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The Importance Of Being Earnest By Oscar Wilde

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The Importance Of Being Earnest By Oscar Wilde
"The Importance of Being Earnest" was written by the famous Irish author, Oscar Wilde. The play represents Wildes late Victorian view of the aristocracy, marriage, wit, and social life during the early 1900's. His characters are typical Victorian snobs who are arrogant, overly proper, formal, and concerned with money. Wilde portrays the women on two separate levels, Cecily Cardew and Gwendolen Fairfax are young, sheltered, and without identity, while Lady Bracknell is the strong adult authority figure. There is no sense of identity for Cecily and Gwendolen; the only woman within the play who clearly stands out is Lady Bracknell. Cecily and Gwendolen lead a very hidden life. For examaple Miss Cardew lives in the Country and Miss Fairfax lives in the city, otherwise they are portrayed similarly by Wilde. The women are in their own way a bit ignorant, this can be said …show more content…
Lady Bracknell did not send her daughter to any educational institute. Gwendolen herself understands what her mother is trying to do to her a favour by not making her over-educated, it was simply thought that Victorian women were only meant to do the housework while their husbands were out working. However though Gwendolen recognises how her mother is helping her she still is not happy by the fact that her mother wont let her go forward and achieve greater things as she states earlier “I intend to develop in many ways”.Cecily is held back as well, but where she lives is not the reason. She resides in the country and even though an education is offered, she is not interested, "But I don't like German. It isn't at all a becoming language. I know perfectly well that I look quite plain after my German lesson." So Gwendolen doesn’t get a chance to learn so she cant discover new things. However Cecily has the chance to learn but doesn’t want to use
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