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Comic Dramatisation of Double Identities in Oscar Wilde’s Importance of Being Earnest

Tenoch Yakecan
13 min readNov 20, 2020

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Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde, published in 1895. A farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictions personae to escape their tiresome lives and struggle as their own stories become tangled in a tale of deception and disguise. Set in 1890s England, the late Victorian era, strong religious drive for higher moral standards prevailed, along with strict social hierarchy, that was highly classist and oppressive.

The double lives are led by Algernon Moncrieff and Jack Worthing, that are known as Ernest either in London or Hertfordshire. The personae, created by these characters are just the means found by them to be liberated from the repressive norms of society, in order to attain the freedom to create and opportunity to show different facets of themselves. Algernon calls the act of not being earnest Bunburying, giving the plot a moral significance, making Bunburying the reason for all the mistaken identities. In the play, Algernon invents a chronic invalid friend named ‘Bunbury’ whom he “visits” in the country whenever he wants to skip out of social responsibilities. The definition of Bunbury is passing oneself off as a fictional character in order to engage in behavior that escapes the restrictive social norms and that could be detrimental to one’s reputation, bunburyism can be a way of life that offers options beyond the conventional. Algernon says to Jack; “Well, one must be serious about something, if one wants to have any amusement in life. I happen to be serious about Bunburying. What on earth are you serious about I haven’t got the remotest idea. About everything, I should fancy. You have absolutely trivial nature.” (p.99,Wilde). Algernon is serious about Bunburying as the Bunburyist is serious about not being serious, the trifle that to be serious about everything is to be serious about nothing. The Bunburyist lives in a world of irresponsibility in which there is always a danger of moral anarchy. Wilde thought that Victorians who wanted to retain the respect of the conventional society lead a double-life, being one respectable and one frivolous. The characters seem to live in a world where order is constantly vanishing and they search for stability. As Algernon says; “The truth is rarely pure and never simple.” (p.17, Wilde). Jack and Algernon fulfill their wishes by means of lying, using the alter-egos to free themselves from the hypocrisy of convention, adopting identities that suit a particular occasion, e.g. they invent lovers they want to marry (Cecily) or adequate themselves to be the ideal lovers’ others want to marry (Jack and Algernon, make appointments with Rev.Chasuble to change their names to Ernest). The characters’ fantasies are brought to life at the end of the play, creating a space for the them to live out fantasies and alternate identities as Jack turns out to be Ernest and he does have a scandalous, black-sheep archetype of a brother. Causing the double lives to not be hypocrisy, and allowing them to mock the laws and the customs of the time. The characters challenge society’s values and free themselves from rigid norms so that at the end of the play they manage to regain balance and become earnest.

However, the aspect of ‘Bunbury’ extends further on the play beyond the two main characters as Gwendolen and Cecily have secret lives. Gwendolen, the sophisticated city lady, leads a ‘double life’ in the sense that she pretends to go to a lecture but instead runs away to see Ernest in the country, she has two facets, one when her mother is around and the other when she is not. Cecily Cardew lives a ‘double life’ in her diary where she invents a romance and even engagements to Jack’s wicked brother, Ernest, and the diary becomes her fantasy world. Even the seemingly impeccable Lane, Algernon’s manservant, turns out to have led a double life when he lets it slip that he has been married. Revealing that the upper class is not the only forced to lead a double life; the entire society seems to be constrained by the same device. Making the theme of dualism evident in the play.

Victorian morality was based on colonial and imperialistic ideas. The assumption of the ruling class being privileged due to their superiority, was very prominent as it was thought for them to be implicitly good and the others are ruled over due to their inferiority and were considered accordingly bad, creating a very oppressive sense of morality. Hence, to escape the repression, all the characters are compelled to lead a double life or invent an alter-ego. The duplicity of the characters, their fluid identities, becomes a satire over Victorian behavior as well as a more truthful description of what a human being is (flawed).

The Importance of Being Earnest is also constructed around many ironies as Jack Worthing is presented as standing for all the Victorian values of morality: duty, honor, and respectability; “When one is placed in the position of guardian, one has to adopt a very high moral tone on all subjects. It’s one’s duty to do so.” (p.17, Wilde). However, he pretends to have an irresponsible brother, named Ernest, who lives a scandalous life and always gets in trouble, requiring Jack to rush off to his assistance: thereby, Jack can disappear for days and do so as he likes, and live the life that he pretends to disapprove of. He thus uses Ernest, his alter-ego, both an excuse and disguise to keep his honorable image intact. Algernon Moncrieff, on the other hand, has no moral convictions other than to live beautifully. To be able to escape dull social obligations, he employs Bunbury as an alibi and Ernest as a double character in order to improve his prospects, as a Bunburyist he is serious about not being serious, leading him to be serious about nothing. Lady Bracknell sets herself up as a guardian of the morality of the society, always implying that she is the only reliable source of taste and probity. Paradoxically, she is found to be a social climber and not an aristocrat at all: “When I married Lord Bracknell I had no fortune of any kind. But I never dreamed for a moment of allowing that to stand in my way” ( p.116, Wilde).

