Empowered, Traditional Womanly Roles in Wildes The Importance of Being Earnest - Essay Example

May 11, Empowered, Traditional Womanly Roles in Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest Women of the nineteenth century may not enjoy the same civil rights and freedoms as women in the next century, but they did have their own influential roles in society. Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest is a comedic play about creating and protecting masculine and feminine identities. The power of naming and names is a central theme in identity making where women have particular significance, especially as both Gwendolen and Cecily desire the name Ernest for their husbands. Jack and Algernon also practice the power of naming by creating a second identity apart from their own, which Algernon calls “Bunburying.” Apart from naming others, women in the play also fulfill various traditional and non-traditional roles. Their traditional roles are based on notions of womanhood and their jobs as mothers and daughters. Their non-traditional roles, on the contrary, are also present in the play because of their need to gain power in society. The role of women in the play is to earnestly follow their traditional and nontraditional roles in society and families to protect their families’ interests and to advance their own personal aspirations for power and social relationships. Women’s traditional roles involve dutifully following gender roles and responsibilities to their families as daughters because they want to protect their family’s interests. Gwendolen and Cecily have their own stubbornness as individuals, but they still generally follow their mother and uncle, respectively, because they are their parents. Though already engaged to Jack, Gwendolen obeys her mother’s orders for her to go to the carriage because the latter wants to interview and disapprove Jack as a fiancé. Gwendolen says, “Yes, mamma,” like any dutiful daughter would (Wilde Act 1). Daughters have roles to their mothers, and that is to obey them even against their own desires. Cecily seems to be a bit more stubborn than Gwendolen in following her Uncle Jack. She does not like studying, in particular, and enjoys writing in her Diary and daydreaming more, so when it comes to studies, her main attitude is: “Horrid Political Economy! Horrid Geography! Horrid, horrid German!” (Wilde Act 2). She is not concerned of the ways of the world, but the ways of her mind, although that does not stop her from obeying Jack. She respects him as her uncle, which is as close as being a daughter to a father would have. These young women cannot betray one of the most important and first roles in their lives as women- the role of being a good daughter that is essential to the preservation of the basic unit of society, the family. Another traditional role of women in the play is to ensure that they are being obeyed as mothers because of their dedication to ensuring the success of their families and marriages. Lady Bracknell is the typical authoritarian mother who is in charge of her family’s welfare. She makes important decisions for her daughter, including whom she should marry. She does not want Gwendolen to be engaged on her own because it is an affair that “is hardly a matter that she could be allowed to arrange for herself” (Wilde Act 1). Even in private matters, mothers have a role in intervening and preserving the family’s interest. To ensure that her daughter is marrying an eligible bachelor, Lady Bracknell interviews Jack to assess his mental, emotions, and financial capabilities. She asserts that as “a really affectionate mother,” she deserves to know what kind of man her daughter is marrying (Wilde Act 1). She actually does the same interview for her nephew Algernon, when she asks about the financial status of Cecily. When she learns that Cecily has “a hundred and thirty thousand pounds in the Funds,” she immediately says, “Miss Cardew seems to me a most attractive young lady, now that I look at her” (Wilde Act 3). She does not say this because she is a materialistic mother alone, but because she knows that Algernon is in debt and will be better off with a rich wife (Wilde Act 3). In addition, Lady Bracknell also interferes with the social relations of his nephew. She hates Bunbury who is always meddling with Algy’s family responsibilities. She tells Algy: …it is high time that Mr. Bunbury made up his mind whether he was going to live or to die. This shilly-shallying with the question is absurd. Nor do I in any way approve of the modern sympathy with invalids. I consider it morbid. Illness of any kind is hardly a thing to be encouraged in others. Health is the primary duty of life. (Wilde Act 1). Lady Bracknell is quite hilarious in how she defends the importance of health, but she does want Bunbury to be a useful friend to Algy, not a detriment to his roles to his family. Lady Bracknell wants to be a good mother even to her nephew by intervening in his social relations. Women in the play serve traditional motherhood roles, especially regarding the marriage of their daughters and the welfare of other male members of the family. Apart from motherhood, women’s final traditional role is to preserve social institutions. Lady Bracknell sees it as her responsibility to find a good man for her daughter, a man who is aligned with social mores. When she asks Jack if he knows everything or nothing, she explains why she prefers ignorance over claims to complete knowledge: The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever. If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes, and probably lead to acts of violence in Grosvenor Square. (Wilde Act 1). She believes that it is better to be ignorant to preserve the status quo because knowledge breeds