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Imagery
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
Key Examples in Cry, the Beloved Country
Book I, Chapter 6
Explanation and Analysis—Beautiful Names:
Msimangu takes Stephen Kumalo for a tour of Johannesburg in Chapter 6. Along the way, he acquaints his fellow minister with the racial inequities—and deep ironies—that run through the city. Nowhere are those contradictions more visible than in the “garbage heap” of Claremont, a community of natives sandwiched between two European ones:
They walked down Lily Street, and turned off into Hyacinth Street, for the names there are very beautiful
Related Themes:
Book I, Chapter 11
Explanation and Analysis—Arthur’s Death:
In Chapter 11, news comes swiftly of Arthur Jarvis’s death. Having just settled down in Msimangu’s church, Stephen Kumalo finds out about the murder in a devastatingly ironic moment:
Unlock with LitCharts A+This is a terrible loss for South Africa, said the white priest. For this Arthur Jarvis was a courageous young man, and a great fighter for justice. And it is a terrible loss for the Church too. He was one of the finest of all our young laymen.
Related Themes:
Book I, Chapter 12
Explanation and Analysis—Shrinking Lives:
Speaking through an eerie, plural first-person perspective, the novel’s narrator takes up the voice of a white population that shifts uneasily in response to reform proposals. Chapter 12’s vaguely collected voices whisper an ironic contradiction to the reader:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We shall live from day to day, and put more locks on the doors, and get a fine fierce dog when the fine fierce bitch next door has pups, and hold on to our handbags more tenaciously; and the beauty of the trees by night, and the raptures of lovers under the stars, these things we shall forego.
Related Themes:
Book I, Chapter 13
Explanation and Analysis—Kumalo’s Pain:
Stephen Kumalo’s less-than ideal arrival into Johannesburg—in which he gets robbed of his entire life’s savings—is only the least of his worries. While visiting Ezenzeleni in Chapter 13, he reflects on his recent spate of ironic misfortunes:
Unlock with LitCharts A+His thoughts turned to the girl, and to the unborn babe that would be his grandchild. Pity that he a priest should have a grandchild born in such a fashion. Yet that could be repaired… Yet where had they failed? What had they done, or left undone, that their son had become a thief, moving like a vagabond from place to place, living with a girl who was herself no more than a child, father of a child who would have had no name?
Related Themes:
Book II, Chapter 21
Explanation and Analysis—Apartheid Oppression:
Arthur Jarvis airs South Africa’s ironies in his writings and speeches. As James Jarvis rifles through his dead son’s essays in Chapter 21, the novel shares a diagnosis of a country plagued by impossible contradictions—a diagnosis that makes use of verbal irony:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We believe in the brotherhood of man, but we do not want it in Africa. We believe that God endows men with diverse gifts, and that human life depends for its fullness on their employment and enjoyment, but we are afraid to explore this belief too deeply. We believe in help for the underdog, but we want him to stay under.
Related Themes:
Book II, Chapter 25
Explanation and Analysis—Kumalo’s Apology:
Through dramatic irony, the novel’s tension peaks in Chapter 25 as James Jarvis and Stephen Kumalo meet. Kumalo visits Margaret Jarvis’s home one afternoon to ask about Sibeko's daughter and, more importantly, seek forgiveness:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Jarvis knew this was not rudeness, for the old man was humble and well-mannered, so he came down the steps, saying, Are you ill, umfundisi? But the old man did not answer. He continued to tremble, and he looked down on the ground, so that Jarvis could not see his face, and could not have seen it unless he had lifted the chin with his hand, which he did not do, for such a thing is not lightly done.
Related Themes:
