不可儿戏：一部给严肃人的轻喜剧

Part 1

Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” opens, subtitled “A Trivial Comedy for Serious People.” The cast: John Worthing (a Justice of the Peace), Algernon Moncrieff, Canon Chasuble, butler Merriman, manservant Lane, Lady Bracknell, her daughter Gwendolen Fairfax, Cecily Cardew, governess Miss Prism. The action moves from Algernon’s Half-Moon Street flat to a Woolton garden and drawing-room. St. James’s Theatre, under George Alexander, opened the play on February 14th, 1895.

Act One opens in Algernon’s morning-room to piano music next door. Lane prepares tea while Algernon boasts he plays with expression, not accuracy, reserving “science for Life.” Lane mentions cucumber sandwiches for Lady Bracknell; Algernon takes two and sinks onto the sofa. The ledger shows eight champagne bottles at a recent dinner with Lord Shoreman and Mr. Worthing. Lane attributes their disappearance to “the superior quality of the wine”—married households rarely stock first-rate champagne. Algernon finds marriage “so demoralising”; Lane admits he married once, “in consequence of a misunderstanding between myself and a young person.” Algernon dismisses the topic.

Lane returns to announce “Mr. Ernest Worthing.” Jack enters and exchanges pleasantries. He claims to have come for “pleasure” and ribs Algernon about refreshment. Country life is “excessively boring”—in town one amuses oneself, in the country other people—and he has horrid Shropshire neighbours he never speaks to.

Spotting cucumber sandwiches and tea, Jack is astonished at Algernon’s “reckless extravagance.” Algernon explains Aunt Augusta and Gwendolen are coming—Augusta will disapprove of Jack’s flirtation with Gwendolen. Jack admits he came expressly to propose; Algernon finds this unromantic—“the very essence of romance is uncertainty. If ever I get married, I’ll certainly try to forget the fact.” Jack retorts the Divorce Court was invented for people with such memories.

Cucumber sandwiches are for Aunt Augusta, bread and butter for Gwendolen. Algernon snaps at Jack, forbidding the match: girls never marry men they flirt with, and Gwendolen is his first cousin. He demands Jack explain “the whole question of Cecily,” but Jack protests he knows no one of that name. Algernon asks Lane for the cigarette case Mr. Worthing left, inspects the inscription, and reads: “From little Cecily with her fondest love to her dear Uncle Jack.” Jack squirms, claiming Cecily is his aunt at Tunbridge Wells, then chasing Algernon for the case. Algernon notes a small aunt cannot call her nephew “uncle,” and produces a card reading “Mr. Ernest Worthing, B. 4, The Albany,” pocketing it as proof.