critical thinkers who can challenge and change it. Apart from this role, women also preserve the institution of marriage. Young women of this time are often conditioned to be future wives. Gwendolen accepts the proposal of marriage from Jack, mainly because she thinks that Ernest is “a divine name” that “has…music of its own” and “produces vibrations” (Wilde Act 1). She is quite prepared to be a wife to the man she desires to marry. The same also goes for Cecily. Cecily is a dreamy romantic. She has not even met Ernest yet but she is already engaged with him for three months. Cecily has a marriage ideal too, specifically, to be married to someone as wicked and interesting as Ernest, a name that “inspire[s] absolute confidence” (Wilde Act 2). Like Gwendolen, Cecily desires to marry in the name of love, a love that strengthens the institution of marriage. Moreover, the play suggests how these women contribute to society by changing how men think about life. Before, Algernon and Jack are only interested in Bunburying. Algernon creates Bunbury because he wants the freedom of a bachelor. He hates marriage and thinks that “[d]ivorces are made in heaven” (Wilde Act 1). His sentiments change, however, when he meets Cecily, and he decides immediately to marry her. Cecily seems to have transformed him to a man who is ready for marriage. Gwendolen also changes Jack from a Bunburyist to a man prepared for a long-term relationship. He tells Algy: “If I marry a charming girl like Gwendolen, and she is the only girl I ever saw in my life that I would marry, I certainly wont want to know Bunbury” (Wilde Act 1). Gwendolen and Cecily have that effect on Bunburyists that they are changed from being single men who are Bunburyists to men who will kill the Bunburys in their lives. Thus, women have traditional roles of ensuring the sanctity of marriage and families. Besides these traditional roles, women’s nontraditional role concerns establishing and imposing power over men and women alike. Women want to impose power on men through the act of naming. Gwendolen and Cecily cannot imagine marrying anyone else who does not have the name of Ernest. Gwendolen argues with Jack that Ernest is “a divine name” that “has…music of its own” and “produces vibrations” (Wilde Act 1). Cecily has the same sentiments about being married to Ernest whom she can give her “undivided attention” (Wilde Act 2). Naming for these women is not a trivial act, but an empowering process. Tony W. Garland argues that women in The Importance of Being Earnest want to name others to empower themselves. He cites Dale Spencer who explains that “names are essential for the construction of reality for without a name it is difficult to accept the existence of an object, an event, a feeling” (163 qtd. in Garland 272). The process of naming men for women enables them to construct reality according to their dreams and hopes. Gwendolen and Cecily desire the name Ernest because of the feelings it gives them, a sense of faithfulness and an assurance for a happy ending (Garland 272). Aside from these young girls, Lady Bracknell also imposes power on men through the naming process. Miss Prism tells Jack that Lady Bracknell is “the lady who can tell you who you really are” (Wilde Act 3). The effect is that Lady Bracknell holds the key to Jack’s identity, whether he will be accepted to their upper class society or not and whether he can marry her daughter or not. When Jack confirms that his father’s name is Ernest, and that his name is Ernest too because he is named after his father, Lady Bracknell says: “Yes, I remember now that the General was called Ernest, I knew I had some particular reason for disliking the name” (Wilde Act 3). As the matriarch, she shows power in the names to be validated or not. These are examples of how women gain power over men. Women also impose power on women through how they name or call them. Garland describes the naming game for Gwendolen and Cecily that starts from politeness and changes to courteous hatred. In the beginning, they call each other by their first names (Wilde Act 2). They are naming one another in the sweetest ways sisters can. Later on, upon knowing that they are engaged to the same Ernest, the tenderness becomes hatred. They become more formal in naming each other aside “Miss Fairfax” and “Miss Cardew.” Garland calls this as the attempt to “secure the other woman’s unmarried status” (273), since they want to marry the same man. Later on, when they realize that they have been deceived they tell each other: “My poor wounded Cecily!” and “My sweet wronged Gwendolen!” (Wilde Act 2). They have become sisters again because they share the same experiences. They now share equal power. Thus, women also have roles in interconnecting with other women through the process of naming. The women of The Importance of Being Earnest are generally sweet and romantic, like Gwendolen and Cecily, but also authoritarian, like Lady Bracknell. Their traits are products of their personalities and social roles and responsibilities in life as family members and society members. These women fulfill traditional and non-traditional roles that secure their feminine identities, as well as create space for more power over men and women. Motherhood is not only the powerful female position because attractive single women also have power over their fiancés. The happy ending of the play suggests the importance of women in society, as they try to preserve the social order, without necessarily losing their autonomy in their private lives. Works Cited Wilde, Oscar. The Importance of Being Earnest. 1895. Web. 4 May 2014.. Garland, Tony W. “The Contest of Naming Between Ladies in The Importance Of Being Earnest.” Explicator 70.4 (2012): 272-274. Web. 4 May 2014. Read More