A Woman of No Importance

The final act of A Woman of No Importance uses tropes from the genre of melodrama, which is a genre of Victorian theater that was popular due to its tendency to evoke strong emotions and create sensational stories. Mrs. Arbuthnot’s impassioned speech to Gerald is an example of melodrama. It convinces both Hester and Gerald to sympathize with her tragic plight by using heightened emotions, and it paints a striking contrast between the innocent Mrs. Arbuthnot and the nefarious Lord Illingworth. However, unlike many Victorian melodramas, which tended to be socially conservative and moralistic in tone, Wilde’s melodramatic ending empowers Mrs. Arbuthnot rather than humbling her. While many Victorian literary works used the trope of the fallen woman in melodrama, they typically ended with the woman seeking redemption and salvation. Instead, A Woman of No Importance asserts that Mrs. Arbuthnot does not want redemption; she rejects the respectable laws of society and fully embraces her motherhood.

Mrs. Arbuthnot’s actions and choices reflect the theme of Passion Versus Intellect, with her always choosing passion. Gerald wants to persuade Lord Illingworth to marry his mother and therefore make their past sexual encounter more honorable; however, Mrs. Arbuthnot refuses to marry a man whom she hates. Wilde hints that such hatred is reasonable and that their marriage would not be a happy one, causing Mrs. Arbuthnot to ultimately reject a chance to restore her reputation. In addition, Mrs. Arbuthnot refuses to spiritually repent for her sexual sin because of her motherly love for Gerald, telling him: “For, though day after day, at morn or evensong, I have knelt in God’s house, I have never repented of my sin. How could I repent of my sin when you, my love, were its fruit?” (161). By framing her lack of penitent guilt as a byproduct of her maternal instinct, Wilde implies that human nature will always be at odds with social rules. Mrs. Arbuthnot’s natural emotions toward Lord Illingworth and Gerald will not allow her to seek out redemption in the expected way, even when Lord Illingworth offers to marry her. She chooses to go with her emotions over the convenient, rational choice, which would have restored her reputation and would have given her son a title. The play portrays her choice as the morally correct one.

Mrs. Arbuthnot’s final confrontation with Lord Illingworth includes a satiric element in the melodramatic conclusion. As Lord Illingworth enters and speaks with Mrs. Arbuthnot, Gerald and Hester are absent, having gone outside to the garden together. The garden evokes both the idea of innocence and paradise, as in the Garden of Eden, but also implies the danger of the fall from grace. The ambiguity of these young lovers left alone in a garden while the former lovers argue inside unsettles the neatness of the happy ending. Similarly, the intense hatred that Mrs. Arbuthnot feels for Lord Illingworth and the rage that she displays disrupts her portrayal as the saintly melodramatic heroine. Importantly, the conversation concludes with her slapping Lord Illingworth. His line of dialogue directly before this is cut off prematurely by the slap, indicated by a dash at the end of his statement: “It’s been an amusing experience to have met amongst people of one’s own rank, and treated quite seriously too, one’s mistress and one’s—” (181). The abrupt end of the line creates uncertainty about his final word, as he could have said a more positive and regretful term like “son” or a more insulting slur like “bastard.” While the audience might be primed to sympathize with Mrs. Arbuthnot and rejoice in her happy ending, Wilde also subtly suggests that the audience might be hypocrites as well. The play itself is a comedy, and characters like Lord Illingworth are frequently given the funniest lines. Without Lord Illingworth and his tawdry humor, the play would lose its charm. So, the audience has enjoyed the witty repartee of these morally deficient characters and had an “amusing experience” by witnessing the story of a man who has mistreated his lover and ignored his son for much of his life; the audience has laughed with him rather than censuring him. Lord Illingworth’s witticisms are the fuel of the play, so with his exit, the play concludes.