Irony

Irony is a statement, situation, or action that actually means the opposite of its surface meaning. In a broad sense, irony is the recognition of the incongruity or difference between reality (what is) and appearance (what seems to be). In other words, it is said that irony is a literary device or figure of speech in which the intended meaning is opposite to the literal meaning. The main purpose of irony is to add depth, humor, or a dramatic twist to language, stories, or real-life situations.

There are several kinds of irony, though they are turned into two main categories: situational and verbal. situational irony refers to the contrast between what is intended or expected and what occurs. Here, the contexts may be primarily social, moral, or metaphysical, and here, irony can be further classified as comic or tragic. In tragic irony, the ostensible reasons for the hero’s downfall, whether it is the anger of the gods or his own relentless pursuit of an ideal, are undercut by psychological reasons of a more mundane sort. Here, Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim provides a good example of this. Comic irony uses similar kinds of juxtaposition to describe and deflate the social aspirations of its protagonists. Situational irony occurs when, for instance, a man is laughing uproariously at the misfortune of another even while the same misfortune, unbeknownst, is happening to him. One form of situational irony is called dramatic irony.

 In dramatic irony, we see that the audience understands the implication and meaning of a situation on stage, or what is being said, but the characters do not. It is common in tragedy and comedy. For example, in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, we see that Oedipus does not realize his crime.  Sir Peter Teazle (in School for Scandal) does not know his wife is behind the screen when he is talking about her to Joseph Surface.

Verbal irony is a figure of speech in which there is a contrast between what is said and what is actually meant. For example, when in Julius Caesar, Antony repeatedly insists that “Brutus is an honorable man,” he is being ironic. The ability to recognize such irony depends upon an appreciation of the particular linguistic, or sometimes more general social or moral, context. in speech, it is possible to indicate by tone of voice that the word ‘clever’ in the sentence ‘He is a clever chap’ is to be understood to mean ‘stupid’, but as this cannot be said to be any of the meanings of the word ‘clever’, the writer has to convey his sense obliquely. Irony is thus an art of juxtaposition and indirection, relying for its success on such techniques as understatement, paradox, puns, and other forms of wit in the expression of incongruities.