Algernon Moncrieff is the charming, idle, selfish, witty dandy of the play and Wilde’s alter-ego. Being clearly a character who has been forced into a closeted existence, as evidenced by his imprudent lifestyle with addictive eating and drinking. As the main theme of the play being living a double life and duality, it would make sense for Algernon to be bisexual. He is drawn to Cecily as she is the embodiment of innocence, beauty and a way out of his own troubled life. The theory behind Algernon’s sexuality can be proved as, beneath the surface, Wilde’s play is permeated with allusions to the gay culture of the time. Those being:

Ernest vs. Earnest

Significance: The plays’ title in which the “earnest” is spelled with an a, plays with the word’s double function as both a name and an adjective. To describe a person as “earnest” means they are genuine and sincere, so the title of Wilde’s play could be interpreted as “ the importance of being your authentic self”.

Cecily

Significance: Cecily is the ingenue, earnest girl that is pursued by Algernon, the character thought to be Wilde’s stand-in. In Victorian England, however, ‘Cecily’ was slang for a young male prostitute.

Bunbury

Significance: When Algernon gets to know about Jack’s double life he says: “ I may mention that I have always suspected you of being a confirmed Bunburyist; and I am quite sure of it now” (p.15 Wilde). Bunburying also has strong connotations with a homoerotic undertone, being a double pun for sodomy. With its definition being passing oneself off as another in order to engage in behavior that could be detrimental to one’s reputation. Therefore, giving a different perspective on the trips made by the two characters as it’s evident that these trips were for pleasure/leisure.

Cucumber Sandwiches

Significance: the eating of cucumber sandwiches becomes a visual joke running through much of the play’s first act. They are a traditional stable of fancy teas. A mainstream Victorian audience, would not pick up the reference. As cucumbers have a phallic shape and their association with “ready money” on the play, makes the double-meaning even more suggestive. Though cucumber sandwiches are prepared for the women in the play, Lady Bracknell specifically requested them, they are consumed exclusively by Algernon.

As an oppressed minority, gay Victorians used a colloquialism to communicate privately with one another, using a “language” unheard by members of mainstream society. In the hands of Wilde, these colloquialisms and even allusions to gay culture were used to undermine traditional notions of the time and its important institutions such as marriage. “ Most scholars believe Wilde was writing for two audiences: and upper-middle-class heterosexual audience and members of an underground gay audience who were about their sexuality” (Director. Joseph W. Ritsch for The Baltimore Sun)

In the play, we can spot subtle details that are linked to the gay community and lifestyle. As in early drafts of the play, Jack’s calling card read that he lives at E4, The Albany, which in reality, was the address of Wilde’s friend, George Ives, founder of the secret homosexual society, The Order of Chaeronea. The name Ernest as a result of the poet John Gambril Nicholson publishing a collection of poems in 1892 entitled “Love in Ernest”, referencing his male lover, therefore, the allusion to the same-sex love is present in Wilde’s play. The plot point of an inscribed cigarette case, in the play, Jack has one from Cecily that sets off the whole narrative when Algernon discovers that Jack’s name is not Ernest, as he has led others to believe. Wilde used to give inscribed cigarette cases to young men he was fond of and would later be questioned about this while on trial. The whole concept of Bunburying is of obvious relevance to homosexuals living in Victorian Britain since they could be trailed and jailed for “gross indecency”. Making, then the concept of Bunbury to not only meaning the pursuit of secret surreptitious pleasures but also suggests a form of behavior or way of life, undertaken with flagrant and self-conscious disregard for social rules and conventions.

By the time that The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) was written, Oscar Wilde had become one of the most flamboyant as well as notorious figures in English literary, theatrical, and social life. A self-professed “dandy”, he made his daily practice to assert the ‘absolute modernity of beauty’. Wilde enjoyed provoking conservative Victorians with his appearance and generally outlandish, irreverent public behavior that was perceived as highly effeminate. Being eager to associate himself with high, fashionable society his practice of cultivating and privileging the beautiful, both in art and life, was a serious expression of his philosophy of aestheticism. Wilde’s effort to gain the favor of the society that he also frequently mocked and criticized was a result of his ambivalent background. Being born in Ireland, where his Protestant father was disgraced by a sex scandal, Wilde came to England as an outsider. His uneasy relationship with his parents and his non-English status can be detected in Jack’s identity crisis, as towards the end of the play he asks “Would you kindly inform me who I am?” (p.130,Wilde) and the satiric taunts to British Imperialism leading him to be considered a ‘conformist rebel’. Wilde’s ostentatious posturing and outrageous part of his non-conformist behavior showed the world that he approached life itself as a show. The same can be spotted in the play, when Jack and Algernon go ‘Bunburying’ under the name of Ernest, treating life as a game of make-believe. By May 1985, Wilde had crashed from the peak of success he had achieved only a few months the earlier, when both of his plays, The Importance of Being Earnest and Ideal Husband, were running as box-office hits in London’s West End. He would then, collapse by being sentenced to two years of hard labor in prison, for his homosexual relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas and other young men in London. Those so considered “serious”, from ‘a trivial comedy for serious people’, were late Victorians whom Wilde had both ridiculed and entertained and now were turning against him, shattering his career while proving their own intolerance, giving Wilde a disgraced name.

