The Importance of Being Earnest

by Oscar Wilde

First Act

Second Part

Scene. Morning-room in Algernon's flat in Half-Moon Street. The room is
luxuriously and artistically furnished. Algernon is eating cucumber
sandwiches and ignoring the bread and butter.
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(Enter Lane.)

Lane. Mr. Ernest Worthing.

(Enter Jack.) (Lane goes out.)

Algernon. How are you, my dear Ernest? What brings you up to town?

Jack. Oh, pleasure, pleasure! What else should bring one anywhere? Eating
as usual, I see, Algy!

Algernon. (Stiffly.) I believe it is customary in good society to take some
slight refreshment at five o'clock. Where have you been since last
Thursday?

Jack. (Sitting down on the sofa.) In the country.

Algernon. What on earth do you do there?

Jack. (Pulling off his gloves.) When one is in town one amuses oneself.
When one is in the country one amuses other people. It is excessively
boring.

Algernon. And who are the people you amuse?

Jack. (Airily.) Oh, neighbours, neighbours.

Algernon. Got nice neighbours in your part of Shropshire?

Jack. Perfectly horrid! Never speak to one of them.

Algernon. How immensely you must amuse them! (Goes over and takes
sandwich.) By the way, Shropshire is your county, is it not?

Jack. Eh? Shropshire? Yes, of course. Hallo! Why all these cups? Why
cucumber sandwiches? Why such reckless extravagance in one so young? Who is
coming to tea?

Algernon. Oh! merely Aunt Augusta and Gwendolen.

Jack. How perfectly delightful!

Algeronon. Yes, that is all very well; but I am afraid Aunt Augusta won't
quite approve of your being here.

Jack. May I ask why?

Algernon. My dear fellow, the way you flirt with Gwendolen is perfectly
disgraceful. It is almost as bad as the way Gwendolen flirts with you.

Jack. I am in love with Gwendolen. I have come up to town expressly to
propose to her.

Algernon. I thought you had come up for pleasure? ... I call that business.

Jack. How utterly unromantic you are!

Algernon. I really don't see anything romantic about proposing. It is very
romantic to be in love. But there is nothing romantic about a definite
proposal. Why, one may be accepted. One usually is, I believe. Then the
excitement is all over. The very essence of romance is uncertainty. If ever
I get married, I'll certainly try to forget the fact.

Jack. I have no doubt about that, dear Algy. The Divorce Court was
specially invented for people whose memories are so curiously constituted.

Algernon. Oh! there is no use speculating on that subject. Divorces are
made in Heaven-- (Jack puts out his hand to take a sandwich. Algernon at
once interferes.) Please don't touch the cucumber sandwiches. They are
ordered specially for Aunt Augusta. (Takes one and eats it.)

Jack. Well, you have been eating them all the time.

Algernon. That is quite a different matter. She is my aunt. (Takes plate
from below.) Have some bread and butter. The bread and butter is for
Gwendolen. Gwendolen is devoted to bread and butter.

Jack. (Advancing to table and helping himself.) And very good bread and
butter it is too.

Algernon. Well, my dear fellow, you need not eat as if you were going to
eat it all. You behave as if you were married to her already. You are not
married to her already, and I don't think you ever will be.

Jack. Why on earth do you say that?

Algernon. Well, in the first place girls never marry the men they flirt
with. Girls don't think it right.

Jack. Oh, that is nonsense!

Algernon. It isn't. It is a great truth. It accounts for the extraordinary
number of bachelors that one sees all over the place. In the second place,
I don't give my consent.

Jack. Your consent!

Algernon. My dear fellow, Gwendolen is my first cousin. And before I allow
you to marry her, you will have to clear up the whole question of Cecily.
(Rings bell.)

(Enter Lane.)

Algernon. Bring me that cigarette case Mr. Worthing left in the
smoking-room the last time he dined here.

Lane. Yes, sir. (Lane goes out.)

Jack. Do you mean to say you have had my cigarette case all this time? I
wish to goodness you had let me know. I have been writing frantic letters
to Scotland Yard about it. I was very nearly offering a large reward.

Algernon. Well, I wish you would offer one. I happen to be more than
usually hard up.

Jack. There is no good offering a large reward now that the thing is found.

(Enter Lane with the cigarette case on a salver. Algernon takes it at once.
Lane goes out.)

