'Comedies leave readers and audiences with a final sense of joy' To what extent do you agree with this view?
Incorporating The Importance of Being Earnest and the AQA Comedy Poetry Anthology.
'Comedies leave readers and audiences with a final sense of joy' To what extent do you agree
with this view?
Plan
YES; it's a neat ending in Earnest with 3 marriages rewarding the initial motives for
entering into a union (name) ‘I’ve now realised for the first time in my life the vital
Importance of Being Earnest’, Jack and Algernon have actually been truthful all along
'it is a terrible thing for a man to find out suddenly that all his life he has been
speaking nothing but the truth’ thus upholding the moralistic society
NO; is it joyous though? Marriages appear superficial based on the name alone and
merely a social instrument, Jack and Algernon weren't truthful in intention and only
in actuality (what difference does it make?), both have led double lives which cannot
be easily overlooked 'my name is Ernest in town and Jack in the country’ (link to
Victorian society) - tinge of tragedy or just satire?
YES; or is it just satire (horatian), satirical elements can prove the ultimate source of
joy as in Not My Best Side, comedy forces us to look at ourselves and recognise how
ridiculous we behave ‘I have diplomas in Dragon Management and Virgin
Reclamation. My horse is the latest model, with automatic transmission and built-in
Obsolescence’, the unexpected sexual innuendo of the maiden ‘He was so nicely
physical, with his claws and lovely green skin, and that sexy tail’ and the absurd
vanity of the dragon (clear in the title)
NO; even Not My Best Side contains some elements that prohibit joy such as the
pre-determined fates for women 'a girl’s got think of her future’, same as Earnest
'An engagement should come on a young girl as a surprise… it is hardly a matter that
she could be allowed to arrange for herself’, overall there is a suggestion of a lack of
love in forming a union (based only on custom) in both texts, Cecily embraces her
inferiority ‘(Men) have moments of physical courage of which we women know
absolutely nothing’, sickeningly anti-feminist
NO; Larkin does not spare us the graphic detail of the poster's vandalism in Sunny
Prestatyn in order to emphasise the lack of humanity and artistic thought associated
with the act ‘a tuberous cock and balls’ (possible rape imagery), we feel further
repulse at the author's apparent pride ‘Autographed Titch Thomas’, then ‘Now Fight
Cancer is there’ - there is a tinge of tragedy which signifies the end of the joke
Response
For comedies to leave readers and audiences with a final sense of joy, there would
have to be a complete resolution of all prior obstructions to the comic ending and an
absence of serious social criticism. However, Larkin's graphic denunciation of the over-
sexualised vandalism in Sunny Prestatyn as well as the anti-feminist tones of The Importance
of Being Earnest and Not My Best Side, whereby both contain female characters who are left
with little choice but to marry superficially-matched suitors, suggest that comedies may
instead leave its readers with unease and a desire to see social change. Nevertheless, it is
possible that such criticism can be deemed easy satire, through which all three writers seek
to delight their readers and audiences with linguistic play and comic inversions.
Indeed, a joyous reaction is certainly a viable possibility in Earnest as the curtain
closes with the typical three marriages expected of the comic play. Importantly, the unions
of Gwendolen and Jack, and Cecily and Algernon, are based on motives for marriage that are
clearly fulfilled as Gwendolen and Cecily achieve their dreams of marrying someone called
'Ernest'; the play ends with Jack's neat appreciation of '(realising) for the first time in (his)
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