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Enriched Classics offer readers accessible editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and commentary. Each book includes educational tools alongside the text, enabling students and readers alike to gain a deeper and more developed understanding of the writer and their work.
Wilde’s classic comedy of manners, The Importance of Being Earnest, a satire of Victorian social hypocrisy and considered Wilde’s greatest dramatic achievement, and his other popular plays—Lady Windermere’s Fan, An Ideal Husband, and Salome—challenged contemporary notions of sex and sensibility, class and cultural identity.
Enriched Classics enhance your engagement by introducing and explaining the historical and cultural significance of the work, the author’s personal history, and what impact this book had on subsequent scholarship. Each book includes discussion questions that help clarify and reinforce major themes and reading recommendations for further research.
Read with confidence.
- Sales Rank: #542858 in Books
- Brand: Simon & Schuster
- Published on: 2005-08-01
- Released on: 2005-08-01
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 6.75" h x 1.10" w x 4.19" l, .37 pounds
- Binding: Mass Market Paperback
- 400 pages
Features
Review
'the man had style and wit and was a great influence on the theatre of his time' Hamish Coghill, Evening News
About the Author
Oscar Wilde was born on October 16, 1854, to the Irish nationalist and writer “Speranza” Wilde and the doctor William Wilde. After graduating from Oxford in 1878, Wilde moved to London, where he became notorious for his sharp wit and flamboyant style of dress.
Though he was publishing plays and poems throughout the 1880s, it wasn’t until the late 1880s and early 1890s that his work started to be received positively. In 1895, Oscar Wilde was tried for homosexuality and was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison. Tragically, this downfall came at the height of his career, as his plays, An Ideal Husband and The Importance of Being Earnest, were playing to full houses in London. He was greatly weakened by the privations of prison life, and moved to Paris after his sentence. Wilde died in a hotel room, either of syphilis or complications from ear surgery, in Paris, on November 30, 1900.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
First Act
Scene—Morning-room of Lord Windermere’s house in Carlton House Terrace.Doors C. and R. Bureau with books and papers R. Sofa with small tea-table L. Window opening on to terrace L. Table R. (Lady Windermere is at table R., arranging roses in a blue bowl.) (Enter Parker.
Parker. Is your ladyship at home this afternoon?
Lady Windermere. Yes—who has called?
Parker. Lord Darlington, my lady.
Lady Windermere. (Hesitates for a moment.) Show him up—and I’m at home to any one who calls. Parker. Yes, my lady. (Exit C.
Lady Windermere. It’s best for me to see him before to-night. I’m glad he’s come. (Enter Parker C.
Parker. Lord Darlington. (Enter Lord Darlington C. (Exit Parker.
Lord Darlington. How do you do, Lady Windermere?
Lady Windermere. How do you do, Lord Darlington? No, I can’t shake hands with you. My hands are all wet with these roses. Aren’t they lovely? They came up from Selby this morning.
Lord Darlington. They are quite perfect. (Sees a fan lying on the table.) And what a wonderful fan! May I look at it?
Lady Windermere. Do. Pretty, isn’t it! It’s got my name on it, and everything. I have only just seen it myself. It’s my husband’s birthday present to me. You know to-day is my birthday?
Lord Darlington. No? Is it really?
Lady Windermere. Yes, I’m of age to-day. Quite an important day in my life, isn’t it? That is why I am giving this party to-night. Do sit down. (Still arranging flowers.)
Lord Darlington. (Sitting down.) I wish I had known it was your birthday, Lady Windermere. I would have covered the whole street in front of your house with flowers for you to walk on. They are made for you. (A short pause.)
Lady Windermere. Lord Darlington, you annoyed me last night at the Foreign Office. I am afraid you are going to annoy me again.
Lord Darlington. I, Lady Windermere? (Enter Parker and Footman C., with tray and tea things.
Lady Windermere. Put it there, Parker. That will do. (Wipes her hands with her pocket-handkerchief, goes to tea-table L., and sits down.) Won’t you come over, Lord Darlington? (Exit Parker C.
Lord Darlington. (Takes chair and goes across L.C.) I am quite miserable, Lady Windermere. You must tell me what I did. (Sits down at table L.)
