actual shared fake name.
I would be remiss to not mention the incredible analytic, satirical stance that Wilde takes on Victorian society in this book, but I know some may find this to be the boring part. Society at the time of “The Importance of Being Earnest” was strict and its customs were, especially in the wealthier “leisure” class, bizarre, and the play does an excellent job at really highlighting the “bizarre” part. The characters in this play are absolutely ridiculous (and self-obsessed) with great lines such as:
“I am sick to death of cleverness. Everybody is clever nowadays.”
“Never speak disrespectfully of Society, Algernon. Only people who can’t get into it do that.”
And don’t forget this real kicker:
“Divorces are made in Heaven.”
Please do not let this classic scare you off; it’s a light read that can be picked up to cheer you up time after time. The writing holds up perfectly today: not too stuffy yet just old-fashioned enough to send you to the world of the Victorians while reading. Plays don’t tend to be my cup of tea, but this made me rethink that opinion! Seriously, whether you avidly read plays akin to this one, love modern fiction and romances, or only read for school (if at all), pick this book up. You won’t regret it; it’s goofy and playful in all the right ways.
My only warning: don’t read somewhere you would be embarrassed to be caught rolling on the floor laughing.
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