Algernon. I think that is rather mean of you, Ernest, I must say. (Opens
case and examines it.) However, it makes no matter, for, now that I look at
the inscription inside, I find that the thing isn't yours after all.

Jack. Of course it's mine. (Moving to him.) You have seen me with it a
hundred times, and you have no right whatsoever to read what is written
inside. It is a very ungentlemanly thing to read a private cigarette case.

Algernon. Oh! it is absurd to have a hard-and-fast rule about what one
should read and what one shouldn't. More than half of modern culture
depends on what one shouldn't read.

Jack. I am quite aware of the fact, and I don't propose to discuss modern
culture. It isn't the sort of thing one should talk of in private. I simply
want my cigarette case back.

Algernon. Yes; but this isn't your cigarette case. This cigarette case is a
present from someone of the name of Cecily, and you said you didn't know
anyone of that name.

Jack. Well, if you want to know, Cecily happens to be my aunt.

Algernon. Your aunt!

Jack. Yes. Charming old lady she is, too. Lives at Tunbridge Wells. Just
give it back to me, Algy.

Algernon. (Retreating to back of sofa.) But why does she call herself
Cecily if she is your aunt and lives at Tunbridge Wells? (Reading.) "From
little Cecily with her fondest love."

Jack. (Moving to sofa and kneeling upon it.) My dear fellow, what on earth
is there in that? Some aunts are tall, some aunts are not tall. That is a
matter that surely an aunt may be allowed to decide for herself. You seem
to think that every aunt should be exactly like your aunt! That is absurd!
For Heaven's sake give me back my cigarette case. (Follows Algernon round
the room.)

Algernon. Yes. But why does your aunt call you her uncle? "From little
Cecily, with her fondest love to her dear Uncle Jack." There is no
objection, I admit, to an aunt being a small aunt, but why an aunt, no
matter what her size may be, should call her own nephew her uncle, I can't
quite make out. Besides, your name isn't Jack at all; it is Ernest.

Jack. It isn't Ernest; it's Jack.

Algernon. You have always told me it was Ernest. I have introduced you to
everyone as Ernest. You answer to the name of Ernest. You look as if your
name was Ernest. You are the most earnest looking person I ever saw in my
life. It is perfectly absurd your saying that your name isn't Ernest. It's
on your cards. Here is one of them. (Taking it from case.) "Mr. Ernest
Worthing, B. 4, The Albany." I'll keep this as a proof that your name is
Ernest if ever you attempt to deny it to me, or to Gwendolen, or to anyone
else. (Puts the card in his pocket.)

Jack. Well, my name is Ernest in town and Jack in the country, and the
cigarette case was given to me in the country.

Algernon. Yes, but that does not account for the fact that your small Aunt
Cecily, who lives at Tunbridge Wells, calls you her dear uncle. Come, old
boy, You had much better have the thing out at once.

Jack. My dear Algy, you talk exactly as if you were a dentist. It is very
vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn't a dentist. It produces a false
impression.

Algernon. Well, that is exactly what dentists always do. Now, go on! Tell
me the whole thing. I may mention that I have always suspected you of being
a confirmed and secret Bunburyist; and I am quite sure of it now.

Jack. Bunburyist? What on earth do you mean by a Bunburyist?

Algernon. I'll reveal to you the meaning of that incomparable expression as
soon as you are kind enough to inform me why you are Ernest in town and
Jack in the country.

Jack. Well, produce my cigarette case first.

Algernon. Here it is. (Hands cigarette case.) Now produce your explanation,
and pray make it improbable. (Sits on sofa.)

Jack. My dear fellow, there is nothing improbable about my explanation at
all. In fact it's perfectly ordinary. Old Mr. Thomas Cardew, who adopted me
when I was a little boy, made me in his will guardian to his granddaughter,
Miss Cecily Cardew. Cecily, who addresses me as her uncle from motives of
respect that you could not possible appreciate, lives at my place in the
country under the charge of her admirable governess, Miss Prism.

Algernon. Where is that place in the country, by the way?

Jack. That is nothing to you, dear boy. You are not going to be invited.
... I may tell you candidly that the place is not in Shropshire.

Algernon. I suspected that, my dear fellow! I have Bunburyed all over
Shropshire on two separate occasions. Now, go on. Why are you Ernest in
town and Jack in the country?

