An Ideal Husband

Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 1895

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Summary

Background

Act Summaries & Analyses

Act I

Act II

Act III

Act IV

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Background

Authorial Context: Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin, Ireland, and later studied at Oxford University before moving to London. After delivering lectures across America and England, Wilde became an editor of Lady’s World Magazine in 1885. During this time, he also married and fathered two children with Constance Lloyd, a wealthy Englishwoman. Shortly after their marriage, Wilde would produce his most recognized works, including his well-known novel The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). At the time of its publication, it was widely criticized as immoral because the protagonist pursued pleasure at any price.

In the novel’s preface, Wilde argued for the aesthetic value of such a work. This was in keeping with Wilde’s broader philosophy of aestheticism. During his time in London, before he was imprisoned for his relationships with other men and then exiled to France, Wilde became one of the founders of this movement, creating work that privileged craft while simultaneously critiquing Victorian morals—something evident in An Ideal Husband, which uses wit and satire to reveal the hypocrisy of Victorian high society.

Literary Context: Aestheticism

Aestheticism is a movement spanning roughly 1860-1900 that privileged “art for art’s sake,” or creating to make something beautiful rather than to express a particular viewpoint. This belief directly contrasted with that of mainstream Victorian culture, which maintained that art should teach a lesson or moral; Victorian Realism, for example, frequently commented on the social conditions of 19th-century society while broadly upholding values such as industry, religiosity, and domesticity. Art and literary critic Walter Pater (1839-1894) was a founding figure in aestheticism, which was also influenced by the midcentury Pre-Raphaelite movement and by turn-of-the-century French Symbolism.

Oscar Wilde was a leader of the aesthetic movement and frequently advocated for it in his works. Aestheticism generally privileges beauty and luxury—values Lord Goring is frequently admonished for holding by his father. Lord Goring is also referred to as a “dandy,” or a man who emphasizes his appearance and grooming, thus embodying the theme of Life as Art. Wilde himself cultivated an image as a dandy and uses the figure of the dandy as a vessel for his critique of Victorian hypocrisy in relation to marriage and politics. Aestheticism is therefore also key to the play’s exploration of Fashionable Morality Versus Authentic Marriage and love.

Historical Context: The Victorian Era

The Victorian Era, which dates from approximately 1820 until 1914 in British history and spanned the reign of Queen Victoria, was defined by its staunch moral attitudes and emphasis on class and gender roles. In upper- and middle-class society, the “Cult of True Womanhood” confined women to the domestic sphere and defined their goodness by their submissiveness, their purity, and their commitment to their husbands. Women were not supposed to venture out into the world but were instead meant to remain a fixture in the home, where their mere moral presence would quell the anxieties and fears of their husbands. This ideology is in part what Wilde critiques in An Ideal Husband, suggesting that these gender roles do not protect—but might in fact destroy—a marriage. More broadly, this critique challenges the ideology that women are only meant for the domestic sphere and men for public or political life.