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TCHS Earnest KLW
AP Prep
Question | Answer |
---|---|
Author? | Oscar Wilde |
Year Published? | 1895 |
Style? | play, comedy, satirical wit, sarcasm |
How do epigrams help the play? | They are literary devices that help create a satire. |
How is the irony clear in the play? | Wilde uses sarcasm, puns, entendres, epigrams, and the plot has situational irony. |
Paradox, contradiction, and humor are what? | Literary Devices used by Wilde |
Symbols: 1) The Pun of Earnest? | The character's name is Ernest, and Earnest actually means honest and truthful. |
Symbols: 2) Satire of the Life of the Elite | It exagerates their ideals and ways of life, and mocks the victorian language. |
Motif: 1) Confused or hidden identity | The play's cast has deceptive and decieving characters. |
Motif: 2) Appearance & Fantasy vs Reality | Ernest has a double life. He isn't who some people think he is. |
Theme: The Nature of Marriage | Algernon and Jack discuss this when they dispute briefly on whether a marriage proposal is a matter of "business" or "pleasure". |
How does Wilde make fun of Victorian Society? | He makes fun of the Victorian idea of morality as a rigid body of rules about what you should and shouldn't do. (ex: Title, the private cigarette case) |
Theme: Constraints of Society | Stupid victorian rules. . . Jack thinks reading a private cigarette case is "ungentlemanly". |
jack (ernest) Worthing J.P. | PROTAGONIST responsible and respectable, but leads a double life |
Hertfordshire | Jack's country estate |
Cecily Cardew | a total opposite of gwendolen, unspoiled, but believes that her and Algernon are engaged, also obsessed with his fake name "Ernest". fantasist. |
Algernon Moncrieff | created double life Bunbury, charming bachelor, witty and tries to say things that are either profound or ridiculous |
Gwendolen Fairfax | artificial, in love with Jack, fixiated on his name "Ernest" she says it "inspires absolute confidence" |