Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of being Earnest

Many of our readings venture to explore the links between love, sex, and finances, both outside of marriage and within it. Some of the comedic works we have read explicitly present us with sex worker characters. Others trace the elaborate ways in which their characters attempt to disguise their participation in stark exchanges of emotion and sex for wealth, security, and/or influence. Examine how humour is used in engaging with the idea that love and sex can become a form of currency. Is this use of humour ever empowering to the characters or to the groups they represent? Consider to what extent the theory we have read can be used to frame this examination.

Use: Billig, Michael. “Victorian Relief Theory.” Laughter and Ridicule: Towards a Social Critique of Humour
and Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest (Dover) as two of the sources