The Importance of Being Earnest

Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest is one of the most celebrated comedies in the English language—a sparkling satire of love, marriage, identity, and the elaborate conventions of Victorian society.

Jack Worthing leads a respectable life in the country, where he is guardian to the young Cecily Cardew. But whenever he wishes to escape to London, he assumes the identity of his imaginary brother, Ernest. His friend Algernon Moncrieff has devised a similar strategy, inventing an invalid friend named Bunbury whenever social obligations become inconvenient.

Their carefully constructed deceptions soon collide. Jack hopes to marry the sophisticated Gwendolen Fairfax, while Algernon becomes fascinated by Cecily—and both women are particularly determined to marry a man named Ernest. What follows is an increasingly absurd tangle of secret identities, romantic misunderstandings, formidable relatives, and unexpected revelations.

A timeless comedy of manners whose wit remains as irresistible today as when it first appeared on the London stage.