(1)Good afternoon, dear *****, I hope you are behaving very well.
(2) Well, I am feeling very well, Aunt *******.
(1) That’s not quite the same thing. In fact, the two things rarely go together.
–Do you smoke?
–Well, yes, I must admit I smoke.
–I’m glad to hear it. A man should have an occupation of some kind.
ALGERNON: The only way to behave about a woman is to make-love to her if she’s pretty, and someone else if she’s plain.
GWENDOLEN
You have filled my tea with lumps of sugar, and though I asked most distinctly for bread and butter, you have given me cake. I am known for the gentleness of my disposition, and the extraordinary sweetness of my nature, but I warn you, Miss Cardew, you may go too far.
I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read on the train.
I now know the vital importance of being earnest.
I really don’t see what there is romantic about proposing. Why, one may be accepted, one usually is, I believe, and then – ha ha – the excitement is over. The very essence of romance is uncertainty.
It could be worse – I could be dead in Paris. Of a severe chill. A-choo.
Jack: How you can sit there, calmly eating muffins when we are in this horrible trouble, I can’t make out. You seem to me to be perfectly heartless.
Algernon: Well, I can’t eat muffins in an agitated manner. The butter would probably get on my cuffs. One should always eat muffins quite calmly. It is the only way to eat them.
Jack: I say it’s perfectly heartless, your eating muffins at all, under the circumstances.
Algernon: When I am in trouble, eating is the only thing that consoles me. Indeed, when I am in really great trouble, as anyone who knows me intimately will tell you, I refuse everything except food and drink. At the present moment I am eating muffins because I am unhappy. Besides, I am particularly fond of muffins. [ Rising. ]
Jack: [ Rising. ] Well that is no reason why you should eat them all in that greedy way. [ Takes muffins from Algernon. ]
Algernon: [ Offering tea cake. ] I wish you would have tea cake instead. I don’t like tea cake.
Jack: Good heavens! I suppose a man may eat his own muffins in his own garden.
Algernon: But you have just said it was perfectly heartless to eat muffins.
Jack: I said it was perfectly heartless of you, under the circumstances. That is a very different thing.
Algernon: That may be, but the muffins are the same. [ He seizes the muffin-dish from Jack. ]
The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately, in England at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever. If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes, and probably lead to acts of violence in Grovner Square.
To lose one parent, Mr. *******, may be regarded as a misfortune – to lose both looks like carelessness.
To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.
When one is in town, one amuses oneself. When one is in the country, one amuses other people. It’s excessively boring.
Page Topic: Movie Quotes from ‘Importance of Being Earnest, The’: Quotes from the movie ‘Importance of Being Earnest, The’