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Situational Irony
Explanation and Analysis—Gentle with Liza:
In Part 2, Chapter 6, the narrative uses situational irony when The Underground Man describes his conversation with Liza:
“Oh, I’m not interrogating you. What do I care? Why are you angry? Of course, you may have had your own troubles. What’s it to me? Just the same, I’m sorry.”
“For whom?”
“I’m sorry for you.”
“No need . . . ,” she whispered barely audibly and stirred once again.
That provoked me at once. What! I was being so gentle with her, while she . . .
As the reader has witnessed The Underground Man berating and judging Liza for pages because of her life choices, the last thing they would expect is for him to refer to his words as "gentle." Readers can see that he is pressuring her with all of his rhetorical questions, demanding to know why she feels the way she does and giving a non-apology when she asks him about it. This moment is therefore ironic, as the reader would expect him to be aware that he is treating her poorly, but he instead says the unexpected: that he is treating her with gentleness.
This irony shows how The Underground Man does not fit in with society. He believes he is being gentle with Liza and understanding with other people, but he is in fact being abrasive and rude. This trait, on top of other discontent with Petersburg society, leads him away from society and to the underground.
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