Lady Windermere’s Fan quotes

Still seated L.C. Oh, nowadays so many conceited people go about Society pretending to be good, that I think it shows rather a sweet and modest disposition to pretend to be bad. Besides, there is this to be said.

If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t.

Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism.

Leaning back on the sofa. You look on me as being behind the age.—Well, I am!

I should be sorry to be on the same level as an age like this.

You think the age very bad?

Do you know I am afraid that good people do a great deal of harm in this world. Certainly the greatest harm they do is that they make badness of such extraordinary importance.

It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious.

I take the side of the charming, and you, Lady Windermere, can’t help belonging to them.

The adjective was unnecessary, Lord Darlington.

I couldn’t help it. I can resist everything except temptation.

You have the modern affectation of weakness.

Don’t say that, Duchess.

As a wicked man I am a complete failure.

Why, there are lots of people who say I have never really done anything wrong in the whole course of my life. Of course they only say it behind my back.

Oh, men don’t matter. With women it is different. We’re good. Some of us are, at least. But we are positively getting elbowed into the corner.

Our husbands would really forget our existence if we didn’t nag at them from time to time, just to remind them that we have a perfect legal right to do so.

It’s a curious thing, Duchess, about the game of marriage—a game, by the way, that is going out of fashion—the wives hold all the honours, and invariably lose the odd trick.

Why do you talk so trivially about life, then?

Because I think that life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it.

Moves up C.

Coming down back of table. I think I had better not, Duchess.

Nowadays to be intelligible is to be found out.

Goodbye! Shakes hands with Duchess. And now—goes up stage Lady Windermere, goodbye. I may come tonight, mayn’t I? Do let me come.

Smiling. Ah! you are beginning to reform me.

It is a dangerous thing to reform anyone, Lady Windermere.

Bows, and exit C.

Oh, all of them, my dear, all of them, without any exception. And they never grow any better.

Men become old, but they never become good.

Windermere and I married for love.

That’s quite right, dear.

Crying is the refuge of plain women but the ruin of pretty ones.

Agatha, darling!

C. I am not going to give you any details about her life. I tell you simply this—Mrs. Erlynne was once honoured, loved, respected. She was well born, she had position—she lost everything—threw it away, if you like. That makes it all the more bitter.

Misfortunes one can endure⁠—they come from outside, they are accidents. But to suffer for one’s own faults⁠—ah!⁠—there is the sting of life.

It was twenty years ago, too. She was little more than a girl then. She had been a wife for even less time than you have.

Now, tonight I am not at all well. Been dining with my people. Wonder why it is one’s people are always so tedious? My father would talk morality after dinner. I told him he was old enough to know better.

But my experience is that as soon as people are old enough to know better, they don’t know anything at all.

Hallo, Tuppy! Hear you’re going to be married again; thought you were tired of that game.

Oh, you mustn’t dream of such a thing.

It’s most dangerous nowadays for a husband to pay any attention to his wife in public. It always makes people think that he beats her when they’re alone.

The world has grown so suspicious of anything that looks like a happy married life. But I’ll tell you what it is at supper. Moves towards door of ballroom.

R.C.

No, dear Lord Augustus, you can’t explain anything. It is your chief charm.

Ah! if you find charms in me, Mrs. Erlynne—

Goes to door of ballroom and looks in. I have heard the most shocking things about her. They say she is ruining poor Windermere. And Lady Windermere, who goes in for being so proper, invites her! How extremely amusing!

It takes a thoroughly good woman to do a thoroughly stupid thing.

You are to lunch there on Friday!

I am—to myself.

I am the only person in the world I should like to know thoroughly; but I don’t see any chance of it just at present.

They pass into the ballroom, and Lady Windermere and Lord Darlington enter from the terrace.

You are right—you are terribly right. But where am I to turn? You said you would be my friend, Lord Darlington.—Tell me, what am I to do? Be my friend now.

Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.

I love you—

You did not know it then—you know it now! Leave this house tonight. I won’t tell you that the world matters nothing, or the world’s voice, or the voice of society. They matter a great deal. They matter far too much.

But there are moments when one has to choose between living one’s own life, fully, entirely, completely⁠—or dragging out some false, shallow, degrading existence that the world in its hypocrisy demands.

