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oscar wilde's comedic devices importance earnest
Wilde use of humour in the importance of being earnest
how oscar wilde uses comedy to satirize the societal pressures and constraints present in victorian england.
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On “The Importance Of Being Earnest”, Act II lines 1324 to 1446 the sources of humor of these passage are the satirization of the Victorian era norms, violations against common sense, mockery of love and delusion. All of these humorous source are provided by the extravagant author Oscar Wilde in the short passage of 122 lines. Satirizing the Victorian era an example would be “But pray, Ernest, don’t stop. I delight in taking down from dictation. I have reached ‘absolute perfection’. You can go on.” This concept is humorous because in the Victorian era woman were not supposed to be conceived and act like the way Cecily is acting. Woman were supposed to be innocent, virtuous and biddable; Cecily seem to have some of her virtuous. As the quote had stated she enjoys the flattering remark from Algernon and asks for more her to infatuate her persona in her diary for the future publication of it. …show more content…
Hopelessly doesn’t seem to make much sense, does it?” Out of the four ridiculously extravagant and inappropriate forms of love when meeting a practical stranger, Cecily only worries about the hopelessness part. This violation of common sense is a hilarious one since the reasons for love come from a stranger who is 11 years older only known by tales without a previous encounter its ridiculous. Mockery of love source fits into this example as well. An extra Mock for the love source is the engagement, dated on “February 14” Valentine’s Day, all lovers Special day when presents are supposed to be given by that special someone and as portraying a late gift on February 15, engagement ring is
The idea of absurdity in Victorian times was embraced by some writers and looked down upon by others. Oscar Wilde embraced the absurd whole-heartedly. This is obvious, if not even the theme, of The Importance of Being Earnest. Not only is the word "absurd" used many times in the story, but the ridiculousness of the characters and their roles conveys the ideas of absurdity in the Victorian Era.
Wilde’s criticism on high society and manners are shown by creating absurd situations and characters whose lack of insight causes them to respond in an inappropriate manner. An example is shown in Lady Bracknell’s preoccupation with her own parties and that the lack of sympathy for invalids makes her react to the news of Bunbury’s illness in an exaggeratedly cold manner. “I think it is high time that Mr Bunbury made up his mind whether he was going to live or to die. I should be much obliged if you would ask Mr Bunbury, from me, to be kind enough not to have a relapse on Saturday, for I rely on you to arrange my music for me”. This quote conveys the audiences that Lady Bracknell is more concerned with the propriety of her music arrangements over the life and death struggles of Bunbury. As mentioned earlier, Lady Bracknell displays a great deal of pride and pretense through her sense of entitlement and by...
Irony in The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde The play The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde is full of irony. Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff, the protagonists in the play, get themselves into a complicated situation called Bunburyism (as Algernon refers to it). They pretend to be someone that they are not to escape their daily lives. They lie to the women they admire, and eventually the truth is revealed.
Oscar Wilde’s, “The Importance of Being Earnest”, play carefully uses satire as a didactic tool to mask the underlying social commentary with the help of comedy through characters theme and dialogue. Wilde uses satire to ridicule class and wealth, marriage and the ignorance of the Victorian Age. Audiences are continually amused by Wilde’s use of linguistic and comic devices such as double entendre, puns, paradox and epigrams, especially in the case of social commentary and didactic lessons. Characters portrayed in the play such as Jack, Cecily, Algernon and Lady Bracknell, allow Wilde to express his opinions on the social problems during the Victorian Age.
Humor Humor is when an object or phrase is considered funny or hilarious. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, one of the definitions of humor is, “something that is or is designed to be comical or amusing.” What people find funny differs because there are so many types of humors that can be expressed in different ways. Humor will often lead to laughter, but some people may find a subject amusing while others may find it offensive. It can be making a racial slur or even a Yo Mama joke.
According to Gazzaniga, Heatherton, and Halpern in Psychological Science, an effective to regulate emotion is through humor (430). Humor allows individuals to distance themselves from negative emotions and can strengthen social connections to others (Gazzaniga, Heatherton, and Halpern 431). In Native American communities, laughter and humor are often utilized to cope with stereotypes imposed upon Native Americans by non-Native people. Illustrations of this occurrence can be found throughout works by Native peoples, such as that by Sherman Alexie. These sources involve Native Americans embracing, rebelling against, and bringing attention to stereotypes about who they are and who the can be, all while using humor to cope with the emotions involved
Oscar Wilde stated, in relation to his play The Importance of Being Earnest that “We should treat all the trivial things of life seriously, and all the serious things of life with sincere and studied triviality.” This reflects the ideas behind the play and the way that Wilde presents his characters, and their actions throughout the course of the play. This philosophy influenced many important themes throughout the play, most notably the presentation of class, as well as Satire and Comic Pairings. Wilde’s presentation of the society he showcases in the play revolves largely around this philosophy of ‘Serious Triviality’, especially in the case of Lady Bracknell, the character that exemplifies Wilde’s philosophy of Serious Triviality in the Importance of Being Earnest.
