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Definition of Irony
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how they actually are. If this seems like a loose definition... read full definition
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how they actually are. If this... read full definition
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how... read full definition
Act 4
Explanation and Analysis—Forgive my Fondness:
At the start of Act 4, Antony asks Dollabella to tell Cleopatra of his departure. Almost as an afterthought, in an exemplary moment of dramatic irony, Antony wavers before also asking Dollabella to inform her that his heart would break if she were ever to take another lover:
Wilt thou forgive my fondness this once more?
Tell her, though we shall never meet again,
If I should hear she took another love,
The news would break my heart. Now I must go,
For every time I have returned, I feel
My soul more tender, and my next command
Would be to bid her stay, and ruin both.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—The Harshest Words:
In Act 4, Dollabella goes to deliver Antony’s parting message to Cleopatra. However, in an act of dramatic irony, when Cleopatra asks him for the message—confident that it was tender and loving—he instead chooses to lie with a selfish viciousness that results in multiple broken hearts:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Cleopatra: “The message then
I know was tender, and each accent smooth,
To mollify that rugged word, ‘Depart’.”Dollabella: Oh, you mistake: he chose the harshest words;
With fiery eyes and with contracted brows,
He coined his face in the severest stamp,
And fury shook his fabric like an earthquake:
He heaved for vent, and burst like bellowing Etna
In sounds scarce human, ‘Hence, away forever;
Let her begone, the blot of my renown,
And bane of all my hopes:
Let her be driven as far as men can think
From man’s commerce: she’ll poison to the centre!’
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—Every Man's Cleopatra:
In Act 4, Ventidius and Octavia try to convince Antony that Cleopatra has betrayed him by taking up with Dollabella. However, their attempt is full of dramatic irony, as the audience knows that no such sordid affair has taken place:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Ventidius: [Dollabella] went by your command,
Indeed ’tis probable, with some kind message,
For she received it graciously: she smiled, And then he grew familiar with her hand,
Squeezed it, and worried it with ravenous kisses.
She blushed, and sighed, and smiled, and blushed again;
At last she took occasion to talk softly,
And brought her cheek up close, and leaned on his,
At which he whispered kisses back on hers,
And then she cried aloud that ‘constancy
Should be rewarded.
Related Themes:
Act 5
Explanation and Analysis—Art Thou Dead?:
In Act 5, Alexas tells Antony that Cleopatra has killed herself, leading him to mournfully lament the death of his beloved and, soon after, take his own life. Of course, the audience knows that Cleopatra is not dead at all and is instead hiding inside her monument. Thus, Antony’s heartfelt lament in the passage below is an excellent example of dramatic irony:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Then art thou innocent, my poor dear love?
And art thou dead?
Oh those two words! Their sound should be divided:
Hadst thou been false, and died; or hadst thou lived,
And hadst been true—but innocence and death!
This shows not well above. Then what am I,
The murderer of this truth, this innocence?
Thoughts cannot form themselves in words so horrid
As can express my guilt!
Related Themes:
