In the play 'The Importance of Being Earnest", Oscar Wilde Presents a Society That is Far from 'Earnest'

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In the play ‘The Importance of Being Earnest”, Oscar Wilde Presents a Society That is Far from ‘E(a)rnest'

As people learn to ‘Bunbury’ more and more they find that life becomes easier to live with so long as they remember the untruth that makes up their alter-egos. The infamous ‘Bunbury’ is utilised for the least selfish of charitable purposes; he saves the feelings of the arrogant and improves the diet and social life of all of his friends. As he lies on his death bed, he is a true friend who has the good grace to fall ill at your whim and the good humour not to join you at the Savoy for a steak dinner (or expect you at his house when you profess a desire to visit to your aunt). No, all he asks is for you to remember him and change how he is feeling (unlike some people you won’t have a nasty shock about your being his namesake) when it suits you… you wouldn’t want to miss your chance to DJ a proper Victorian get together would you? Or people might not listen to your tales of cucumbers and ‘ready money’.

Lane seems to be one of the more interesting cameos in the play, he will back his master trough any lie or misfortune as long as he still receives his wage — you never get the impression that he would not leave his master if ‘Agly’ fell completely from the good graces of Lady Bracknell and into the dreaded disrepute of poor health becoming unable to provide wage. Lane will rarely inflect emotion upon his voice but seems still to be an uncomfortable butler as he is susceptible to a vocal trap laid by his effervescent master upon his life aside from butler-ing: he begins to regale (after being asked) a minute chunk of his own experience and is cut short by the snarky remark ‘I don’t know that I am much interested in your family life, Lane.’ Lane’s glib response is to agree half-heartedly with his employer. While the emotion in his language is not conveyed to the reader, a dramatised version of the play will commonly depict Lane fuming in silence over the comment — the play only shows him dishonest about his feelings and continuing to aid his master’s every whim in an emotionless mask of the common house servant.

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The theme of lies and deception which so perpetuates itself in Wilde’s greater works is present also in the way that the two young lovers at the start of our story undermine Lady Bracknell with the purity and innocence of young lovers as they blow kisses behind her back, she pretends not to notice this most embarrassing display of affectation ordering Gwendolen ‘To The Carriage!’ instead. Her concerns about the eligible bachelor are far from those of a modern mother: she is more concerned that the town house is on the ‘unfashionable’ side of Grosvenor square (at the time a UK ...

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