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Imagery
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—Only a Snail:
The narrator rebukes the idea that the mark on the wall can be defined, philosophizing about its nature and the nature of life, more generally. This long, stream of consciousness contemplation becomes situationally ironic when someone interrupts the narrator's train of thought at the end of the story, revealing that the mark is a snail:
'It's no good buying newspapers . . . . Nothing ever happens. Curse this war; God damn this war! . . . All the same, I don't see why we should have a snail on our wall.'
Related Themes:
