Previous
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
Chapter 3
Explanation and Analysis—Heaviest Lumber:
J. pompously instructs the reader to get rid of things they don't need, but his opinions on owning things don’t seem very consistent. In chapter 3, the author employs metaphor, simile, and situational irony to convey J.'s hypocritical perspective on material possessions. As he is frantically packing for the Thames trip, J. laments:
oh, heaviest, maddest lumber of all! – the dread of what will my neighbour think, with luxuries that only cloy, with pleasures that bore, with empty show that, like the criminal’s iron crown of yore, makes to bleed and swoon the aching head that wears it!
Related Themes:
Chapter 4
Explanation and Analysis—Funeral Bell:
As the "three men" decide what to pack, J. tells an anecdote about the time he made the ill-fated decision to deliver some incredibly stinky cheese for a friend. He combines verbal irony and hyperbole to amplify the comic effect of this tall tale, where his good intentions end in disaster:
Unlock with LitCharts A+I called for the cheeses, and took them away in a cab. It was a ramshackle affair, dragged along by a knock-kneed, broken-winded somnambulist, which his owner, in a moment of enthusiasm, during conversation, referred to as a horse. I put the cheeses on the top, and we started off at a shamble that would have done credit to the swiftest steam-roller ever built, and all went merry as a funeral bell, until we turned a corner.
Related Themes:
Chapter 17
Explanation and Analysis—Plaster Trout:
J. and George have been sitting in a pub in Wallingford, listening to a series of people earnestly tell them how they caught a famous prize trout that hangs on the wall. Jerome uses situational irony to reveal that the fabled trout is actually made of plaster of Paris:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We thought it strange and unaccountable that a stuffed trout should break up into little pieces like that. And so it would have been strange and unaccountable, if it had been a stuffed trout, but it was not. That trout was plaster of Paris.
Related Themes:
Chapter 19
Explanation and Analysis—Pleasant Chat:
In the penultimate scene of the novel, Jerome employs situational irony to highlight the characters' self-important hypochondria. The novel ends close to where it starts, with the characters discussing their imaginary ailments:
Unlock with LitCharts A+This naturally led to some pleasant chat about sciatica, fevers, chills, lung diseases, and bronchitis; and Harris said how very awkward it would be if one of us were taken seriously ill in the night, seeing how far away we were from a doctor.
Related Themes:
