Symbols, Setting, Important Scenes Flashcards
Symbol: cucumber sandwiches
From the very first act, Algernon is seen eating throughout the play. The most notable instance is the first, where Algernon eats all the cucumber sandwiches without letting his friend Jack have any. The cucumber sandwiches can be seen as a status symbol within the play. Algernon reserving these cucumbers for only himself and family shows the contrast between Algernon’s wealthy upbringing and Jack’s status as a handbag orphan.
The food within the play also serves as a stand-in for sexual desire. In Victorian times, sexual desires were often repressed. Oscar Wilde cleverly uses Algernon’s gluttonous actions and innuendo-filled lines in order to mirror and reveal his bachelor lifestyle without being overt.
Importance of the ending scene
As with all comedies, “The Importance of Being Earnest” ends with the characters living happily ever after. Jack realizes that he is Algernon’s long lost brother named Ernest and was left in a coatroom in a Victorian station. Lady Bracknell permits him to marry Gwendolen because of his newly discovered ties to those with social status. Cecily is also permitted to marry Algernon because of her wealth.
Miss Prism, a character introduced in the very last scene, provides the convenient answer to Jack’s identity crisis. She can be seen as the deus ex machina of the play that resolves the story’s conflicts.
Country VS City Setting
- property
- life in the country vs city
- escape
In “The Importance of Being Earnest”, a person’s residence is a key signifier of their social standing and sophistication. Lady Bracknell’s keen interest in Jack’s property exemplifies this alignment between class, fashion, and residence. She finds Jack’s house in town to be “unfashionable,” but sufficient, as “it gives one position.”
Just as Lady Bracknell judges Jack’s class upon the value and location of his real estate, Gwendolen evaluates Cecily’s tastes based upon her upbringing in the country. Gwendolen, a fashionable urbanite, makes several cutting remarks about country girl Cecily’s lack of taste: “I had no idea there was anything approaching good taste in the more remote country districts…Personally I cannot understand how anybody manages to exist in the country.” While Gwendolen views Cecily as a country-bumpkin-nobody for her rural roots, Cecily associates city living with vulgarity and aristocratic snobbishness: “I believe most London houses are extremely vulgar…I believe the aristocracy are suffering very much.” Through Gwendolen and Cecily’s attitudes about country and city life, Wilde upsets the characters’ alignment of the city with sophistication and the country with poor taste. The city is urbane, but it is also “vulgar;” and while the country lacks taste it also affords one “position” in society.
Wilde also suggests that town and country are a means of fantasy and escape. Jack escapes to the city, under false pretenses, to avoid his obligations to Cecily in the country, while Algernon similarly escapes to the country to avoid his social obligations to his aunt and cousin.
