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Definition of Dramatic Irony
Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a character's understanding of a given situation, and that of the... read full definition
Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a character's understanding of a given... read full definition
Dramatic irony is a plot device often used in theater, literature, film, and television to highlight the difference between a... read full definition
Key Examples in The Revenger’s Tragedy
Act 1, Scene 3
Explanation and Analysis—The Only Daughter:
In a scene rife with dramatic irony, Lussurioso unknowingly orders a disguised Vindice to serve as a “panderer” (or a “middleman” between a sex worker and a client) for his own sister. After offering to set up Lussurioso with any woman he chooses, the Duke’s eldest son reveals his deep desire for Castiza:
Vindice. You have gi’en it the tang, i’faith, my lord.
Make known the lady to me, and my brain
Shall swell with strange invention; I will move it
Till I expire with speaking, and drop down
Without a word to save me; – but I’ll work –Lussurioso. We thank thee, and will raise thee.
Receive her name: it is the only daughter to
Madam Graziana, the late widow.Vindice. [Aside] Oh, my sister, my sister!
Lussurioso. Why dost walk aside?
Vindice. My lord, I was thinking how I might begin,
As thus, ‘oh lady’ – or twenty hundred devices:
Related Themes:
Act 2, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—The Panderer:
The scenes in which Vindice assumes the disguise of a “panderer” (similar to a “pimp”) are heavily suffused with dramatic irony, as other characters do not realize that they are speaking with Vindice and behave very differently than they ordinarily would in his company. When Lussurioso unknowingly requests that Vindice “pander” his own sister and insinuates that Gratiana would approve, Vindice decides to test his mother’s virtue:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Vindice. You took great pains for her once when it was:
Let her requite it now, though it be but some.
You brought her forth, she may well bring you home.Mother. O heavens! This overcomes me.
Vindice. [Aside] Not, I hope, already?
Mother. It is too strong for me. Men know that know us,
We are so weak their words can overthrow us.
He touched me nearly, made my virtues ’bate
When his tongue struck upon my poor estate.Vindice. [Aside] I e’en quake to proceed.
My spirit turns edge? I fear me she’s unmothered, yet I’ll venture:
Related Themes:
Act 4, Scene 2
Explanation and Analysis—Satire of Lawyers:
In Act 4, Scene 2, Lussurioso orders the death of “Piato” who is in fact Vindice in disguise. In a turn of both dramatic and situational irony, he decides to find a new “panderer” and asks Hippolito about Vindice, who then assumes a new disguise as a lawyer. In their “first” meeting, Vindice offers a harsh satire of lawyers, a conventional target for satirical works in the early modern period:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Lussurioso. What, three and twenty years in law?
Vindice. I have known those that have been five and fifty, and all about pullin and pigs.
Lussurioso. May it be possible such men should breathe,
To vex the terms so much?Vindice. ’Tis food to some, my lord. There are old men at the present, that are so poisoned with the affectation of law-words – have had many suits canvassed – that their common talk is nothing but Barbary latin. They cannot so much as pray, but in law, that their sins may be removed, with a writ of error; and their souls fetched up on heaven with a sasarara.
