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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
Irony
Explanation and Analysis—Unlocking:
Situational irony runs beneath the surface of Oskar's central quest. He spends months convinced that the mysterious key he found in a vase in his father's closet must open something deeply meaningful, some final message or puzzle designed just for him. The reality is far more ordinary. The key belongs to a stranger that Oskar's father bought the vase from at a garage sale, and it opens a safe deposit box.
Related Themes:
Chapter 17, “Beautiful and True”
Explanation and Analysis—Talking to a Stranger:
One of the novel's most poignant uses of dramatic irony is Oskar's relationship with "the renter," a mute older man who moves into his grandmother's apartment. To Oskar, the renter is a stranger with whom he can share his story. What Oskar doesn't realize, and what the reader comes to know, is that the renter is actually his grandfather, Thomas Schell Sr., who abandoned the family decades earlier.
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Related Themes:
