Monday 22 October 2012

Wilde introductions

Try drafting the introduction to one of the essay titles here. use the critical terminolgy and answer the questions set within the introduction...

14 comments:

  1. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in 'The Importance of being Earnest'.

    In the context of 'The Importance of being Earnest', the way in which the Victorian social norms are portrayed, establishes the whole aspect of what is displayed as a common value in the nineteenth century. Wilde expresses a wide range of different aphorisms and epigrams as well using the location as a metaphor and structuring the play with a dramatic disorder.

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  2. Wilde's characterisation in The Importance Of Being Earnest is shallow and two dimensional. To what extent is this true and how can it be justified?

    In the Victorian era, Wilde was faced by lots of different characteristics and class systems. This makes his characters more diverse and unique throughout the play. He makes sure that the characterisation of his characters is two dimensional and shallow to represent his personal views on the Victorian class system. For example he saw the power of the upper class as too much for the little amount of work they did, compared to that of the working class labourers.

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  3. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in IBE?

    During the play 'The importance of being earnest'you can see how the Victorian social norms are in fact portrayed through the conventions of comedy. A convention of comedy is that the play must end in a marriage, which IBE does do. In the Victorian era many people were expected to marry at a young age, as they seemed pure and women were below men and therefore were there to fulfil mens needs. Wilde uses a whole variety of different epigrams and aphorisms, he also uses structuring to make certain scenes more dramatic so you can pick out the social norms that Wilde may be mocking by using a comic convention.
    Zoe

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  4. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in 'The Importance of being Earnest'?

    Throughtout the play 'The Importance of being Earnest' Wilde uses many of the conventions of comedy to mock the social norms of a Victorian society. He does this by using a range of aphorisms and epigrams to stress these social norms. Wilde continuously refers to how women were seen as inferior in the Victorian era, making the women in 'The Importance of being Earnest' easy to mock and implying their lack of intelligence. Also, Wilde uses the change in location to make the play more dramatic, emphasising the change in attitude.

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  5. Wilde’s Characterisation in IBE is shallow and two dimensional. To what extent is this true and how could it be justified?

    In the Victorian era, social values and status played a very important rule in people’s life. Wilde gets his point of views on these social values through his characterisation of the characters in the play. He shows how shallow and two dimensional people were in the Victorian era. Wilde also mocks the Victorian society by using comedic conventions, such as epigrams, marriage, location and title of the play. He also shows how much money and high status mattered at that time and showed what people thought about someone who didn't have any of this in their life and how they were treated through his characterisation of the characters, which makes them look more opinionated.

    Sadia

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  6. Wilde’s Characterisation in Importance of Being Earnest is shallow and two dimensional. To what extent is this true and how could it be justified?

    The characters of Importance of Being Earnest, by extension of the nature of the play, come across as highly trivial and superficial people. This could be said to be mocking the socialites of the Victorian era; who were necessarily notoriously shallow. Problematically, this opens the play to criticism by those who believe that the characters, rather than being as developed and complex as real people with shallow and two-dimensional facades, are really poorly developed and lackluster. Such criticism could extend to the play to say that, in a conclusion pandering to the character's fickle and shallow dispositions, it becomes a mockery of itself; a farcical play that is itself a farce. This essay will argue that this is precisely what Wilde intended, and that the natures of the characters of Importance of Being Earnest is essential to this.

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  7. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in 'The Importance of being Earnest'.

    In the "The Importance of being Earnest" Wilde mocks Victorian social norms by using Comedic conventions. Wilde uses Aphorisms, Epigrams and a metaphor for change of location to show how unimportant the Victorian social norms are. Wilde constantly refers to marriage, as though it is a bore and a daily task, which was considered a major Victorian social norms. Wilde also uses a Dramatic disorder to the play in which helps add to the showing of how insignificant the Victorian social norms are.

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  8. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in 'The Importance of Being Earnest'?

    During ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’, one of the most predominant features of Wilde’s writing is the use of comedic conventions to mock the social norms and values of a typical Victorian society. For example, Wilde heavily features the importance of marriage in often comically exaggerated ways, as well as highlighting the double standards- and the double lives- that belonged to men in the Victorian era. He often chooses to do this with the use of aphorisms and epigrams as subtle references to these conventions. Wilde also chooses to use location as a metaphor for the change between classes throughout the play, and most particularly the contrast between order and chaos as Jack and Algernon’s identities begin to rapidly unravel and spiral out of control.

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  9. Wilde said, ‘The first duty of life is to be as artificial as possible.’ To what extent does Wilde achieve this in IBE?

    Throughout ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’, Wilde succeeds in including this topic by means of not only individuals’ stage directions ,but also the manner in which they communicate with others, and this is mostly in particular women. Wilde subtly refers to this through the use of epigrams and aphorisms. The dialogue used in some parts sharply implies that individuals felt they had to be artificial to impress others and fit in with society.

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  10. Wilde said ‘the first duty of life if to be as artificial as possible’ to what extent does Wilde achieve this in IBE?

    Throughout The Importance of Being Earnest an outstanding feature seems the to be the artificial characteristics that possess the main characters, IBE is a satirical play about two characters named Algernon and Jack and plays with the ideas of double standards, alter egos and lies- all which are commonly perceived as tell-tale signs of being artificial- whilst still managing to use comedic conventions. Throughout the play Wilde depicts his characters to appear very artificial and thus achieves this well though their habits, actions and most importantly their dialogs. We see these artificial characteristics shown more often through the women in the play as they are striving to be as socially acceptable as possible, one particular artificial woman would be the character of Lady Bracknell who is depicted as such through her excessive need for social acceptance and being drawn towards money. Throughout the play we see that it is through the artificialness of the characters that the Victorian social norms are gently mocked and often through the use of epigrams and aphorisms.

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  11. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’?

    ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’, written by Oscar Wilde, explores the social norms of the Victorian upper class and the contrast between what the characterisation of the rich believe to be important and what Wilde feels to be insignificant within their society. This is heightened through Wilde’s use of the traditional comedic conventions originated by the Greek philosopher, Aristotle. For example, within 'The Importance of Being Earnest', Wilde comically inflates the upper class through marriage, their expectations of it and the ironic double standard between upstanding men of society and women through characterisation and the use of epigrams and aphorisms. As well as this Wilde uses additional comedic conventions such as locations used as a metaphor for change and female characters being prominent within the plot.

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  12. How does Wilde utilise the conventions of comedy to satirise Victorian social norms in 'The Importance of Being Ernest?'

    In 'The importance of Being Ernest', Wilde uses comedic conventions such as epigrams and aphorisms to show a contrast between what was thought to be right in Victorian times, and to show how his characterisation of the main characters mocks this. Wilde also uses location as a metaphor for change, and dramatic structure to satirise Victorian social convention such as the superiority of men, class, double standards for men and expectations of women.

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  13. Wilde said, ‘The first duty of life is to be as artificial as possible.’ To what extent does Wilde achieve this in IBE?


    Throughout the Importance of Being Earnest Wilde lightly mocks the Victorian society in which he lives in. One of the ways in which he exaggerates this is through portraying the characters as being as artificial as possible. The characterization of Jack, for example is led by his double standards and double life (being Earnest). This is used to emphasize the comedic convention and is helped by Wildes frequent use of Epigrams, amphraisms and puns. All through the play Wilde depicts the artificialness of the characters through the use of dialog, crude puns, stage directions and their actions towards one another. Wilde shows the convention through the characterization of Lady Bracknell as all through the play she strives to be socially acceptable as well as being very influenced and extremely opinionated.

    - Megan

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  14. Throughout the Importance of Being Earnest one of the more dominant features of the play is the artificial characterisation of all of the Characters. Being a satirical play it is used to mock the social norms of the Victorian society; however Wilde uses this to point out the fact that he saw the Victorian Society as Artificial, in which he achieves the fact that ‘the first duty of life is to be as artificial as possible.’
    Taking a closer look you can see that he does this by introducing double standards through the characters of Jack and Algernon, the petty moral standards of the upper class through Lady Bracknell and how Wilde depicts the naivety of younger women of the time through Gwendolen and Cecily. All in which Wilde has achieved through the use of factors such as epigrams, aphorisms and even the conventions of comedy.
    Chloe Burrows.

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