Breakfast of Champions

by Kurt Vonnegut

Breakfast of Champions: Dramatic Irony 1 key example

Definition of Dramatic Irony

Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a character's understanding of a given situation, and that of the... read full definition
Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a character's understanding of a given... read full definition
Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a... read full definition
Chapter 23
Explanation and Analysis—Now It Can Be Told:

In Chapter 23, Dwayne reads Kilgore Trout's novel Now It Can Be Told and takes it as fact rather than fiction. The scene in which he avidly reads the novel is full of dramatic irony, since readers of Breakfast of Champions know that Trout's novel is a work of fiction, but Dwayne himself does not.

An example of this dramatic irony occurs when Dwayne reads the following passage:

He also programmed robots to write books and magazines and newspapers for you, and television and radio shows, and stage shows, and films. They wrote songs for you. The Creator of the Universe had them invent hundreds of religions, so you would have plenty to choose among. He had them kill each other by the millions, for this purpose only: that you be amazed. They have committed every possible atrocity and every possible kindness unfeelingly, automatically, inevitably, to get a reaction from Y-O-U.