COMEDY OF MANNERS: taking a particular part of society and uses humor to parody or satirize the behavior and mannerisms of its members.
The most significant dramatic convention in the play is the use of humor to satirize Victorian society. From the choices of food and the manner of eating food--whether it's cucumber sandwiches, butter and bread, or muffins; these upper class treats represent the shallowness of society. It seems absurd to have arguments over food, such as how one should consume or refrain from food, and whether bread and butter is more fashionable than cake, but to the characters, these are very serious issues. They all share the common character of hypocrisy, and as Lady Bracknell puts forth, it is the age of surfaces. It doesn't matter if you are "Ernest" or not earnest, as long as you appear to be socially fashionable and you convincingly tell lies, there is absolutely nothing wrong with not telling the truth.
"In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing."
This emphasis of style over sincerity shows that sincerity does not exist in the upper class society which arguably is due to the reinforcement of shallow ideals. It's preconceived in their minds that there are always hidden intentions and people never say what they mean because they never mean what they say. It is respectable to pursue marriage, but they satirize marriage as a loveless relationship and that it is absurd to give up pleasure for marriage. When they claim to uphold Victorian morals as an upper class individual, they speak immorally of other people and perceive educated people as inferior because they are a threat to the "natural ignorance" of the upper class.
Their mentality is for the most part logically flawed, but at the same time this complete disjunction between appearance and reality clearly explains their surface-oriented society. The part that I enjoy most about the play is that this social critique is masked behind seemingly lighthearted upper class drama, when Wilde is clearly mocking such prevalent hypocrisy.
I agree, the play was outrageously absurd and all the characters seemed off the wall. However, there clearly is some truth in many of the exaggerations. When Algernon claims how serious he is towards eating, we see how shallow that behaviour is. He cares so much about the way he eats muffins but cares nothing for marriage or morals. The Victorian upper class that Wilde portrays is hypocritical and ignorant of their own deeds. While it may be funny to read about, if someone was like that in real life, we wouldn't be able to laugh out loud but would rather lambaste them for their behaviour and thinking.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your analysis on comedy of manners. However, what you said about hypocrisy and how characters only aim at being earnest in a superficial way (want to be named Earnest rather than be sincere) made me realize why Wilde titled his play The Importance of Being Earnest. As no one in the play actually acted earnestly, the title alludes to the importance of being Earnest in the superficial way. The characters in the play want to be identified as Earnest without acting that way, meaning it was only important to be earnest on the surface. This all ties in with what you say how everyone in this play live in a surface-oriented society.
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