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Maxims and Masks: The Epigram in "The Importance of Being Earnest"
Title: Maxims and Masks: The Epigram in "The Importance of Being Earnest"
Category: Literature / English
Details: Words: 1826 | Pages: 7.8 (approximately 235 words/page)
Maxims and Masks: The Epigram in "The Importance of Being Earnest"
Oscar Wilde frames "The Importance of Being Earnest" around the paradoxical epigram, a skewering metaphor for the play's central theme of division of truth and identity that hints at a homosexual subtext. Other targets of Wilde's absurd yet grounded wit are the social conventions of his stuffy Victorian society, which are exposed as a "shallow mask of manners" (1655). Aided by clever wordplay, frantic misunderstanding, and dissonance of knowledge between the characters and the audience, devices …showed first 75 words of 1826 total…
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…showed last 75 words of 1826 total…double is not surprising - some critics argue that Dr. Jekyl's evil counterpart, Mr. Hyde, has some homosexual leanings - as such a controversial and, perhaps, embarrassing topic can be more easily disguised and obscured in the murky depths of the doppelganger tale. Today, with scientific evidence backing an opinion that places individuals' sexual preferences on a sliding scale from full heterosexuality to full homosexuality, the simple bifurcated view of sexuality in literature may soon be obsolete.
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