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Definition of Verbal Irony
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean. When there's a hurricane raging outside and someone remarks "what... read full definition
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean. When there's a hurricane raging... read full definition
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean... read full definition
Key Examples in Sense and Sensibility
Chapter 1
Explanation and Analysis—Ill-disposed John:
When Austen describes Elinor and Marianne’s half-brother John Dashwood (who has inherited their home after the death of their father and forces them to move out), she uses verbal irony:
He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather cold hearted, and rather selfish, is to be ill-disposed: but he was, in general, well respected.
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Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—How Comfortable:
Near the start of the novel, Fanny Dashwood tries to convince her husband John that his half-sisters don’t need more than 1,500 pounds a year each to live off of (after he has proposed 3,000 pounds), inadvertently using verbal irony:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“Altogether, they will have five hundred a year amongst them, and what on earth can four women want for more than that? They will live so cheap! Their housekeeping will be nothing at all. They will have no carriage, no horses, and hardly any servants; they will keep no company, and can have no expences of any kind! Only conceive how comfortable they will be!”
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Chapter 32
Explanation and Analysis—You're Still in Town:
In an example of verbal irony, Lucy Steele communicates to Elinor how glad she is to find her still in town when she, in fact, means the opposite, given her awareness of Elinor and Edward’s love for each other:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“I should have been quite disappointed if I had not found you here still,” said she repeatedly, with a strong emphasis on the word. “But I always thought I should. I was almost sure you would not leave London yet awhile; though you told me, you know, at Barton, that you should not stay above a month. But I thought, at the time, that you would most likely change your mind when it came to the point […] And now to be sure you will be in no hurry to be gone. I am amazingly glad you did not keep to your word.”
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Chapter 34
Explanation and Analysis—Mrs. Ferrars:
In an example of verbal irony, Austen describes Mrs. Ferrars—Edward’s mother—as if she is complimenting her when really she is criticizing her:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression; but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill nature. She was not a woman of many words: for, unlike people in general, she proportioned them to the number of her ideas.
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