Wilde’s writing throughout “The Canterville Ghost” is littered with all manner of ironies, particularly in the context of the ghost’s relationship with the Otis family. When Mrs. Otis first encounters the ghost in Chapter 3, for instance, her response generates situational irony within the narrative:
He accordingly laughed his most horrible laugh, till the old vaulted roof rang and rang again, but hardly had the fearful echo died away when a door opened, and Mrs. Otis came out in a light-blue dressing gown. "I'm afraid you are far from well," she said, "and have brought you a bottle of Dr. Dobell's tincture. If it is indigestion, you will find it a most excellent remedy."
Mrs. Otis responds to the Canterville Ghost's hauntings not with fear or terror, but with what the narrator seems to consider characteristic American practicality. As Wilde satirizes Gothic fiction, passages like this draw attention to genre conventions by undermining them, surprising the reader with characters who respond in unconventional ways to supernatural phenomena. As a woman, Mrs. Otis might be expected to respond to the ghost’s presence by fainting or falling ill; instead, she offers the ghost a tincture to heal his ailments. She does not contract her own illness from supernatural phenomena, like a Gothic heroine; rather, she approaches the supernatural beings that haunt her home with all the calm tenacity of a nurse or doctor.
In Chapter 4, the Canterville Ghost bemoans his lack of success in terrorizing the American family. As he wallows in self-pity, the ghost engages in a rash of ironic behavior, particularly when compared to Gothic genre tropes. In one such passage, the ghost acts as an ailing young woman typically might in fiction at the time:
[The ghost] contented himself, as a rule, with creeping about the passages in list slippers, with a thick red muffler round his throat for fear of draughts, and a small arabesque, in case he should be attacked by the twins.
In both Gothic and sentimental fiction, the sick or infirm—yet beautiful—young woman often features as a romantic figure. Such young women are often seen to be fainting at the sight of blood, or of a ghost; or, more common for the Gothic genre, it is women who believe and are aware of the dangers of the supernatural realm before their skeptical male counterparts. In such instances, it is often the female characters who experience the physical illness and side effects that accompany encounters with malicious supernatural forces.
One can observe the presence of this trope within “The Canterville Ghost” itself, as the ghost recounts the physical maladies his presence has effected in the various women who’ve lived at Canterville Chase over the years. It is ironic, then, that the ghost himself should be experiencing those same physical maladies, and from encounters with a mischievous (living) American family, no less. In an amusing turn of events, the supernatural being is ailed by human infirmities.
