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Definition of Irony
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how they actually are. If this seems like a loose definition... read full definition
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how they actually are. If this... read full definition
Irony is a literary device or event in which how things seem to be is in fact very different from how... read full definition
Book 1, Chapter 1
Explanation and Analysis—Immigrant Families:
Cather uses dramatic irony in Book 1, Chapter 1 when the young Jim Burden first encounters the Shimerda family, who are immigrants from Bohemia. When they arrive in Nebraska and are standing on the train station platform, Jim observes that:
In the red glow from the fire-box, a group of people stood huddled together on the platform, encumbered by bundles and boxes. I knew this must be the immigrant family the conductor had told us about.
Just before to this encounter, Jim describes Nebraska and the American West as an entirely new country to him; he is an expatriate from Virginia in this new land. However, on arriving at the station he immediately notes the foreignness of the “huddled group” and identifies them as one of the many "immigrant families" around him.
The reader is aware of his strangeness to the new landscape and new ideas. This is an example of dramatic irony—when the reader is aware of something that a character cannot see. His own status as a new arrival makes it seem strange that Jim thinks of the Shimerdas as more "foreign" than he is himself. Both he and the Shimerda family are new immigrants in this frontier location. The use of dramatic irony in this quote highlights the cultural misunderstanding and convergence of immigrant identities that run through My Ántonia. Cather puts the tension between the Shimerda family’s national identity and Jim’s cultural identity at odds, as the narrator struggles to understand where he fits in his new world out West.
This irony recurs in Book 1, Chapter 11. As he is putting together a picture book for one of the Shimerda children, Jim actually describes his home state of Virginia in the same language the Shimerdas use to describe Bohemia:
On the white pages I grouped Sunday-School cards and advertising cards which I had brought from my “old country.”
The narrator refers to his home of Virginia as his own "old country,” a phrase the reader has already heard both the Shimerdas and Russian immigrants use to describe their own places of origin. The reader knows that Jim is a foreigner himself in many ways, but he does not seem to recognize this fact even as he uses this phrase. The use of dramatic irony in this second passage highlights the conflicts that arise when people try to compare degrees of belonging to a country or location. In this passage, the author demonstrates how the idea of who "belongs" is more complex than just “who’s from here.”
Related Themes:
Book 1, Chapter 11
Explanation and Analysis—Immigrant Families:
Cather uses dramatic irony in Book 1, Chapter 1 when the young Jim Burden first encounters the Shimerda family, who are immigrants from Bohemia. When they arrive in Nebraska and are standing on the train station platform, Jim observes that:
In the red glow from the fire-box, a group of people stood huddled together on the platform, encumbered by bundles and boxes. I knew this must be the immigrant family the conductor had told us about.
Just before to this encounter, Jim describes Nebraska and the American West as an entirely new country to him; he is an expatriate from Virginia in this new land. However, on arriving at the station he immediately notes the foreignness of the “huddled group” and identifies them as one of the many "immigrant families" around him.
The reader is aware of his strangeness to the new landscape and new ideas. This is an example of dramatic irony—when the reader is aware of something that a character cannot see. His own status as a new arrival makes it seem strange that Jim thinks of the Shimerdas as more "foreign" than he is himself. Both he and the Shimerda family are new immigrants in this frontier location. The use of dramatic irony in this quote highlights the cultural misunderstanding and convergence of immigrant identities that run through My Ántonia. Cather puts the tension between the Shimerda family’s national identity and Jim’s cultural identity at odds, as the narrator struggles to understand where he fits in his new world out West.
This irony recurs in Book 1, Chapter 11. As he is putting together a picture book for one of the Shimerda children, Jim actually describes his home state of Virginia in the same language the Shimerdas use to describe Bohemia:
On the white pages I grouped Sunday-School cards and advertising cards which I had brought from my “old country.”
The narrator refers to his home of Virginia as his own "old country,” a phrase the reader has already heard both the Shimerdas and Russian immigrants use to describe their own places of origin. The reader knows that Jim is a foreigner himself in many ways, but he does not seem to recognize this fact even as he uses this phrase. The use of dramatic irony in this second passage highlights the conflicts that arise when people try to compare degrees of belonging to a country or location. In this passage, the author demonstrates how the idea of who "belongs" is more complex than just “who’s from here.”
Related Themes:
