Monday, July 27, 2009
4th Learning Log, Hongye, 2RSP (28)
Tuesday. Were a disasterous day for people who didn't do their literature essay. They were told to stand for the whole lessons, as they didn't hand up their essay on time. Followed on, we were about to learn the meaning of Irony. There's 4 main type of Irony, which is basically categorised in 4 different groups. Verbal Irony, Situational Irony, Dramatic Irony and lastly, Tragic Irony. However, we only learnt verbal, situational and dramatic irony.
Verbal irony is a deliberate comment of what you do not mean. In other words, it's a sarcasm comment we made nastily to mock at a person or a thing. For example, Mr Chua 'said' that he is handsome, however, he do not mean that, he is actually wanting to said it like a joke and make us laugh. Which failed, and we had to entertain him by laughing.
Situational irony is that there is a difference between expected and actual results. For example, in Romeo and Juliet, the readers or audience will normally think that in the end, Romeo will be together with Juliet and live together forever after. But unexpectedly, Romeo thought that Juliet is dead and eventually, he killed himself by drinking the poisonous potion. There was a situational irony as the result of the whole story was different from what the reader or audience expected.
Dramatic irony exists when a character in a literary or dramatic work perceives a situation in a limited way while the reader or audience is aware of a greater significance. For example, also in Romeo and Juliet, the readers or audience know exactly what happened. But Romeo didn't know that Juliet had actually taken a potion which makes her appear to be died, or rather to be sleeping for a very long time. Then, Romeo thought that Juliet is died, and he committed suicide. Being a reader or audience, we'll normally felt sad for Romeo and Juliet, because Romeo is unaware about the situation and this had led to a huge change in the whole story. The audience or reader will felt very agitated and wonder why Romeo would not want to wait for a long while? And both of them could be together. However, these are not under our control.
Irony can be used to expose pretence and self-deception in mankind, and show up in an amusing way. It can also be used to express anger in the form of fierce or wounding criticism that arouses the reader's indignation or anger. It also shows the tragedy or sadness of a situation.
Be My Romeo / Juliet
