importance of being earnest as a social satire
“The comic nature of The Importance of Being Earnest was a mask behind which Wilde conducted a critique of the English Establishment.” ‘The Importance of Being Earnest aims a stinging blow at Victorian society, in particular at the lower and middle classes’ . It is obvious that Wilde believes in the idea that most people of the upper class society of his time are great leaders of double lives and that the earnest way in which they are portrayed is no where near the way they actually act in the privacy of their own homes or in the company of each other. ... It is through the characters that we see these opinions being expressed. ... Although I think he might have being exaggerating a little bit and that Lady Bracknell might be the extreme. ... I am greatly distressed, Aunt Augusta, about there being no cucumbers, not even for ready money. ... For them marriage is a social arrangement not for love but for money. Lady Bracknell views it as a social transaction. ... And both herself and Gwendolen have decided to marry men because their supposed name is Earnest. This shows that Wilde thought of marriage in the upper classes as a ‘social tool of advancement’. ... The ironic thing being that the higher-class audience were too simple-minded to see this or maybe they were too earnest to admit it!