Irony

Irony is a contrast between apparent and intended meaning, or between expectations and events. It can create emphasis, humor, or criticism.

Verbal irony: A figure of speech in which a speaker’s intended meaning contrasts with the literal meaning of the words. This is irony produced through a mismatch between what is said and what is meant.
Expectation: A belief or anticipation about what is likely to happen or be true. Situational irony depends on an outcome that diverges from an established expectation.
Satire: A mode of expression that uses humor, wit, or ridicule to expose folly and criticize people or institutions. Satire often relies on ironic contrast to expose the gap between ideals and conduct.
Oedipus Rex: A tragedy by Sophocles in which Oedipus seeks the cause of a plague and discovers his own role in it. The audience knows Oedipus’s identity before he does, making his investigation dramatically ironic.
Situational irony: A mismatch between what is expected to happen and what actually happens. This is irony expressed through events rather than a speaker’s wording.
Context: The surrounding circumstances that shape how an expression or event is interpreted. Context lets an audience infer intended meaning beyond a statement’s literal wording.
Tragicomedy: A dramatic genre combining tragic and comic elements, often without a purely tragic or happy ending. Irony can make tragic and comic aspects of the same situation coexist.
The Gift of the Magi: A short story by O. Henry about a couple who each sacrifice a treasured possession to buy a gift for the other. The couple’s gifts become unusable through their mutual, unexpected sacrifices.
Dramatic irony: A narrative situation in which an audience knows something important that a character does not. The audience’s knowledge creates a contrast between a character’s understanding and the story’s reality.
Implicature: Meaning conveyed indirectly through an utterance rather than stated explicitly. Verbal irony often communicates its intended meaning through implication.

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