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Theatrical Irony

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2009

Eli Rozik
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It is my intention to derive the concept of ‘theatrical irony’ from the general theory of theatrical communication.

The basic meaning of the term ‘irony’, from the Greek word ‘ειρωνεια’, was ‘dissimulation’. Over the centuries, this term has been extended to additional semantic fields and consequently acquired new meanings as in ‘Socratic irony’, ‘philosophical irony’, ‘romantic irony’, ‘dramatic irony’, ‘tragic irony’, and so on. At the same time, a number of more colloquial expressions were introduced as well, as in ‘ironic smile’, ‘irony of events’, ‘irony of fate’, and so on. I am of the opinion, however, that despite the diversity of such phrases and regardless of their partial overlap, it is still possible to unveil a common semantic core. Furthermore, it is my belief that our understanding of theatrical irony benefits from all these additional usages.

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Theatre Research International , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , Summer 1986, pp. 132 - 151
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Copyright © International Federation for Theatre Research 1986

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References

Notes

1. The ‘dramatic’ refers here to the entire set of iconic media, which includes theatre, cinema, television, drama, puppet theatre, animation and the like.

2. Cf. Muecke, D. C., Irony (London: Methuen, 1973), p. 13.Google Scholar

3. Quintilianus, , Instituto OratoriaGoogle Scholar, Butler, H. E. (tr) (Cambridge), III, 18. 7.Google Scholar

4. See also Aristotle, , The Art of RhetoricGoogle Scholar, Freeze, J. H. (tr) (London: W. Heinemann, 1926).Google Scholar

5. Sophocles, , Oedipus and KingGoogle Scholar, Grene, David (tr) in Greek Tragedies, vol. I (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1968).Google Scholar

6. In opposition to C. Brooks, who claims that ‘irony’ stands for any modification of meaning because of pressure of context, which results in fact in one single meaning: The Well Wrought Urn (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1947), p. 209.Google Scholar

7. The contrast ‘appearance-reality’ is not the relevant one in this context. The real one is between linguistic formulation and reality, including appearance. Cf. Chevalier, Haakon: The Ironic Temper, Anatole France and His Time (New York: Oxford University Press, 1932)Google Scholar and Muecke, , id. p. 31.Google Scholar

8. Aristotle, , Nichomachean Ethics, 4. 13–14Google Scholar. See also Cooper, Lane, An Aristotelian Theory of Comedy (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1924), p. 263.Google Scholar

9. Iconic theatrical language constitutes basically a set of imitations of symptomatic signs. Cf. Rozik, Eli, ‘Theatre as a Language’, Semiotica, 45–1/2, 1983, pp. 65–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10. Molière, , L'Avare.Google Scholar

11. The communication of different meanings by means of the same verbal utterances is dealt with within the theory of ‘speech acts’. Cf. Austin, J. L., How To Do Things With Words (London: Clarendon Press, 1962)Google Scholar, Searle, J. R., Speech Acts (Cambridge University Press, 1967), p. 49Google Scholar. See also Bentley, E. R., The Modern Theatre (London: Robert Hale, 1948), p. 82.Google Scholar

12. Cf. Styan, J. L., The elements of Drama (Cambridge University Press, 1967), p. 49.Google Scholar

13. In fact, Styan sees ‘irony’ in terms of ‘metaphor’: ‘fusion of meaning’, ‘tertium aliquid’, etc. Cf. id. p. 52.

14. Cf. Krook, Dorothea, Elements of Tragedy (Yale University Press, 1969).Google Scholar

15. Cf. Muecke, , id. p. 40.Google Scholar

16. Cf. Frye, Northrop, Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton University Press, 1955), pp. 33 and 365.Google Scholar

17. Cf. id. p. 34.

18. Shakespeare, , Macbeth.Google Scholar

19. Racine, , Phedre.Google Scholar

20. Sophocles, , AntigoneGoogle Scholar, Wyckoff, E. (tr) in Greek Tragedies. Cf. note 5.Google Scholar

21. Cf. Bradley, A. C., Oxford Lectures on Poetry (London: Macmillan, 1965), p. 71.Google Scholar

22. In fact, every spectator becomes a privileged one, in opposition to Styan, J. L., id. p. 49.Google Scholar

23. Lorca, , Terma.Google Scholar

24. Pinter, Harold, A Slight Ache.Google Scholar

25. Philosophical conceptions are irrelevant in this context since they deal with absolute irony, e.g. F. Schlegel, [Irony is] ‘the recognition of the fact that the world in its essence is paradoxical and that an ambivalent attitude alone can grasp its contradictory totality’ (quoted by Wellek, R. in A History of Modern Criticism 1750–1950, II, ‘The Romantic Age’ (London: Cape, 1955), p. 300Google Scholar. See also Kierkegard, , The Concept of Irony with Constant Reference to Socrates (London: Collins, 1966).Google Scholar

26. Cf. N. Frye, id.: ‘The contest of eiron and alazon forms the basis of the comic action, and the buffoon and the churl polarize the comic mood’ (p. 172). In my opinion, N. Frye makes a terrible mistake in defining this pair in terms of action – ‘bringing about’, ‘blocking’, etc., in opposition to a wellestablished tradition and theoretical convention.

27. Cf. Cooper, Lane, op. cit.Google Scholar

28. In opposition to ‘behavioural irony’ in Muecke, , id. p. 28Google Scholar, which seems to apply to the ‘alazonic’ in the real world only.

29. In opposition to the view that there is a possibility of irony without an ironist. Cf. Thirlwall, C., ‘On the Irony of Sophocles’ in The Philological Museum, vol. II, 1833.Google Scholar

30. In opposition to Muecke, , id. p. 34 and in accordance with Thirlwall.Google Scholar

31. In opposition to Muecke, , id. p. 28.Google Scholar

32. In opposition to Muecke, , id. pp. 28–9.Google Scholar

33. ‘Double irony’ does not necessarily restore the validity of the first object of irony as the two antonymic layers are not opposed in every respect.

34. Similarly, the omission of the omniscient storyteller or the addition of a fictional storyteller closes the whole work to further irony.

35. In opposition to Sedgewick, G. G.: Of Irony, Especially in Drama (Toronto: University of Toronto, 1948), pp. 32–3Google Scholar (unawareness of the characters to their theatrical status).

36. See ‘Paradoxical Sympathy’ in Sedgewick, , id. p. 33Google Scholar and in opposition to the ‘painful-comic’ formula in Thompson, A. R.. The Dry Mock: A Study of Irony in Drama (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1942).Google Scholar

37. Cf. Muecke, , id. p. 38Google Scholar and Karl Solger as quoted by Sedgewick, , id. p. 17.Google Scholar

38. Chevalier, H., id. p. 42, etc.Google Scholar

39. Joyce, James, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (London: New Travellers, 1950), p. 245.Google Scholar

40. Sedgewick, , id. p. 32.Google Scholar