Irony in Everyday Life :: Irony Essays

In general, a discrepancy between appearances and reality is irony. Irony is encountered thoughout our daily activies and comes in many forms; verbal, situational, and cosmic. Verbal irony is the most familiar kind, this occurs when we understand that the speaker's meaning is far from the usual meaning. For example, Sally rushes all morning to get to the parking lot early, only to find her space taken, she then exclaims,"This is exacly why I rushed, just so I can hunt for a empty space." We understand that she is not happy, and that her meaning is not literal. A form of verbal irony is sarcasm, this is when the statement made is ironic, but it is bitter, coarse, and vulgar. An example of this is, a Beth says to Sally (who is covered in mud), "Oh Sally, you look so nice today!" The comment from Beth is made out of spite, simply to be rude and unkind. Sally understands that Beth's real meaning is not what was said. The second form of irony is situational, this form is often confused with cosmic, the difference between the two is minimal. Situational irony is contradiction between what is expected to happen and happens. In cosmic irony the contradiction takes place, but a supernatural force is said to smoking campain, smokes. It would not be ironic for Kim to smoke, however the circumstances make the situation ironic. However; Anne, the head of MADD, on her way to a meeting with the organization, is struck by a drunk driver and dies, not knowing that the drunk driver,who survives without a scratch, was her son. This is an example of both situational and cosmic irony. The situation is ironic but, a supernatural force seems to have created the situation. An example of the third form of irony, cosmic, is found in the story "The Necklace," in which a wife loses a diamond necklace that was lended to her, she and her husband work ten years to pay back the money they lended to buy a new necklace, only to discover the original necklace was fake.