Jack. My dear Algy, I don't know whether you will be able to understand my
real motives. You are hardly serious enough. When one is placed in the
position of guardian, one has to adopt a very high moral tone on all
subjects. It's one's duty to do so. And as a high moral tone can hardly be
said to conduce very much to either one's health or one's happiness, in
order to get up to town I have always pretended to have a younger brother
of the name of Ernest, who lives in the Albany, and gets into the most
dreadful scrapes. That, my dear Algy, is the whole truth pure and simple.

Algernon. The truth is rarely pure and never simple. Modern life would be
very tedious if it were either, and modern literature a complete
impossibility!

Jack. That wouldn't be at all a bad thing.

Algernon. Literary criticism is not your forte, my dear fellow. Don't try
it. You should leave that to people who haven't been at a University. They
do it so well in the daily papers. What you really are is a Bunburyist. I
was quite right in saying you were a Bunburyist. You are one of the most
advanced Bunburyists I know.

Jack. What on earth do you mean?

Algernon. You have invented a very useful young brother called Ernest, in
order that you may be able to come up to town as often as you like. I have
invented an invaluable permanent invalid called Bunbury, in order that I
may be able to go down into the country whenever I choose. Bunbury is
perfectly invaluable. If it wasn't for Bunbury's extraordinary bad health,
for instance, I wouldn't be able to dine with you at Willis's tonight, for
I have been really engaged to Aunt Augusta for more than a week.

Jack. I haven't asked you to dine with me anywhere tonight.

Algernon. I know. You are absurdly careless about sending out invitations.
It is very foolishy of you. Nothing annoys people so much as not receiving
invitations.

Jack. You had much better dine with your Aunt Augusta.

Algernon. I haven't the smallest intention of doing anything of the kind.
To begin with I dined there on Monday, and once a week is quite enough to
dine with one's own relations. In the second place, whenever I do dine
there I am always treated as a member of the family, and sent down with
either no woman at all, or two. In the third place, I know perfectly well
whom she will place me next to, tonight. 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.

Jack. I'm not a Bunburyist at all. If Gwendolen accepts me, I am going to
kill my brother, indeed I think I'll kill him in any case. Cecily is a
little too much interested in him. It is rather a bore. So I am going to
get rid of Ernest. And I strongly advise you to do the same with Mr. ...
with your invalid friend who has the absurd name.

Algernon. Nothing will induce me to part with Bunbury, and if you ever get
married, which seems to me extremely problematic, you will be very glad to
know Bunbury. A man who marries without knowing Bunbury has a very tedious
time of it.

Jack. That is nonsense. If I marry a charming girl like Gwendolen, and she
is the only girl I ever saw in my life that I would marry, I certainly
won't want to know Bunbury.

Algernon. Then your wife will. You don't seem to realize, that in married
life three is company and two is none.

Jack. (Sententiously) That, my dear young friend, is the theory that the
corrupt French Drama has been propounding for the last fifty years.

Algernon. Yes; and that the happy English home has proved in half the time.

Jack. For heaven's sake, don't try to be cynical. It's perfectly easy to be
cynical.

Algernon. My dear fellow, it isn't easy to be anything nowadays. There's
such a lot of beastly competition about. (The sound of an electric bell is
heard.) Ah! that must be Aunt Augusta. Only relatives, or creditors, ever
ring in that Wagnerian manner. Now, if I get her out of the way for ten
minutes, so that you can have an opportunity for proposing to Gwendolen,
may I dine with you tonight at Willis's?

Jack. I suppose so, if you want to.

Algernon. Yes, but you must be serious about it. I hate people who are not
serious about meals. It is so shallow of them.

(Enter Lane.)

Lane. Lady Bracknell and Miss Fairfax.

   * Next: Act I, Part 3

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The Scenes of the Play

   * Act I: Algernon Moncrieff's Flat in Half-Moon Street, W.
        o Part 1
        o Part 3
        o Part 4
        o Part 5
        o Part 6
        o Part 7
   * Act II: The Garden at the Manor House, Woolton.
   * Act III: Drawing-Room at the Manor House, Woolton

Transcription and organization by Jerry Stratton, for FireBlade
Publications. If you have any comments or questions, please let us know!
Jerry
jerry@acusd.edu
