1. Introduction 1.1 Research background Oscar Wilde, a glaring star in English literature, was considered to be among the most significant writers in the 19th century. He was a representative figure of Victorian British aestheticism who had produced us several classical works, which teemed with wittily humor and acrimoniously sarcasm in the typical Victorian society which was a multiple contradictory era. As he once said when he was gonging to addressing speeches in America”I have nothing to declare except my genius.” Oscar Wilde was a language genius full of ideas and originality and was regarded as the four peaks of British drama player, with Shakespeare, Jonson and Sheridan. I have nothing to declare except my genius. The Importance of Being Earnest has been considered as the most successful social comedy among Oscar Wilde#8217;s works, as instead of pursuing serious plots, he focused on building a comic world for dandies and absurd situations , which embodies Wilde#8217;s deconstruction and transformation of the real world and constructs its own logic through paradox, illusion and contradiction. Presents a pure prodigal world that embodies style, skill and form of revelry. In this play, the traditional concepts of morality and gender have been searched and reconstructed. Therefore, this paper is about to explore the complicated usage of ”earnest” under the Victorian Society in this remarkable play. As one of Wilde#8217;s most representative works, the discussion on The Importance of Being Earnest could have a profound effect on the nowadays social circumstances. . 1.2. Literature review Oscar Wilde, has been investigated by lots of scholarson different perspectives，including self-identity，aesthetics，gender awareness, the criticism of traditional literature and the pessimistic view of love． When it comes to The Importance of Being Earnest ,some critical thought it was nothing but trifles and nonsense, while others he4ld the view that this show revealing on the problems of identity and truth and stressing the balance between sport and seriousness. Different opinions aroused at home and abroad. Most critics focused on the translation, the principles of the corporation or the duality of character. However, seldom questions have been asked about the ”Earnestness" in the whole work, so this paper is determined to analyze the ”Earnestness" in both moral and art directions. Wu Tianming(2012)[ 要举一两个例子,同时指出这些学者说这些话时的年代，像模版里列出的那样。

] thought that The Importance of Being Earnest was filled with wisdom and powerful satire to the ladies and gentlemen in the upper class through constructing a kind of dandiacal Utopia. Wilde used his incomparable linguistic talents to create lots of absurd coincidences which led to a series logical accidents, which could be concluded as ”out of imagination and within the logics” as he used all the grotesque cases to point out which seems to pretty normal in the top class.Li Jun(2002) consider this play was a totally parody. Here is the very witty pun: Ernest, the name of the fake character, sounds similar to earnest which means real and sincerely. It is definitely ironic that name a sham man truth while this is the centre of the whole paradox. This play was written before Oscar Wilde was thrown into the prison because of the scandal, so the commentators believed this was finished during his heyday, which was one of the reasons why it attracted so much attention when the time passed on. When reading his works, critics often inevitably put his pieces and his personal life together. The pros and cons of this phenomenon are rather complicated. Li Jia[ 同上。

]cai(2012) assumed that his tragedy was due to the limits of the entirely era, nothing could happen if he lived in ancient Grace or in the Morden society, but it just a nice hypothesis. Even in today#8217;s society which has the maximal tolerance of homosexual, the fate is still covered by fog if he indulged him in that too much. Anyway, the relationship between the society and the artists is another topic requiring much discussion and deep thoughts. Generally speaking, most of Oscar Wilde's comedies were a melodrama that were popular in the 19th century in Britain and France. Especially the there comedies which were released before the The Importance of Being Earnest #8212;#8212; Lady Windermere's Fan, A Unimportant woman and The ideal husband.These comedies stress the complicated structure of plot pursuing the compact climax repeated misunderstanding clusters of coincidence which always lead to the theme that kind always defeat the evil. The protagonist who stuggling through misunderstanding and crisis would meet a satisfactorily ending. To conclude, this paper is based on the the cultural and historic background of Oscar Wilde and The Importance of Being Earnest, talking about the research on the duality of ”earnestness" in this play. 1.3.Conclusion It is well-known that The Importance of Being Earnest is a excellent play in the world literature.This is typical a story about the mockery of Victorian Society and the hypocrisy of the upper-class members. Using a fake identity to propose to a girl is absurd enough, but the fake name, Ernest, is the only name that the girl would accept. It seems like that a magnetic characteristic worth penniless in front of a idyllic name. Love begin with delusion. Works Cited Chen, Li.[陈丽]，谎言的艺术#8212;#8212;论王尔德《真诚的重要性》. 北京: 外语教学,2014,(2). Li，Jiacai.[李家才]，现实#183;现代#183;后现代#8212;#8212;王尔德喜剧《认真的重要性》多元解读. 绵阳: 剑南文学: 经典教苑, 2012,(11). Li，Peipei; Li， Changyin.[李蓓蓓;李昌银]，论王尔德《认真的重要》中双关语的应用. 哈尔滨: 北方文学, 2015,0(07). Liu，Maosheng.[刘茂生]，艺术与道德的冲突与融合：王尔德创作. 北京: 社会科学文献出版社：2015. Oscar.Wilde; Sun，Yixue.[王尔德；孙宜学]，《奥斯卡#183;王尔德自传》. 北京：团结出版社，2005.5. Tzvetan Todorov; Zhu，Jing.[茨维坦#183;托多罗夫;朱静]，走向绝对. 上海:华东师范大学出版社：2014. Yang，Ni.[杨霓]，王尔德”面具艺术”研究：王尔德的审美性自我塑造.北京:中国社会科学出版社，2017. Zhang，Yuling; Chen, Li.[张玉玲;陈丽]，《认真的重要性》中唯美主义与道德的关系. 绥化: 绥化学院学报, 2017,(05). Zhong，Daiqing.[钟岱青]，从语用模糊和会话策略的角度分析《真诚的重要性》的人物刻画.西宁: 兰州教育学院学报: 2012,28(3). Outline 1. Introduction 1.1 Introduction of the story 1.2 Oscar Wilde#8217;s main works and his aesthetic theory 2. Literature Review 2.1 Literature review of western studies of Oscar Wilde 2.2 Literature review of The Importance of Being Earnest 3. The "Earnestness" in The Importance of Being Earnest 3.1 The Main figures depicted in book 3.1.1 Jack Worthing 3.1.2 Algernon Moncrieff 3.2 The ridiculous plot of the story 3.2.1 The structure 3.2.2 The usage of ”Earnest” 4. Themes in The Importance of Being Earnest 4.1 The absurd character of the book 4.2 The ridiculous love in the story 4.3 The happy end of the story 5. Conclusion