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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 822.8
EAN: 9780140436068
ISBN: 0140436065
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 464
Publication Date: 2001-03-01
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2001-02-27
Studio: Penguin Classics

Oscar Wilde was at once a family man and a homosexual outsider, a socialite, socialist, and Irish nationalist. His contradictions inspired him to ponder the roles and masks donned in conventional society, and his acute and wry insights are wonderfully displayed in this collection of his essential plays. Known not only for his brilliant, epigrammatic language, but also for his sense of theatrical design, color, and staging, Wilde created an enduring body of finely crafted works, whose delights and ironies still speak to modern audiences. In addition to Lady Windermere's Fan, Salomé, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, A Florentine Tragedy, and The Importance of Being Earnest, this edition contains an introduction, notes and commentaries, and an excised scene from The Importance of Being Earnest.

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A handbag?
Review: I consider these to plays to be probably the most entertaining that we have in the English language. Shakespeare, they're not, but that is precisely why they can be enjoyed by a modern audience. Don't get me wrong, when shakespeare is good he's the tops (much ado about nothing, taming o. the shrew), but even with these plays one has to put one's sixteenth century english cap on, and start thinking in english like that renaissance bard did. What's more, with shakespeare, even the comedies had some serious dark, somber undercurrents. None of that with Wilde. Everything is left to the wit of language, which is ample, and usually uproarious. You really owe yourself the opportunity to become acquainted with these plays. Go out and watch a stage or film production of these plays if you can...

Which is the best play out of the three presented here? Importance of Being Earnest, no question.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Not so funny
Review: I have decided that since so many people are obviously blind to how dumb this play is, I should write a review to enlighten anyone that might read it. The humor is dated and because of that, very boring. The situations are completely inconceivable and it makes no sense! The characters are flat and serve no real purpose. I suggest that no one else ever ever read this play.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: THE BEST EDITION OF THE PLAYS...
Review: All you Wildeans take note: this is the only edition of the plays wherein the lines are properly numbered for specific citation and easy reference: very, very important!!

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The Importance of the whole Text
Review: An extraordinary play; witty, profound and beautiful. And even better if you read all of it. Which you won't if you buy the Penguin copy with Edith Evans on the front, since this version is heavily abridged. Which is fine except the publishers make no mention of this at all in the volume. And cultural vandalism of this kind should, I feel at least be acknowledged.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: It Is Impotant To Be Earnest
Review: I had no knowledge of Oscar Wilde and had only seen ten minutes of the movie, The Importance of Being Earnest, as I flipped through the cable channels on my television. However, due to a class that I am enrolled in, not only do I now know who he is but I am blessed to have been introduced to his work.

The Importance of Being Earnest, makes a very humorous yet profound commentary on money, marriage, status and image as it pertains to the aristocracy of that time. It seems that Oscar Wilde utilized this medium of artistic expression to cleverly expose the twisted way that those with wealth perceived themselves and the lengths they would go to the preserve that perception. It has been referred to as a "comedy of manners" because so much of what defined or distinguished the aristocracy from the common man was not necessarily the wealth that they actually had but what men and women did to appear like they had it.

Ernest, who is the main character in the play, has done all of what is necessary to appear as though he comes from wealth. He wears the clothing, keeps the company and talks the talk of the aristocrat. However what he soon finds out is that all of those whom he is trying to impress and fit in with, have more unresolved issues in their closet than he does. I believe Wilde addresses this social paradox with impeccable wit and an amazing sense of human psychology. He not only challenged those who belonged to the aristocracy to examine what they placed value in, but continues to challenge each reader today, that these superficial values might not stand as valuable at all.

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