As a society, we never seem to tire of ranking things. Whether it is the American Film Institute’s list of the one hundred greatest movies or the weekly top video countdown, the need to name something “The Best” is universal. So it is not surprising that someone created a list of the greatest wits of all time. Shakespeare naturally made the cut, as did Oscar Wilde. The real curio, however, is Oasis musician Liam Gallagher. Really? Gallagher aside, the pairing of Shakespeare and Wilde struck me. Do these two writers share anything other than wit?

Wilde’s life and career were notoriously cut short by the famous trial over “the love that dare not speak its name.” Still, in his brief life, Wilde produced some of the sharpest comedies ever written about high society. His most famous of these is the mistaken-identity charmer The Importance of Being Earnest. Yet, how does this work line up against that of Shakespeare? Mistaken identity and double identity (which figure so prominently in Earnest) certainly show up in Shakespeare’s comedies. Twelfth Night and As You Like It feature cross-dressing heroines; The Comedy of Errors boasts not one but two sets of mixed-up twins; and A Midsummer Night’s Dream features a quartet of lovers, just like Earnest. Overall, however, the two writers create more of a contrast than a comparison. Both were witty and clever, but the snidely dry Wilde and the play-to-the-rafters Shakespeare made people laugh for very different reasons.

Posted Wed, 17 Oct 2007 16:56:31 and filed under Comedy, The Comedy of Errors, A Midsummer Night's Dream, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, Theatre. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.