The Importance of Being Earnest: How Conflict Contributes to Humor - Essay Example

The play is a critique of Marriage, which is seen as a social tool. The class conflict within the Victorian society is clearly portrayed in this play. It is this conflict that elicits the humor that surrounds the manipulative desires connected to marriage. Both Gwendolen and Cecily are only interested in their partners since they believe that these men have disreputable backgrounds. The two ladies would like to marry someone named Earnest, a factor that portrays them as attracted to titles and not character.

However, these lovers’ motives are jeopardized by Lady Bracknell’s priorities. She upholds the Victorian tendency to see marriage as a financial contract. She does oppose Gwendolen’s marriage to Jack, since the young man is an orphan. She also snubs Cecily, an act that only stops when she finds out that Cecily is very wealthy. Lady Bracknell does not approve of her daughter’s marriage to Jack or “Earnest” because he was conceived in a bag, abandoned at a train depot. She finds it absurd for her daughter to be married to a poor orphan when there are a number of noble men around.

She tells Jack, “You are not down on my list of eligible young men” (Wilde, Act 3, 142). Here humor arises due to the author’s attempt to satirize and ridicule class conflicts within the Victorian society. . Wilde also satirizes the amount of importance put on holding a high status in the society. Lady Bracknell is a true crusader of this. She tells Algernon, “Never speak disrespectfully of society, Algernon. Only people who can’t get into it do that” (Wilde, Act 3, 179). She is so full of herself, especially when it comes to pointing out class differences, and this makes her comments to look not only ridiculous but also extremely humorous.

The characters’ confused sense of values also leads to conflict, which in turn elicits humor in the play. These confused values have prompted Wilde to employ humor to tone them down. All the actors speak in deadly earnest, and the audience only realizes after some time that these are just jokes. This makes the audience to somehow forgive the characters’ irresponsibility and indiscretions. Wilde uses any slight opportunity to entertain his audience with humor. He expressly achieves this aim by use of conflict in dialogues.

For instance, at a certain point he ridicules the over-politeness of the Victorian society. He does this with a disagreement between Jack and Algernon. They usually speak to each other with great politeness, even when they openly disagree. Jack politely requests Algernon to leave is house: “You are certainly not staying with me for a whole week as a guest or anything else. You have got to leave, by the four-five train,” and Algernon, equally courteously declines, “I certainly won’t leave you so long as you are in mourning.

It would be most unfriendly.” (Wilde, Act 2, 155). This is a strong satire to Victorian ideals, since Algernon has offended Jack by coming to his home in the country, but they still address each other with