Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Connection of Hard Times to The Importance of Being Earnest-Bret O'Brien
The question of of marriage is one that appears frequently in both Hard times and another great victorian critique: The importance of Being Earnest. Both Oscar Wilde and Dickens question the way that marriage is used as a social institution, contrasting it with the love it is intended to represent. In looking back at The Importance of being Earnest, it appears that Wilde depicts marriage to be solely a matter of “business”. Furthermore, he seems to exagerate the business-like nature of marriage in this age to critique what it had truly become: a shallow means to manipulate social position, income, and power. The parralels that I felt were apparent in Hard Times went beyond the time period, to the message, and the satirical means of supporting his message. Similar to how Wilde exaggerated the bussiness-like nature of marriage, Dickens uses Louisa's marriage to Mr. Bounderby to represent the very same idea (in that is was determined by her father and based on wealth) but ultimately, the marriage's failing reflects the shallow nature of Victorian age marriage.
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I agree with you that the reasons or the conditions of the marriages are very interesting. Another parallel in the Importance of Being Earnest is that the two women wanted to marry whoever was the essence, or the "person", named Earnest. They wanted to marry someone who had that certain title and a set of characteristics. In Hard Times, Bounderby wanted to marry Louisa, who (in her own words) has nothing but "a great wilderness"(208) where "the garden that should haved bloomed" (208) was, signifying that she had no fancy, or nature of the heart, and was empty. She, in a way, wasn't even a whole person, but was to marry, while in Earnest the "whole person" was imaginary. The satirical elements of both texts could be suggesting that one needs that fancy and nurturing of the heart as well as a truthful stance in life.
ReplyDelete-Jessica K.