importance of being earnest analysis

The title 'the importance of being earnest ' comes from the very definition of what earnest actually means .It refers to being sincere and honest ,but the irony of the play is that earnest (jack) is far from being honest and sincere as he leads a double life that causes us to see the name in a different twist.The intelligence of this title is the pun intended way oscar uses the name of jack as 'ernest' and the title possibly suggesting that there has to be some meaning to being that person jack is imposing to be .In the play ,everything depends on pretending to be ernest ,so i feel the title is merly a comedic way of showing how there is some importance of jack playing this pretence character ernest.

The cast list is set in upper class to lower class ,it shows us that there are obvious signs of status hierarchy ,in the play ,jack is presented with his name at the top of the list ,leading an honourable role of JP justice of peace ,as you read on ,you notice just how important his role is in his level of profession and his secret life .leading on we see the second character Algernon Moncrieff, he also leads a double life of secrecy in name ,i personally believe that the characters lists all relate to the fact that each of them have a level of importance ,since Algernon is pretty close to jack and leads a similar life .as Gwendolyn Fairfax comes third to the rest of the cast list ,it is visible that all the characters are in list to who plays important roles to jack ,hence implying for to question ,what is the importance of these people to earnest.

the language used in act 1 part 1 is very eased and casual between lane and Algernon .although they are both from different societies of class lane seems to stick to the norm of politeness and limited conversations between servants and there bosses ,were as algernon sounds as if it doesn't matter ;so he elongates the discourse.Oscar Wilde shows us the obvious differences between upper class and lower class ,and uses that to show that the rules are being broken ,usually conversations like algernon and lane do not extend further then 'please' and yes 'sir' .Algernon in the text state 'Lanes views on marriage seem somewhat lax. Really, if the lower orders don’t set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them? They seem, as a class, to have absolutely no sense of moral responsibility '.This imposes to us that though he is able to have a near to normal conversation with lane .


Oscar Wilde shows us in the play ,that because this play is set in the Victorian era ,it was very important then to divide yourself from someone like lane ;algernon in act 1 part 1 didn't seem to care at all that he was having a normal conversation with the servant about marriage and if its demoralizing .Algernon had carried the conversation on this shows us that Oscar explores his use of language through status like this ,through creating characters who aren't from the same social class but are somehow link together throughout the play . 

This forms a very ironic tone to the play because it is as if Oscar his preparing the audience to see first hand that there will be some light heartedness between Victorian social norm ,this .as in terms of class ,when they both mix in the play ,for instance there are governesses ,servant , justice of Peace ,honarble and so on .Their all from different social statuses ,so Oscar explores status through creating a serious of twists and events ,also adding that although at the time those weren't really what was socially expectable (having normal conversations with servants , Oscar makes it seem as though rules don't really exist within  a play for serious people .