Wilde's final play again returns to the theme of switched identities: the play's two protagonists engage in "bunburying" (the maintenance of alternative personas in the town and country) which allows them to escape Victorian social mores. "Earnest" is even lighter in tone than Wilde's earlier comedies. While their characters often rise to serious themes in moments of crisis, "Earnest" lacks the by-now stock Wildean characters: there is no "woman with a past", the principals are neither villainous nor cunning, simply idle cultivés, and the idealistic young women are not that innocent. Mostly set in drawing rooms and almost completely lacking in action or violence, "Earnest" lacks the self-conscious decadence found in "The Picture of Dorian Gray" and "Salome".