Insincerity is by no means an issue of the past, but in the 1800s, Oscar Wilde felt that society was disappointingly fake. He wrote satirical plays to expose the faults of the society comically. Wilde expressed that people were dishonest and deceitful but also characterless and cowardly. In the societies described in The Importance of Being Earnest and Lady Windermere’s Fan, insincerity causes damage to the value of marriage and created societal pressure in relationships. In The Importance of Being Earnest characters lie about their names in order to please women and get married. Algernon and Jack do not think that marriages require honesty or trust. Lady Bracknell also feels that marriage works best if the spouses are unfamiliar with each other’s secrets and true personality. Similarly, in Lady Windermere Lady and Lord Windermere’s keep secrets from each other throughout the entire play. Party goers are also…show more content… Both plays contain many examples of couples who are dishonest and not truly in love. In The Importance of Being Earnest, Algernon Moncrief proposes to Cecily within ten minutes of meeting her and feels wholly in love. Cecily also agrees to marry him when he asks, despite her conviction that he is wicked because she does not understand the seriousness of marriage. Both Algernon and Jack lie about their names to their fiancés who care much more about their name being Ernest than their true character, which Lady Bracknell believes should not be known by partners until they are wed. She says: “To speak frankly, I am not in favour of long engagements. They give people the opportunity of finding out each other's character before marriage, which I think is never advisable” (Page 40). Lady Bracknell’s parents arranged her marriage for social advancement and she plans to do the same for Gwendolyn. Lady Bracknell does not think that a marriage requires love, honesty, or