In Oscar Wilde’s An Ideal Husband, I’d like to talk about Mrs. Cheveley, because she embodies a strong sense of feminism.
Mrs. Cheveley is passionate about politics. She said, “Politics is my only joy……I prefer politics. I think politics is more…..right.” The author for Mrs. Cheveley’s image is not glorious, as she has been a thief since the age of students, but it is such a bad woman, however, she embodies a strong feminist characteristics. Therefore, if Mrs.Chiltern is the embodiment of justice, then from the angle of Dualism, the devil in the play is Mrs. Cheveley. She is almost in contradiction with every major character in the play, especially the confrontation with the two men, and it is the most fascinating scenario of the play. This is precisely the most vivid manifestation of Mrs. Cheveley’s distinctive struggle for women’s discourse power in the male-dominated society.
Mrs. Cheveley was ambitious. She walked among men and was extremely good at using her beauty to achieve her goals. Her wits with Sir Robert Chiltern and Lord Goring are the main clues for the development of the whole scenario. Just as Sir Robert Chiltern was alive in the spring, Mrs. Cheveley appeared with a secret enough to make him ruined; and when Lord Goring was determined to express love to Miss Mabel, the woman who symbolized her past life in the sky was unexpected. Such opposition and conflict can be described by Wilde's ingenious design. The boundary between good and evil can only collapse completely in a flash, which fully reflects the fact that the “evil” of Mrs. Cheveley and the “good” of others are in the eyes of the author. In fact, there is no difference. As the "culprit" of various contradictions, Mrs. Cheveley is actually the most flamboyant figure in the drama. The self-consciousness and rebellious spirit it embodies have the meaning of transcending the times.
Women play a very important role in this drama, and the emergence of female figures subtly promotes the development of dramatic plots. The departure of Mrs. Cheveley made Sir Robert Chiltern, who had been above and above him, momentarily go to destruction, and Mrs. Chiltern became the angel to save her husband. Mrs. Cheveley played a "male" role in the play. She used Chiltern's scandal to criticize him. What differs from the previous drama is that women are strong here. She has the initiative and men are passive. Wilde had arranged the plot so that a woman, not a man, acted as a leader, and had a great relationship with the social background at that time. At the end of the 19th century, western feminism rose, and more and more women demanded equal rights with men. They demanded the right to political elections and issued their own voices. From Mrs. Cheveley we can see Oscar Wilde's writing intentions: The weak in real society may also unexpectedly become strong and become a force that cannot be ignored.
Mrs. Cheveley, who was modeled by Wilde, is a figure different from Victoria's traditional women. Victoria's upper class women are social, not political. But Mrs. Cheveley was involved in a political world that was men. She thought politics was a more savvy game. She is an extremely intelligent woman, and Viscount Lord Goring praised her as “a genius in the day and a beauty in the night.” She knew how to make the best move for her. In order not to hurt her economy, she managed to ride Sir Chiltern successfully. For her own love, she tempted the Viscount Lord Goring to marry himself by returning the letter as a stack. Although in the end, she lost in this contest. What she lost was not her own but the Victorian patriarchal society. Her failure was also the failure of Victorian women to seek their own rights.
My first impression of Mrs. Cheveley was shrewd and witty, but she never treated people with sincerity. Therefore, Mrs. Cheveley would use some shameful means to seek wealth and status. She even uses her own body and personality to achieve her goals. But at the same time, Mrs. Cheveley will also realize her own value through continuous efforts to find a place in the men’s society. The French feminist Beauvoir has said that in a relationship with a man, a woman is the "other" and a woman does not become a woman, but becomes a woman in the day after tomorrow. What is the typical Victorian female image? It will be a housewife who teaches at home and will have a tea party to chat with other ladies. But Mrs. Cheveley completely broke the shackles of the family and became an ambitious woman. She had enough courage to threaten Sir Chiltern, but also dared to bargain with him. This must be seen as an indication that Mrs. Cheveley also wanted to have the same social status as men. She wants to transcend the hierarchy of male and female inferiority inherent in society. But her scheming and improper means, as well as her strong desire for status and wealth, have degraded her, and she eventually failed to achieve her goal.
Mrs. Cheveley is one of the many female images in Oscar Wilde's works. These female images subvert the traditional female patriarchal literature in the image of women. Traditional women's literary images are mostly "angels" or "adventurous women." However, Mrs. Cheveley, written by Wilde, is a person with a soul. She has her own unique ideas, dares to pursue, dares to resist, and has the spirit of a new era of women. But her thoughts are inevitably mixed with limitations. She is not a perfect angel, but she is definitely not an evil slut.
The discovery of Mrs. Cheveley's true self and striving to achieve self-worth, the courage to get rid of the male control and fight with the male power society, and boldly pursue the characteristics of the new era of love and happiness, all of them tell Oscar Wilde's concern and insistence on feminism, and also have far-reaching influence on the development of feminist literature.
By 惠丽莹
