In The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Wilder uses dramatic irony to communicate the literary fame that Doña Maria's letters will attain after her death. In one of her many letters to her daughter, Doña Clara, Doña Maria references Uncle Pio's humorous personality, writing that:
If he weren’t so disreputable I should make him my secretary. He could write all my letters for me and generations would rise up and call me witty.
This is an instance of dramatic irony, because the narrator has already stated explicitly that Doña Maria's letters will become a Peruvian literary touchstone in the centuries after her death. By suggesting that Uncle Pio would be able to improve her letters, Doña Maria shows that she doesn't comprehend her own genius. By contrast, the reader understands the situation far more accurately than she does.
Moments such as this one remind the reader that although the novel plumbs the interior lives of its protagonists, it is governed by an omniscient narrator who knows far more than they do. Moreover, this instance of dramatic irony helps to develop the theme of art and memory. Through Doña Maria's misapprehension of her own talents, the book suggests that great art happens when people least expect to create it. While Brother Juniper sets out to write an important theological treatise and fails miserably, Doña Maria creates literature of lasting value when she expresses her feelings with sincerity and vulnerability.
