Ridiculing Victoran Society inrThe Important of Being...

In ‘The Important of Being Earnest’, Oscar Wildes ridiculing representation of Victorian Society comments on the ridiculous behavior of the Victorian Society’s inability to recognise the difference between important and unimportant issues. Therefore, Oscar Wilde subverts Victorian values to mock and imply triviality and superficiality. Wilde forces the audience to rethink the importance of their life and how they act while also scrutinizing the ignorance of the characters in upper class society through mocking their morals and obsessive fascinations. Wildes uses the inversion of what isn’t serious and what is to ridicule Victorian Society. Despite this, Wilde wanted to create something beautiful and superficial. Hence, it would be more†¦show more content†¦Arguably, another reason why everything in the play is presented as superficial and doesn’t need to be taken seriously is the character Lady Bracknell and her funny yet disturbing outburst of her judging Jack on whether he can marry Gwendolen. Lady Bracknell is a stereotypical Victorian woman whose utmost concern is outward appearance and societal impressions. The only important things in life are status and money, without which one is destined to become associated with the abhorrent lower class. Wilde satirises Lady Bracknell’s view of marriage to indicate how the society regard it to be nothing but social business. Lady Bracknell ‘looks in her pocket for notebook and pencil’ as she begins to interrogate Jack. She begins with ‘I feel bound to telling you that you are not down on my list of eligible young men’. This shows us she undertakes the role of an over-controlling mother and her immediate concern over him and Gwendolen getting married as she doesn’t believe him to be ‘good enough’. Lady Bracknell carries on by saying ‘to lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness†. This implies her total disregard for death and the prepared interrogation to which she makes Jack undergo are based on a set of suspicions about the nature and purpose of marriage. More often than not, these assumptions reflect the typical views of Victorian