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Definition of Verbal Irony
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean. When there's a hurricane raging outside and someone remarks "what... read full definition
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean. When there's a hurricane raging... read full definition
Verbal irony occurs when the literal meaning of what someone says is different from—and often opposite to—what they actually mean... read full definition
Verbal Irony
Explanation and Analysis—Good Country People:
The title of “Good Country People” is an example of verbal irony. This is because, while many characters in the story are described as “good country people,” none of them actually are. As readers learn over the course of the story, all of the characters treat one another with condescension or cruelty (or, at the very least, think unkind thoughts about one another), making them far from simple and “good” country people.
The following passage—in which the Bible Salesman reveals to Hulga that he is a seedy con man—captures the irony of the phrase “good country people” being applied to him:
The boy was unscrewing the top of the flask. He stopped and pointed, with a smile, to the deck of cards. It was not an ordinary deck but one with an obscene picture on the back of each card. “Take a swig,” he said, offering her the bottle first. He held it in front of her, but like one mesmerized, she did not move.
Her voice when she spoke had an almost pleading sound. “Aren’t you,” she murmured, “aren’t you just good country people?”
Here, the Bible Salesman drinks from a flask, pulls out pornographic playing cards (making sure that Hulga notes their pornographic nature), and tries to get Hulga to drink with him. In response, Hulga speaks in a “pleading” voice, asking him, “Aren’t you […] aren’t you just good country people?” Hulga’s disbelief here demonstrates that, because of the Salesman’s lower class position and lack of formal education, she has judged him to be a simple “good country person” and cannot accept that he is a complex and able to manipulate her.
The verbal irony of the title comes at many points in the story, but this moment is perhaps the most obvious. O’Connor encourages readers to internalize the lesson along with Hulga that they should let go of their condescending and simplistic views of poor and working-class people in rural communities and see them, instead, as fallible equals.
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