What term describes the act of inventing a fictional friend to avoid social obligations in the play?

• A. Evading
• B. Fabrication
• C. Bunburying
• D. Deception

Answer: (C)

The act being tested is a specific comic device Wilde coins in the play: Bunburying. Algernon creates an imaginary friend named Bunbury who needs his help, using this invented person as an alibi to dodge social obligations. That precise practice—inventing a fictitious companion to justify avoiding duties or society events—gets its own name in the text, and that name is Bunburying. It’s more than general evasion or deception; it’s a deliberately manufactured excuse that characters use to maintain a double life and pursue personal freedom without consequence. The other terms describe broader ideas (evading, fabrication, deception), but Bunburying points to the exact, play-specific mechanism Wilde uses for social satire.