Ben Stark

Mrs Gatfield

Honors Survey of British Literature

12 February 2021

Feminism in The Importance of Being Earnest

Feminism is an ever-evolving topic in philosophy. And it’s introduction into literature is

fairly recent. It became a very big topic of interest in Western Europe and British literature.

During the time that it first arose, the idea was that men created society, ruled society, viewed

through the eyes of men, and was judged by men. The feminist movement was first introduced

into literature in the 1960’s. Women had been writing and publishing literature for centuries, but

it was during this time that the feminist literature thoery arose. Up until this idea came alone, all

of the writing of women, or about women, were from the viewpoints of men. Women were

accepting of the ideas that men had on them, such as being unintelligent or less educated than

men. It wasn’t until the feminist movement that women started to re-evaluate these standards and

ideas on how women were portrayed in literature and start to develop the concept of “modern

women”. “The feminist approach is based on finding suggestions of misog- yny (negative

attitudes toward women) within pieces of literature and exposing them. Feminists are interested

in exposing the undervaluing of women in literature that has been accepted as the norm by both

men and women”(Richardson 2021) Many of these feminist ideas were shown in British

literature mulitlple times. One of these books being The Importance of Being Earnest. This is

shown with Algernon’s views on marriage, the relationship and engagement between Jack and

Gwendolen, and Lady Bracknell’s comments on Lady Harbury.

 Algernon is a very interesting and intriguing person in this story. Many of his views on

life are very strange. One of these being his view on love and marriage. Algernon does not like

marriage. He hates it when married people flirt in public. He feels you need a way out of

marriage before your partner gets one first. Algernon views marriage as business instead of

pleasure. He feels that proposing is pointless and most people view this as unromantic and

demeaning. He feels that the most alluring aspect of marriage is the physical aspect. This is very

demeaning towards women, because they are more than just their looks.

ALGERNON-“In the third place, I know perfectly well whom she will place me next to,

to-night. She will place me next Mary Farquhar, who always flirts with her own husband

across the dinner-table. That is not very pleasant. Indeed, it is not even decent . . . and

that sort of thing is enormously on the increase. The amount of women in London who

flirt with their own husbands is perfectly scandalous. It looks so bad. It is simply washing

one’s clean linen in public. Besides, now that I know you to be a confirmed Bunburyist I

naturally want to talk to you about Bunburying. I want to tell you the rules” (Act 1).

This shows that Algernon believes that when married people flirt in public, especially the

women, it is scandalous and not pleasant for anyone. He feels that no one should be doing it, and

it reflects bad views on their marriage towards people. He says that you need a way out of

marriage or your relationship, and you need to think of one before your partner does. And he can

get away when he wants and doesn’t have to stay.

 Another aspect of feminism shown is through Gwendolen and Jack’s relationship.

Gwendolen and Jack both want to marry each other but neither of them have any real reason to

marry them. Gwendolen only likes Jack because his name is Ernest. Jack has more of a physical

attraction or infatuation towards her.

“JACK. My own one, I have never loved any one in the world but you.”

GWENDOLEN. “Yes, but men often propose for practice. I know my brother Gerald

does. All my girl-friends tell me so. What wonderfully blue eyes you have, Ernest! They

are quite, quite, blue. I hope you will always look at me just like that, especially when

there are other people present” (Act 1)

Gwendolen is showing how much of a flirt she is to Jack. She clearly won’t take her marriage to

him seriously unless he is continuously giving her attention. She will flatter and compliment him

to get what she wants. She wants public adoration and everything to be about her. She is taking

the feminism aspect and doing a complete one-eighty to give her power over Ernest.

A final way that feminism is shown in this story is between Lady Bracknell and Lady

Harbury. After Lady Harbury’s husband dies, Lady Bracknell is quick to give her opinion on it.

But, she is very fake and passive aggressive when stating it. She hints at some of the situation

when talking to Algernon. But it also reveals a lot about how Lady Harbury feels about her

marriage. It also can show us how some other women viewed their marriages at the time.

LADY BRACKNELL.- ”I’m sorry if we are a little late, Algernon, but I was obliged to
 call on dear Lady Harbury. I hadn’t been there since her poor husband’s death. I never

saw a woman so altered; she looks quite twenty years younger. And now I’ll have a cup

of tea, and one of those nice cucumber sandwiches you promised me” (Act 1)

This is showing that she didn’t really care about her marriage and wanted a way out of her

relationship. She has moved on too fast. Lady Bracknell says that she looks twenty years

younger because she is jealous of her, and wants that in her own life. This can also show us a

little bit about Lady Bracknell’s marriage, and how she sees it. She doesn’t want to be in a

relationship, and feels anger. Lady Bracknell is very fake and oppressive towards Lady Harbury.

Feminism is a very important and well known idea, and it has been around for a long

time. Some of the views and definitions of feminism have strayed from the original idea of

women wanting to be equal with men. But, we can still look back on older literature to help us

see how it was used and represented. Feminism was shown many times throughout The

Importance of Being Earnest. I feel that it was a very good reflection of what was happening

during this time, but being that it is a satire, it was a little over-exaggerated. But, the main ideas

still stayed the same. Feminism was shown through Algernon’s views on marriage, the

relationship and engagement between Jack and Gwendolen, and Lady Bracknell’s comments on

Lady Harbury. This can help us today to understand how an author’s point of view or literary

criticism approach can affect their writing and give personal opinion to it. It can also affect the

reader and how the reader is going to read it and view it.

Citations
Richardson, Eva. “Prestwick House Multiple Critical Perspectives™.” Teaching Oscar

Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, www.prestwickhouse.com/samples/303135.pdf.

Wilde, Oscar, et al. The Importance of Being Earnest. Pearson Education, 2010.