Lady Bracknell Quotes And Analysis

Front 1

"I'm sorry if we are a little late, Algernon, but I was obliged to call on dear Lady Harbury. I hadn't been there since her poor husband's death. I never saw a woman so altered; she looks quite twenty years younger."

Back 1

Wilde uses a paradox; the audience would expect Bracknell to comment on how awful her friend looked following the death of her husband. The fact that she looks 'quite twenty years younger' implies that she is a lot happier single than she was when married. This is a subtle dig at marriage; challenges the view that marriage completes a person.

Front 2

"Well, I must say, Algernon, that I think it is high time that Mr. Bunbury made up his mind whether he was going to live or to die."

Back 2

Here, Wilde uses a hyperbole. It is ridiculous to imply that a person can simply decide whether they want to live or die, and this highlights the fact that Bracknell is a very cruel, insensitive character. Conforms to the stereotype that Bracknell is a power-wielding Victorian matriarch.

Front 3

"To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness."

Back 3

Once again, this accentuates Lady Bracknell's insensitivity, as she implies that it is bad enough to lose one parent but it is down to carelessness if one loses both - which is not something that Jack had any control over as he was so young! Trying to insinuate that something could have been done to prevent the loss of his parents?

Front 4

"To be born, or at any rate bred, in a hand-bag, whether it has handles or not, seems to me to display a contempt for the decencies of family life that reminds one of the worst excesses of the French Revolution."

Back 4

This is a huge hyperbole as it is, of course, impossible to be 'bred in a hand-bag'. Wilde uses this remark in order to create a sarcastic tone; she is being sarcastic about not knowing Jack's parentage and, as a result, the social status into which he was born.