Lady Windermere. Well, you kept paying me elaborate compliments the whole evening.
Lord Darlington. (Smiling.) Ah, now-a-days we are all of us so hard up, that the only pleasant things to pay are compliments. They’re the only things we can pay.
Lady Windermere. (Shaking her head.) No, I am talking very seriously. You mustn’t laugh, I am quite serious. I don’t like compliments, and I don’t see why a man should think he is pleasing a woman enormously when he says to her a whole heap of things that he doesn’t mean.
Lord Darlington. Ah, but I did mean them. (Takes tea which she offers him.)
Lady Windermere. (Gravely.) I hope not. I should be sorry to have to quarrel with you, Lord Darlington. I like you very much, you know that. But I shouldn’t like you at all if I thought you were what most other men are. Believe me, you are better than most other men, and I sometimes think you pretend to be worse.
Lord Darlington. We all have our little vanities, Lady Windermere.
Lady Windermere. Why do you make that your special one? (Still seated at table L.)
Lord Darlington. (Still seated L.C.) Oh, now-a-days so many conceited people go about Society6 pretending to be good, that I think it shows rather a sweet and modest disposition to pretend to be bad. Besides, there is this to be said. If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism.
Lady Windermere. Don’t you want the world to take you seriously then, Lord Darlington?
Lord Darlington. No, not the world. Who are the people the world takes seriously? All the dull people one can think of, from the Bishops down to the bores. I should like you to take me very seriously, Lady Windermere, you more than any one else in life.
Lady Windermere. Why—why me?
Lord Darlington. (After a slight hesitation.) Because I think we might be great friends. Let us be great friends. You may want a friend some day.
Lady Windermere. Why do you say that?
Lord Darlington. Oh!—we all want friends at times.
Lady Windermere. I think we’re very good friends already, Lord Darlington. We can always remain so as long as you don’t——
Lord Darlington. Don’t what?
Lady Windermere. Don’t spoil it by saying extravagant silly things to me. You think I am a Puritan, I suppose? Well, I have something of the Puritan in me. I was brought up like that. I am glad of it. My mother died when I was a mere child. I lived always with Lady Julia, my father’s elder sister you know. She was stern to me, but she taught me, what the world is forgetting, the difference that there is between what is right and what is wrong. She allowed of no compromise. I allow of none.
Lord Darlington. My dear Lady Windermere!
Lady Windermere. (Leaning back on the sofa.) You look on me as being behind the age.—Well, I am! I should be sorry to be on the same level as an age like this.
Lord Darlington. You think the age very bad?
Lady Windermere. Yes. Now-a-days people seem to look on life as a speculation.8 It is not a speculation. It is a sacrament. Its ideal is Love. Its purification is sacrifice.
Lord Darlington. (Smiling.) Oh, anything is better than being sacrificed!
Lady Windermere. (Leaning forward.) Don’t say that.
Lord Darlington. I do say it. I feel it—I know it. (Enter Parker C.
Parker. The men want to know if they are to put the carpets on the terrace for to-night, my lady?
Lady Windermere. You don’t think it will rain, Lord Darlington, do you?
Lord Darlington. I won’t hear of its raining on your birthday!
Lady Windermere. Tell them to do it at once, Parker. (Exit Parker C.
Lord Darlington. (Still seated.) Do you think then—of course I am only putting an imaginary instance—do you think that in the case of a young married couple, say about two years married, if the husband suddenly becomes the intimate friend of a woman of—well, more than doubtful character, is always calling upon her, lunching with her, and probably paying her bills—do you think that the wife should not console herself?
Lady Windermere. (Frowning.) Console herself?
Lord Darlington. Yes, I think she should—I think she has the right.
Lady Windermere. Because the husband is vile—should the wife be vile also?
Lord Darlington. Vileness is a terrible word, Lady Windermere.
Lady Windermere. It is a terrible thing, Lord Darlington.
Lord Darlington. Do you know I am afraid that good people do a great deal of harm in this world. Certainly the greatest harm they do is that they make badness of such extraordinary importance. It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious. I take the side of the charming, and you, Lady Windermere, can’t help belonging to them.
Lady Windermere. Now, Lord Darlington. (Rising and crossing R., front of him.) Don’t stir, I am merely going to finish my flowers. (Goes to table R.C.)
