IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/h/spr/sprchp/978-3-031-23015-8_2.html
   My bibliography  Save this book chapter

Three Types of Dramatic Irony

In: Power and Responsibility

Author

Listed:
  • Timo Airaksinen

    (University of Helsinki)

Abstract

What is dramatic irony? To answer, we need a minimal definition and its two extensions: doxastic asymmetry, meaning differences, and missed ironies on stage. The first one tends to ignore the ironic status of dramatic irony. Why call it irony? Yet, scholars utilize it as a self-evidently valid definition. I explore the mutual relations of these three definitions starting with Peter Goldie’s views. My main result is that the three types of dramatic irony are all interconnected so that they together show what dramatic irony is. I utilize Kafka’s novels, Euripides’ Bacchants, Sophocles’ Ajax, Machiavelli, and certain Biblical narratives. I discuss the problem of ironic alienation and the Brechtian Verfremdung-effect and contrast them to the thesis that dramatic irony makes the affected characters on stage look and feel sympathetic. Typically, irony entails power imbalance, distancing and alienation, and, perhaps, criticism, too.

Suggested Citation

  • Timo Airaksinen, 2023. "Three Types of Dramatic Irony," Springer Books, in: Martin A. Leroch & Florian Rupp (ed.), Power and Responsibility, pages 15-30, Springer.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-23015-8_2
    DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-23015-8_2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-23015-8_2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.