In Oscar Wilde’s play, “An Ideal Husband” Wilde’s touches upon and focuses on many different sorts of themes such as forgiveness and the past and also marriage. Out of all these many different themes that this play explores in society around the time of 1895, the one that stood out to me the most and I found most striking was the theme of Femininity. Throughout the time that this play took place, Femininity was a very uncommon occurrence to experience. However Wilde uses this theme in order to emphasize the dependency of a woman during that time. Wilde starts off by expressing his views on femininity by comparing two of the characters in his play. Both of these women represent two different roles of a woman. Wilde decides to chose Lady Chiltern who is innocent and to be the “standard” of how a woman should act and behave. On the other hand, Wilde chooses Mrs. Cheveley, who is somewhat humorous and she represents the opposite of Lady Chilteren. The women of the play, such as Lady Chiltren and Mrs. Cheveley all fulfill a major part in society of that time, and these Victorian women would also supply and provide a major part in the home life and as well the political sphere. These women were advised to be compliant mothers and wives and even forgivers in the public and more importantly at home.
During the play Lady Chiltern is seen as someone who is upright and honest, someone who is educated and also someone who is encouraging and understanding of her husbands job. She is looked upon as the the “model” woman. Lady Chiltern is a woman in the Victorian era who admires her husband because she thinks his very genuine and honorable. Later on the play, during act five, she also takes the role of a custodian and also a pardoner. In this …
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…ring the Victorian era, men were the one who were deemed to be the most powerful gender. Women were the ones who had moderate rights and at times were even almost believed to be as second class. If women wanted to work they only had a few options, unlike men, they had many options. As Oscar Wilde mentions throughout his play that the role of women was to be supportive of their husband and superintend the house. In my opinion I believe that Wilde stresses the role of women in society and the point that he is making across this whole play is that, rather expecting husbands to be flawless, women should instead just be supportive and loving. Thus, many of the women within the play have a complicated role. The agreement of women and men frequently seems a continuous struggle, but a struggle that would in the end be advantageous to if not all people, but to many others.
