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Question

What is dramatic irony?

3 years ago

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323 Replies

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J

Justice Torphy


323 Answers

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Laura Byrne

It’s when the audience knows something that one or more characters in a play doesn’t. For example, in A View from the Bridge - Eddie comes home from drinking and doesn’t know that Catherine and Rodolfo are in the bedroom - the audience knows they are there and that Eddie will be angry so suspense is created.

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Joshua Sharp

Dramatic Irony is when the audience or the reader is aware of information a character in the story is not.

For example in The Tempest, Miranda is unaware Gonzalo is with her on the island. The audience however learn this early.

D
Dominick Oloo

This is the response given through expression that means totally different from the normal usually used to show humor and emphatic effects.

H
Habiba Abdalla

literary device used in a story telling by letting the audience know something that the characters arent yet aware of

A
Anna Collins

Dramatic irony is a literary device in which the audience knows more about a situation, event, or character than the characters in the story do. This creates a contrast between the characters' understanding of what is happening and the actual reality of the situation, often leading to tension, suspense, or humor.

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Emily Upson

Dramatic irony is a literary device usually found in plays, where an author reveals information to the audience but the characters are unaware of this information. An example of this is in Act One of An Inspector Calls when Mr Birling describes the Titanic as 'unsinkable' yet the audience in 1945/6 knows the Titanic sank in 1912.

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Where the audience knows something the characters don't know!

This could be for example when Mr Birling proclaims The Titanic is 'unsinkable!' - the audience of course knows the Titanic in fact sunk. Why is dramatic irony important? Well, it's all about why the author wants us to know more. Mr Birling seems over-confident in the ship, reflecting his over-confidence in himself; he will 'sink' when his reputation is chipped away by The Inspector's revelations, so this is a comedic and foreboding use of dramatic irony!

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E
Ellis Bolle

A literary device when the audience or reader knows something important that character does not/ has yet to know. It's used in theatre and most famously in Shakespeare's plays to empower the audience, and create tension and suspense.

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Isabelle Henderson

Dramatic Irony occurs mainly in a play where the audience knows a piece of information that a key character does not.

For example: In Romeo and Juliet the character Paris tells the Friar that he and Juliet are going to be married on a certain day BUT we, in the audience, already know that Juliet has said that she would rather die than marry Paris.

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Sharon

Dramatic irony is a literary technique that occurs in the context of plays. It is when the audience is aware of something (e.g. about a character), that the characters (i.e. other characters) are oblivious to.

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Hannah Brooke

When you as the reader of whatever you’re reading, knows something which the character dosen’t

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Marius Scholtz

Dramatic irony is a literary and dramatic device. There is dramatic irony in a fictional situation whenever the audience or reader knows more than a character or group of characters do about their own lives. The most famous example is "the bomb under the table," which Alfred Hitchcock was fond of using. If the audience knows there is a bomb under the table where a character is sitting, but the character is not aware of this, there is dramatic irony. It is a device that produces a sense of expectation and often tension as we anticipate what will happen to the character(s) when the unknown situation presents itself to them.

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Leena

Dramatic irony is a literary device authors employ to emphasise a character's lack of knowledge on an event or issue that the audience would be aware of already.

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A situation in plays where the words and actions are known to the audience but not to the character.

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Z
Zhanetta Rodgers

It's bitter-sweet taste impact on you from the dramatic retelling or performance or a book

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