The Importance of Being Earnest shows the struggle of people who feel the need to live a double life by the fear of not being accepted in their own environment due to their sexuality. Using fictional characters in order to hide their true personalities, the men at the time were expected to act elegant, restful, and gallantly complacent to the conventional behavior in their homes, however, when Bunburying they wouldn’t have to oblige to those expectations. The characters struggle through life, switching between their two identities due to the difficulty of someone behaving in an entirely proper manner, whilst feeling comfortable in displaying their personality and true essence. Camouflaging sexuality can cause a strong notion of hiding one’s true identity. This can be brought back to Wilde’s own life, as in the Victorian Era there were legislative prohibitions against homosexuality, which made it impossible for non-hereto-conforming people to come forward about their sexual orientations. Therefore, homosexuals in this age would keep a double life. Being that, what Wilde tried to do, by using his marriage to Constance Mary Lloyd as a cover of his sexuality. Which is also is reflected in the play as Jack and Algernon engage in the dandyish dating of females as a cover-up for the pursuit of Bunburying. The play portrays a person’s true struggle with their sexuality and the difficulties that may come with it, not only in a time more than a hundred years ago but still in the present. Both current and Victorian society with prejudices and conventions kept and still keep non-heterosexual-conforming people from being themselves openly. The play displays that the fear of coming out, being yourself, and telling the truth about your identity in these prejudicial societies .

One of Wilde’s most memorable lines was “For he who lives more lives than one more deaths than one must die”, aptly applicable to himself, Jack and Algernon with their multiple private and public identities, as the mask they used is unveiled they lose their alter-ego but being the same exposed to one’s public life, as happened to Wilde. He didn’t only lost the privilege to go out “Bunburying”, but also lost so much in his other public facet, affecting his professional life. Wilde would, therefore, directly experience proof of his own insight “ there is not a single real poet or prose-writer of this century, for instance, on whom the British public have not solemnly conferred diplomas of immorality”. As, in comparison to Wilde other famous writers would have their lives and art surrounded by their non-hereto-conforming practices, such as Virginia Wolf in her novel Mrs.Dalloway (1925). The protagonist, Clarissa Dalloway, has a young passion for Sally Seton that is rekindled when Sally attends her party many years later, even though both of them are married. Clarissa has her thoughts portrayed in the novel, creating acknowledgment of her same-sex desires which may appear as Wolf suggesting that despite the society’s unwillingness to acknowledge and accept homosexuality in post World War I London, Clarissa still can admit her feeling for Sally even if it’s just to herself. Thereby, to some extent Clarissa did have different facets, as one in her thoughts and another on how she presented herself to others, she could even be qualified as an ‘introspective Bunburyist’. As per usual, we can spot something similar in Wolf’s life. As she took part in the Bloomsbury Group, that had the majority of its group members engaged in homosexual and polyamory relationships. Also, even though married to Leonard Wolf, she had a romantic affair with the writer, Vita SackVille-West, who was ten years younger than her and also married. However, at the time homosexuality was still a criminal offense in the U.K, but there was no equivalent legislation as “gross indecency” targeted to gay women, which contributed Wold to have a different ending from Wilde on that aspect. Yet another famous saying of Wilde is that “ a community is infinitely more brutalized by the habitual employment of punishment, than is by the occasional occurrence of crime”, which is just so descriptive of the discriminatory culture present made to oppress minorities, as Wilde suffer directly from it, the theme brought up by this quote is so timeless that even can be spotted nowadays, e.g. the protest against police brutality towards the African American communities after the murder of George Floyd.

In conclusion, looking back at the play from the sobering perspective of Wilde’s disgrace and imprisonment, we can thus see how his play is a plea for tolerance. As Wilde tries to create a world in which the societal laws have no power and the double lives can be revealed, this idea would most likely match Oscar Wilde’s ideal world. By writing this play it could have been his safe way to come out, to feel more free without having to put his reputation at the stake, as he also wanted other homosexuals and non-hetero-confirming people to read the play and feel represented as much as they could, whilst having to coexist with the huge prejudices of the time.

Sources

Oscar Wilde
Homosexuality
Book Analysis
Bunbury
British Literature

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Tenoch Yakecan
Tenoch Yakecan

Written by Tenoch Yakecan

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