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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
Key Examples in Lady Audley’s Secret
Volume 1, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—Blue, Green, and Opal:
As he sails back to England from Sydney, George Talboys looks over the side of the Argus and feels discontented with the view. Describing this, Braddon engages alliteration and situational irony to convey his discontentment and displeasure:
"How wearisome they are," he said; "blue and green, and opal; opal, and blue, and green; all very well in their way, of course, but three months of them are rather too much, especially—"
Related Themes:
Volume 1, Chapter 4
Explanation and Analysis—Supposed Barrister:
In this passage from Volume 1, the narrator uses verbal irony to offer a funny, biting commentary on the character Robert Audley:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Robert Audley was supposed to be a barrister. As a barrister was his name inscribed in the law-list; as a barrister he had chambers in Figtree Court, Temple; as a barrister he had eaten the allotted number of dinners, which form the sublime ordeal through which the forensic aspirant wades on to fame and fortune. If these things can make a man a barrister, Robert Audley decidedly was one.
Related Themes:
Volume 1, Chapter 5
Explanation and Analysis—Superior to Himself:
In this section from Lady Audley's Secret, the author uses a simile and situational irony to describe Robert's unexpected display of capability when faced with the crisis of the “recent death of Helen Talboys”:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[George] looked at him with a pitiful, bewildered expression. The big dragoon was as helpless as a baby; and Robert Audley, the most vacillating and unenergetic of men, found himself called upon to act for another. He rose superior to himself, and equal to the occasion.
Related Themes:
Volume 2, Chapter 13
Explanation and Analysis—Petty Woman's Tyranny:
In this segment of Lady Audley's Secret, the narrative uses hyperbolic language and dramatic irony to talk about Lady Audley's beauty and how it has made her selfish and self-obsessed:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Did she remember the day in which that fairy dower of beauty had first taught her to be selfish and cruel, indifferent to the joys and sorrows of others, cold-hearted and capricious, greedy of admiration, exacting and tyrannical with that petty woman's tyranny which is the worst of despotism?
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Explanation and Analysis—Bric-a-Brac:
Toward the end of the novel, Lady Audley is deeply uneasy amidst her many luxuries. This is because her enemies aren’t yet totally crushed. Her desire for revenge and loss of interest in the trappings of wealth is highlighted by her discomfort with her fancy possessions. These are briefly alluded to and then ironically dismissed as "bric-a-brac" in the following passage:
Unlock with LitCharts A+My lady shivered and looked round at the bright collection of bric-a-brac, as if the Sèvres and bronze, the buhl and ormolu, had been the moldering adornments of some ruined castle.
Related Themes:
Volume 3, Chapter 8
Explanation and Analysis—George's Real Fate:
In the novel’s final chapter, readers learn about George Talboys's survival before Lucy finds out herself. The situational irony comes into full effect when, having learned all the facts, Robert Audley writes Lucy a letter finally informing her of the truth:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Robert Audley wrote a long letter that evening, addressed to Madame Taylor, care of Monsieur Val, Villebrumeuse; a long letter in which he told the wretched woman who had borne so many names, and was to bear a false one for the rest of her life, the story that the dying man had told him.
"It may be some comfort to her to hear that her husband did not perish in his youth by her wicked hand," he thought, "if her selfish soul can hold any sentiment of pity or sorrow for others.”
Related Themes:
