Satire In The Importance Of Being Algernon By Oscar Wilde

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The “Importance of Being Earnest” is a Victorian melodrama with the main focus on mocking the different classes. The cynical, snarky but playful tone results in a very satirical resonance throughout the entirety of the play. Oscar Wilde intended to do this to show how shallow and hypocritical the whole charade of the aristocrat’s behaviour really is. The charade that all the aristocrat’s do is sit around playing on a piano, lying to get out of seeing relatives and eating cucumber sandwiches is completely exaggerated however it does insinuate that the characters in the play cannot be that far away from the Victorian ideal of the time. The fact that Wilde created a term for a normal venture in the Victorian Society suggests that he is trying…show more content…
He claims that “anyone can play accurately”, the pronoun “anyone” suggests that he feel that associating himself with anything anyone beneath him in the class system can do is wrong and he should completely juxtapose them. In society in the Victorian era it was suggested that the lower classes where used to set a “good example” for the upper classes and that they had no other worldly use. Algernon also claims that “the truth is rarely pure and never simple” when he questions Jack about his antics in the town when he resides in the country. The adverb “rarely” suggests that Algernon may not even believe Jack’s explanations of his actions which is quite hypocritical as he admits to “bunburying” to get away from the restraints of the town. It could also imply that Algernon is a constant liar and feels all upper class members of the Victorian society are like this. Algernon can also be seen to follow the code of Victorian behaviour in “The Importance of Being Earnest” by stating that he is “occasionally a little over-dressed” but that he makes “up for it by being always immensely over-educated” this intensifies the readers impression that Algernon is extremely assured of his own intelligence and gives off the impression that he feel that he can do nothing wrong. This was the normal opinion of the upper classes in the Victorian era, it seemed they did not feel
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