Lord Darlington. (Rising and moving chair.) And I must say I think you are very hard on modern life, Lady Windermere. Of course there is much against it, I admit. Most women, for instance, now-a-days, are rather mercenary.
Lady Windermere. Don’t talk about such people.
Lord Darlington. Well then, setting mercenary people aside, who, of course, are dreadful, do you think seriously that women who have committed what the world calls a fault should never be forgiven?
Lady Windermere. (Standing at table.) I think they should never be forgiven.
Lord Darlington. And men? Do you think that there should be the same laws for men as there are for women?
Lady Windermere. Certainly!
Lord Darlington. I think life too complex a thing to be settled by these hard and fast rules.
Lady Windermere. If we had “these hard and fast rules,” we should find life much more simple.
Lord Darlington. You allow of no exceptions?
Lady Windermere. None!
Lord Darlington. Ah, what a fascinating Puritan you are, Lady Windermere!
Lady Windermere. The adjective was unnecessary, Lord Darlington.
Lord Darlington. I couldn’t help it. I can resist everything except temptation.
Lady Windermere. You have the modern affectation of weakness.
Lord Darlington. (Looking at her.) It’s only an affectation, Lady Windermere. (Enter Parker C.
Parker. The Duchess of Berwick and Lady Agatha Carlisle. (Enter the Duchess of Berwick and Lady Agatha Carlisle C. (Exit Parker C.
Duchess of Berwick. (Coming down C., and shaking hands.) Dear Margaret, I am so pleased to see you. You remember Agatha, don’t you? (Crossing L.C.) How do you do, Lord Darlington? I won’t let you know my daughter, you are far too wicked.
Lord Darlington. Don’t say that, Duchess. As a wicked man I am a complete failure. Why, there are lots of people who say I have never really done anything wrong in the whole course of my life. Of course they only say it behind my back.
Duchess of Berwick. Isn’t he dreadful? Agatha, this is Lord Darlington. Mind you don’t believe a word he says. (Lord Darlington crosses R.C.) No, no tea, thank you, dear. (Crosses and sits on sofa.) We have just had tea at Lady Markby’s. Such bad tea, too. It was quite undrinkable. I wasn’t at all surprised. Her own son-in-law supplies it. Agatha is looking forward so much to your ball to-night, dear Margaret.
Lady Windermere. (Seated L.C.) Oh, you mustn’t think it is going to be a ball, Duchess. It is only a dance in honour of my birthday. A small and early.
Lord Darlington. (Standing L.C.) Very small, very early, and very select, Duchess.
Duchess of Berwick. (On sofa L.) Of course it’s going to be select. But we know that, dear Margaret, about your house. It is really one of the few houses in London where I can take Agatha, and where I feel perfectly secure about dear Berwick. I don’t know what society is coming to. The most dreadful people seem to go everywhere. They certainly come to my parties—the men get quite furious if one doesn’t ask them. Really, some one should make a stand against it.
Lady Windermere. I will, Duchess. I will have no one in my house about whom there is any scandal.
Most helpful customer reviews
117 of 120 people found the following review helpful.
Wilde's wittiest
By James Hiller
One thing happens when you read Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest"; you are amazed to remember that this play was authored over 100 years ago. For most plays of that era, the average reader tends to lose references and it tends to be stodgy and irrelevant. Not so Earnest, due to the brilliance and imagination of it's playwright.
The Importance of Being Earnest is a tour de force of comedy, misidentifications, and farce. Algernon and Jack are friends, and each has invented an imaginary person as an excuse of getting out of engagements. Jack's person is Ernest, a brother with a wild past. The two conspire to woo the ladies that they love, and through a series of happenstances, must gently deceive to get want they want. The end result is a play of uncomperable quality, chock full of witticisms that are highly quotable out of context. In fact, I dare suggest the entire play is quotable, such its brilliance.
Wilde pulled no punches when writing Earnest. Often, when a play is filled with memorable quotes, it takes away from the realism of the scenes because the characters then become merely conduits for the writer's intellect. Not so in Earnest. Wilde manages to make the characters say exactly what they would say in each situation, true to their persona. That alone is quite an accomplishment, one not often seen.
