Empathy In The Victorian Era

An artificial world, full of greed and wealth, a place where all truth vanishes and only superficiality and materialism remains, this was the Victorian era. In the Victorian era, individual opinions and emotions were not considered. All that simply mattered were appearances, which stemmed from a universal lack of empathy. Empathy is an important factor and influence towards understanding character and sympathizing with others but a lack of empathy, along with the falsifications of reality is used to create and develop a sense of resilience. Resilience gives one the ability to ignore the negative opinions of others, while continuing to fulfill their desires, it is unaffected by empathy when one is already of wealth and status. In The Importance

Failing to understand one of the fundamental human desires, Lady Bracknell’s unempathetic wealth-driven persona makes her disapprove of Gwendolen and Jack’s love because Jack is not of inherent status. As an archetypal aristocrat and ruthless social climber, Lady Bracknell behaves in a way that socially discriminates others and excludes anyone who is not fit into her high class. Her disapproval of her daughter’s unsuitable marriage is a perfect example of how she disregards love for money. In the scene where the protagonist, Jack Worthing, allows himself to be interviewed by Lady Bracknell, Lady Bracknell demonstrates her superficial lack of empathy upon discovering the young man’s unusual origins. When Jack explains that he “was [found] in a hand bag” (127) and “lost both his parents” (126), instead of behaving empathetically, Lady Bracknell is shocked and displeased. In her eyes, relationships are arranged in hierarchy. She sees marriage solely as an alliance for property and social security, thus after hearing that Jack does not have aristocratic relations, she reacts with ignorance and negativity, the total opposite of a how a normal person would react. Furthermore, when Jack asks what he should do in this unsound