You have that moment now. Choose! Oh, my love, choose.

Awful manners young Hopper has!

Ah! Hopper is one of Nature’s gentlemen, the worst type of gentleman I know.

Sensible woman, Lady Windermere. Lots of wives would have objected to Mrs. Erlynne coming. But Lady Windermere has that uncommon thing called common sense.

Laughing. Then we will talk of it on the terrace. Even business should have a picturesque background. Should it not, Windermere?

With a proper background women can do anything.

Won’t tomorrow do as well?

You have a delightful opportunity now of paying me a compliment, Windermere. But you are not very clever at paying compliments. I am afraid Margaret doesn’t encourage you in that excellent habit. It’s a great mistake on her part.

When men give up saying what is charming, they give up thinking what is charming.

But seriously, what do you say to £2,000? £2,500, I think. In modern life margin is everything. Windermere, don’t you think the world an intensely amusing place? I do!

I am afraid Margaret doesn’t encourage you in that excellent habit. It’s a great mistake on her part. When men give up saying what is charming, they give up thinking what is charming. But seriously, what do you say to £2,000? £2,500, I think.

In modern life margin is everything.

Windermere, don’t you think the world an intensely amusing place? I do!

What can I do? I feel a passion awakening within me that I never felt before. What can it mean? The daughter must not be like the mother—that would be terrible. How can I save her? How can I save my child?

A moment may ruin a life.

Who knows that better than I? Windermere must be got out of the house; that is absolutely necessary. Goes L. But how shall I do it? It must be done somehow. Ah!

Arthur must have read my letter by this time. If he cared for me, he would have come after me, would have taken me back by force. But he doesn’t care. He’s entrammelled by this woman—fascinated by her—dominated by her.

If a woman wants to hold a man, she has merely to appeal to what is worst in him.

We make gods of men and they leave us. Others make brutes of them and they fawn and are faithful. How hideous life is! … Oh! it was mad of me to come here, horribly mad.

But he doesn’t care. He’s entrammelled by this woman—fascinated by her—dominated by her. If a woman wants to hold a man, she has merely to appeal to what is worst in him.

We make gods of men and they leave us. Others make brutes of them and they fawn and are faithful.

How hideous life is! … Oh! it was mad of me to come here, horribly mad.

Go back to my husband, Mrs. Erlynne. He belongs to you and not to me. I suppose he is afraid of a scandal.

Men are such cowards. They outrage every law of the world, and are afraid of the world’s tongue.

But he had better prepare himself. He shall have a scandal. He shall have the worst scandal there has been in London for years. He shall see his name in every vile paper, mine on every hideous placard.

You don’t know what it is.

One pays for one’s sin, and then one pays again, and all one’s life one pays.

You must never know that.—As for me, if suffering be an expiation, then at this moment I have expiated all my faults, whatever they have been;

None! That is why it interests me.

My own business always bores me to death. I prefer other people’s.

Have something to drink, you fellows. Cecil, you’ll have a whisky and soda?

Oh!

Wicked women bother one. Good women bore one.

That is the only difference between them.

Puts his hands on his shoulders.

Now, Tuppy, you’ve lost your figure and you’ve lost your character. Don’t lose your temper; you have only got one.

My dear boy, if I wasn’t the most good-natured man in London—

We’d treat you with more respect, wouldn’t we, Tuppy? Strolls away.

The youth of the present day are quite monstrous. They have absolutely no respect for dyed hair.

Lord Augustus looks round angrily.

Oh! gossip is charming! History is merely gossip. But scandal is gossip made tedious by morality. Now, I never moralise.

A man who moralises is usually a hypocrite, and a woman who moralises is invariably plain.

There is nothing in the whole world so unbecoming to a woman as a Nonconformist conscience. And most women know it, I’m glad to say.

Oh! gossip is charming!

History is merely gossip. But scandal is gossip made tedious by morality.

Now, I never moralise. A man who moralises is usually a hypocrite, and a woman who moralises is invariably plain. There is nothing in the whole world so unbecoming to a woman as a Nonconformist conscience. And most women know it, I’m glad to say.

Just my sentiments, dear boy, just my sentiments.

Sorry to hear it, Tuppy; whenever people agree with me, I always feel I must be wrong.

