Perfection and the consequences that result from a society (and the people who exist within it), with unrealistic expectations is the core of Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband. Mrs. Cheveley describes the state of their society's expectations best when she states to Sir Robert Chiltern, “In old days nobody pretended to be a bit better than his neighbors. In fact, to be a bit better than one's neighbor was considered excessively vulgar and middle-class. Nowadays, with our modern mania for morality, every one has to pose as a paragon of purity, incorruptibility, and all the other seven deadly virtues - and what is the result?”.
Therein lies the perfect question. What is the result of a society that expects too much from the people who make up that society?
According to Mrs. Cheveley, the answer to the question posed above is, “You all go over like ninepins - one after the other” . In other words, scandal ensues from any breach of propriety, regardless of how big or small, and the person around whom the scandal surrounds is forever a pariah. Scandal in today's world doesn't have the same effect as it would have had in Victorian England. Sure we love a good scandal, but it doesn't necessarily mean the banishment of the person involved. In fact, many times it can push the career of someone further than if the scandal hasn't existed, giving credence to the saying, “There's no such thing as bad publicity.” In Victorian England, however, scandal would have ruined anyone.
Sir Robert Chiltern is a man seen by society as having an impeccable reputation - he is above and beyond reproach. That, in itself, carries with it a burden of unimaginable proportions. Add to that a wife who has placed him on a pedestal and states, “All your life you have stood apart from others. You have never let the world soil you. To the world, as to myself, you have been an ideal always” .
Imagine having to carry that on your shoulders. It is human nature to strive to be the best, but striving for perfection is a battle always lost.
Imagine further being blackmailed for something one did eighteen years previously - something that would, beyond a shadow of a doubt, place an indelible black mark on an otherwise perfect character.
Mrs. Cheveley's blackmail of Sir Robert Chiltern with the knowledge, and a letter to prove it, that he began his fortune by selling cabinet secrets concerning the Suez Canal, threatens to bring about his demise both in society and in his wife's eyes. No one, aside from Sir Robert Chiltern and Mrs. Cheveley know of his youthful transgression, and if it were known Sir Robert, in the words of Mrs. Cheveley, would be “hounded out of public life…” .
Additionally, Lady Chiltern, though she knows nothing of this secret, would withdraw her love and affection from her husband. Society has its expectations of perfections, and so does Lady Chiltern who vehemently exclaims that, “One's past is what one is. It is the only way by which people should be judged” . In that statement there is no room for anything other than perfection, and in holding to that belief she denounces her husband.
Of all the characters, Lord Goring seems to be the only person with a sensible head on his shoulders. Initially, we think he's nothing more than a dandy - he plays the societal game well, but by the end of the play he is much wiser than those around him. Lord Goring single-handedly rids society of Mrs. Cheveley's presence by blackmailing her with a stolen bracelet in exchange for returning the letter with which she is blackmailing Sir Robert, reconciles Sir Robert and Lady Chiltern after she finds out about his youthful transgression, and prompts Lady Chiltern to answer the question of what constitutes an ideal husband by stating that there is no such thing, because the concept is based on the idea of perfection; something which, by its very nature, is impossible.