Misidentities, witty banter, love, all conspire to one of English's most brilliant comedies ever to have seen the stage. We should be so lucky the world had Oscar Wilde in it, and even more so, that he wrote at all.
60 of 65 people found the following review helpful.
The wittiest play ever written in the English language
By Lawrance Bernabo
"The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for Serious People" is one of the first plays written in English since the works of Shakespeare that celebrates the language itself. Oscar Wilde's comedy has one advantage over the classic comedies of the Bard in that "The Importance of Being Earnest" is as funny today as it was when it was first performed at the St. Jame's Theater in London on February 14, 1895. After all, enjoying Shakespeare requires checking the bottom for footnotes explaining the meaning of those dozens of words that Shakespeare makes up in any one of his plays. But Wilde's brilliant wit, his humor and social satire, remain intact even though he was a writer of the Victorian era.
Wilde believed in art for art's own sake, which explains why he emphasized beauty while his contemporaries were dealing with the problems of industrial England. "The Importance of Being Earnest" is set among the upper class, making fun of their excesses and absurdities while imbuing them with witty banter providing a constant stream of epigrams. The play's situation is simple in its unraveling complexity. Algernon Moncrieff is an upper-class English bachelor who is visited by his friend Jack Worthing, who is known as "Ernest." Jack has come to town to propose to Gwendolen Fairfax, the daugher of the imposing Lady Bracknell and Algy's first cousin. Jack has a ward named Cecily who lives in the country while Algernon has an imaginary friend named "Bunbury" whom he uses as an excuse to get out of social engagements.
Jack proposes to Gwendolen but has two problems. First, Gwendolen is wiling to agree because his name is Ernest, a name that "seems to inspire absolute confidence," but which, of course, is not his true Christian name. Second, Lady Bracknell objects to Jack as a suitor when she learns he was abandoned by his parents and found in a handbag in Victoria Station by Mr. Thomas Cardew. Meanwhile, Algernon heads off to the country to check out Cecily, to whom he introduces himself as being her guardian Jack's brother Ernest. This meets with Ceclily's approval because in her diary she has been writing about her engagement to a man named Ernest. Then things get really interesting.
Wilde proves once and for all time that the pun can indeed be elevated to a high art form. Throughout the entire play we have the double meaning of the word "earnest," almost to the level of a conceit, since many of the play's twists and turns deal with the efforts of Jack and Algernon to be "Ernest," by lying, only to discover that circumstances makes honest men of them in the end (and of the women for that matter as well). There is every reason to believe that Wilde was making a point about earnestness being a key ideal of Victorian culture and one worthy of being thoroughly and completely mocked. Granted, some of the puns are really bad, and the discussion of "Bunburying" is so bad it is stands alone in that regard, but there is a sense in which the bad ones only make the good ones so glorious and emphasize that Wilde is at his best while playing games with the English language.
But if Wilde's puns are the low road then his epigrams represent the heights of his genius, especially when they are used by the characters in an ironic vein (e.g., "It is very romantic to be in love. But there is nothing romantic about a definite proposal" and "I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance"). Jack is the male lead, but it is Algernon who represents the ideal Wilde character, who insists he is a rebel speaking out against the institutions of society, such as marriage, but with attacks that are so flamboyant and humorous that the cleverness of the humor ends up standing apart from the inherent point.
In the end, "The Importance of Being Earnest" is the wittiest play every written, in English or any other language, and I doubt that anything written in the future will come close. Wilde was essentially a stand-up comedian who managed to create a narrative in which he could get off dozens of classic one-liners given a high-class sheen by being labeled epigrams. Like a comedian he touches on several topics, from the aristocracy, marriage, and the literary world to English manners, women, love, religion, and anything else that came to his fertile mind. But because it is done with such a lighthearted tone that the barbs remain as timely today as they were at the end of the 19th-century and "The Importance of Being Earnest" will always be at the forefront of the plays of that time which will continue to be produced.
33 of 34 people found the following review helpful.
Stay away from Dover Thrift Version
By B Wo
The Dover Thrift edition is a highly abridged version. There are entire scenes and characters missing. And the ending is abruptly cut short. Spend the extra money on finding an edition with complete Oscar Wilde text.
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