My dear boy, when I was your age—

With a sigh.

Good heavens! how marriage ruins a man! It’s as demoralising as cigarettes, and far more expensive.

You’ll play, of course, Tuppy?

Pouring himself out a brandy and soda at table. Can’t, dear boy. Promised Mrs. Erlynne never to play or drink again.

Now, my dear Tuppy, don’t be led astray into the paths of virtue. Reformed, you would be perfectly tedious.

That is the worst of women. They always want one to be good. And if we are good, when they meet us, they don’t love us at all. They like to find us quite irretrievably bad, and to leave us quite unattractively good.

I don’t think we are bad. I think we are all good, except Tuppy.

No, we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Sits down at C. table.

A married woman, then!

Well, there’s nothing in the world like the devotion of a married woman. It’s a thing no married man knows anything about.

Oh! she doesn’t love me. She is a good woman. She is the only good woman I have ever met in my life.

Lighting a cigarette. Well, you are a lucky fellow! Why, I have met hundreds of good women. I never seem to meet any but good women.

The world is perfectly packed with good women. To know them is a middle-class education.

This woman has purity and innocence. She has everything we men have lost.

I congratulate you, my dear fellow.

In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.

The last is much the worst; the last is a real tragedy! But I am interested to hear she does not love you. How long could you love a woman who didn’t love you, Cecil?

That is a great error. Experience is a question of instinct about life. I have got it. Tuppy hasn’t. Experience is the name Tuppy gives to his mistakes. That is all. Lord Augustus looks round indignantly.

Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.

Standing with his back to the fireplace. One shouldn’t commit any. Sees Lady Windermere’s fan on sofa.

It’s no use talking to Tuppy. You might just as well talk to a brick wall.

But I like talking to a brick wall⁠—it’s the only thing in the world that never contradicts me!

Tuppy!

Oh, if he knows—how can I look him in the face again? He would never forgive me. Touches bell. How securely one thinks one lives—out of reach of temptation, sin, folly. And then suddenly—Oh!

Life is terrible. It rules us, we do not rule it.

Did your ladyship ring for me?

For even if she doesn’t tell, I must. Oh! the shame of it, the shame of it. To tell it is to live through it all again.

Actions are the first tragedy in life, words are the second. Words are perhaps the worst.

Words are merciless. … Oh! Starts as Lord Windermere enters.

Arthur, Arthur, don’t talk so bitterly about any woman. I don’t think now that people can be divided into the good and the bad as though they were two separate races or creations.

What are called good women may have terrible things in them, mad moods of recklessness, assertion, jealousy, sin. Bad women, as they are termed, may have in them sorrow, repentance, pity, sacrifice.

And I don’t think Mrs. Erlynne a bad woman—I know she’s not.

With an amused smile.

My dear Windermere, manners before morals!

Returning. I’m afraid it is very flattering—I am not so pretty as that. Showing photograph.

Shrugging her shoulders.

Don’t use ugly words, Windermere. They are vulgar.

I saw my chance, it is true, and took it.

That is stupid of you, Arthur; in real life we don’t do such things—not as long as we have any good looks left, at any rate.

No⁠—what consoles one nowadays is not repentance, but pleasure. Repentance is quite out of date.

And besides, if a woman really repents, she has to go to a bad dressmaker, otherwise no one believes in her. And nothing in the world would induce me to do that. No; I am going to pass entirely out of your two lives.

That is stupid of you, Arthur; in real life we don’t do such things—not as long as we have any good looks left, at any rate. No—what consoles one nowadays is not repentance, but pleasure. Repentance is quite out of date.

And besides, if a woman really repents, she has to go to a bad dressmaker, otherwise no one believes in her.

And nothing in the world would induce me to do that. No; I am going to pass entirely out of your two lives. My coming into them has been a mistake—I discovered that last night.

I am sorry now I did not tell my wife the whole thing at once.

I regret my bad actions. You regret your good ones⁠—that is the difference between us.

I don’t trust you. I will tell my wife. It’s better for her to know, and from me. It will cause her infinite pain—it will humiliate her terribly, but it’s right that she should know.

We all have ideals in life. At least we all should have. Mine is my mother.

Ideals are dangerous things. Realities are better.

They wound, but they’re better.