The Importance of Being Earnest gets its comedic aspect from the ridiculous characters and how they view earnestness as opposed to ‘Ernestness”. For example the main struggle of the characters is that they are more concerned with the fact that they are Ernest, not that they are particularly earnest. In Oscar Wilde’s play, Jack and Algernon, the two men in the story, face the challenge of appearing Ernest and earnest in front of their love interests, both of whom only want to marry each of the men because their name is earnest. There are also funny characters such as Lady Bracknell who represents the flaws and the ‘un-earnestness’ in society at the time. Oscar Wilde did an excellent job writing this
The idea of humor is centralized around someone or something establishing an engaging observation or an understanding that produces amusement and joy to an audience. In the book Status Anxiety by Alain de Botton, the author notifies that the role of humor in society is to bring out hidden thoughts and messages that people can divulge and/or understand without the restraint from other people. I believe that de Botton's viewpoint of humor having a vital role in the function of society is true, because humor does rashly enable people to carelessly express and relate to messages and observations without the restriction of society on them, but also allows people more awareness of the presence of damage and destruction in a society by viewing humorists. Those around them are more likely to understand, through the usage of comical and amusing entertainment.
In many instances Algernon expresses how the reputation of a woman is important. It is important that women remain under the strict moral codes of the Victorian Era and the way in which Gwendolen presents herself through flirting with men in public is dishonourable. This theme provides the play with meaning about the importance of containing a good reputation within society during this period of history, in relation to women. Therefore, through the theme of respect and reputation presented in The Importance of Being Earnest it conveys how there is an underlying purpose and meaning to Oscar Wilde’s
In ‘The Important of Being Earnest’, Oscar Wilde's 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. Wilde's 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 accurate to say everything in the play is presented as superficial so perhaps there isn’t a message that needs to be taken seriously.
Depending on how the reader and author see it, humour can be interpreted in multiple ways. In both Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest and William Shakespeare’s As You Like It, different aspects of irony are implemented to create an entertaining story line. The use of dramatic irony portrays the characters in an irrational and humorous light, through the verbal exchanges among those with alter egos; foolish actions originating from adverse situations; and the implications of dramatic irony in love.
The Importance of Being Earnest appears to be a conventional 19th century farce. False identities, prohibited engagements, domineering mothers, lost children are typical of almost every farce. However, this is only on the surface in Wilde's play. His parody works at two levels- on the one hand he ridicules the manners of the high society and on the other he satirises the human condition in general. The characters in The Importance of Being Earnest assume false identities in order to achieve their goals but do not interfere with the others' lives. The double life led by Algernon, Jack, and Cecily (through her diary) is simply another means by which they liberate themselves from the repressive norms of society. They have the freedom to create themselves and use their double identities to give themselves the opportunity to show opposite sides of their characters. They mock every custom of the society and challenge its values. This creates not only the comic effect of the play but also makes the audience think of the serious things of life.
Everyone loves to be happy and enjoy life and humor allows us to smile and laugh, making us happy and letting us enjoy life. What's so funny? Taught me many new interesting things such as learning how many types and styles of humor there are. The book taught me how humor can be used and why we use and need humor. What's so funny? Also taught me that even “Medical science has established that laughter offers numerous health benefits” Schumacher, Julie A., editor. What's so Funny? page 9, Perfection Learning Corp., 2000. When I think about humor, I see a lot of people laughing and being happy. When you think of humor you usually imagine good things. Humor can obviously have a bad effect. It could be used at inappropriate times it can turn out
Humor and laughter can benefit every person's mental health. According to Melinda Smith and Jeanne Segal, who are the authors in the Help Guide Organization, " Laughter makes us feel good. And the good feeling that we get when we laugh remains with us even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps us keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss." They are right, laughter make us feel good even when the laughter subsides. The reason why it still feels good even when the laughter is gone is because our minds keep replaying the scenario over and over again so that our mind will be able to relax, reduce the stress and the tension that is in our mind and our body. They also said that humor helps us overlook