Types of Irony to Use in Your Story

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

Our lives contain all kinds of irony. We experience it in everyday life and will continue to experience it until our stories end.

Like other artists and creatives who are continuously looking for tools to increase the strength of their craft, irony opens the door to many possibilities for your novel. When a writer uses irony correctly, it can build gut-tightening suspense, deep laughs from quick wit, and offer profound and poignant life lessons.

Irony is the opposition between what was expected and what is reality. Take note: that doesn’t necessarily mean a contradiction or something different. Irony is how something is completely undermined and completely sabotages the reader’s expectations. The nuances of this literary technique, whether it’s in conversation between two people or an event, is a clever way to add depth to your story. Let’s jump in and learn about five types of irony with examples from popular stories.

Situational irony

Have you ever had something happen to you that felt too crazy to re-tell? Situational irony is a straightforward approach in terms of defying expectations. A sequence of events naturally leads up to certain outcomes. You push a ball, it moves. You jump up, you’ll fall right back down. At least, so we think.

There are four types of situational irony where you can subvert the reader’s expectations.

Cosmic irony

Cosmic irony is a matter of fate: the action is completely the opposite of what’s expected, is highly unlikely, and there is little explanation as to how it could happen without speculating (or concluding) that it may have been divine.

In Pulp Fiction, the scene where Samuel Jackson and John Travolta’s characters are shot at but every bullet has missed is highly unlikely. They even communicate that it is “divine intervention,” articulating the expectation that those bullets being fired should have meant that they both were killed. Alas, they live. The sheer number of bullets fired, and their living to tell the tale, is cosmic.

Have you ever had an experience that couldn’t be explained or seemed like a miracle?

Cosmic irony is a force that seems to intervene like God. Cosmic irony meddles with life and death — it’s the supernatural (or something) creating and causing outcomes that feel only like a powerful, other-worldly experience could have created.

Remember what makes something ironic is that the opposite of what’s expected happens.

Poetic irony

This is a situation where good prevails over evil and evil gets punished in some way that is ironic. In the movie Aladdin, Jaffar wishes to be an all-powerful genie, which seems like the worst possible way to punish a villain. However, being a genie also means being confined to a lamp and in the service of the wisher. He is all-powerful but contained. The irony is in that.

Using poetic irony like this can leave a story on a feel-good note. When the irony is executed correctly, it gives a refreshing twist on good vs. evil storylines.

Verbal irony

Verbal irony is great to use to get your readers laughing by creating comedic relief or satire. Verbal irony can be misunderstood as someone not telling the truth or being hypocritical. So, when using verbal irony, the words used are intended to contradict, exaggerate, or undermine what was said.

For example, sarcasm is a great vehicle for verbal irony. This can be used to pretend to criticize others passively. For example, saying “nothing gets past you” to someone who is regularly oblivious is an example of verbal irony.

Another form of verbal irony is understatement. If your character says “I’m overjoyed” with a straight face and no enthusiasm, the verbal irony of saying the opposite of what is being communicated makes a character saying this comedic. Note how facial expressions undermine what is happening.

Socratic irony is when someone pretends to be ignorant to outsmart others. Say you have a character that is lactose intolerant, and they eat cheese. One character could say, “I thought you were lactose intolerant.” Embarrassed, your character could say, “I was when I told you, but I’m miraculously cured.”

Feigning ignorance and outsmarting your characters is a good tactic for Socratic irony.

Using this in storytelling is a great way to show the character’s personality and inject them into the plot’s trajectory.

Dramatic irony

Dramatic irony occurs when the readers know something will happen before your characters do. You’ll see the killer before the character does. All the writer must do is create distance between the inevitable tragic event and the time the characters experience it.

For example, in the movie Titanic, we know that the ship will inevitably sink. However, the way the story unfolds is still dramatic and heightens emotions as we barrel toward our inevitable end.

Dramatic irony can create tension and uniqueness around the events that are unfolding for the reader. In the classic Romeo and Juliet, we know that the lovers die, but the way the story unfolds is still heartbreaking.

Dramatic irony is best used as an ending for story writing. All the pieces add up and then they will inevitably crash into the ending that is foretold and inevitable.

To make it ironic, remember that the opposite of what is expected happens. In a love story like Romeo and Juliet, the characters are supposed to be together, not dead. (Who would’ve thought?) In Titanic, a ship is supposed to float, but it sinks. And this is not some regular ship. This was a ship designed to hold water even if it did get hit … and still sunk anyway.

Writing tips to effectively use irony in your writing

You can use irony to heighten the subtext between your characters, your readers, and the world you’ve set them in.

If you’re balancing irony with sincerity and emotional depth, you can utilize verbal irony between two characters who have been fighting with each other. Say your story centers on a relationship between brothers. They use their sarcasm to veil their feelings of admiration with jealousy as they compete for their callous father’s love and recognition.

Dramatic irony can be created in this situation by creating an ending where the father dies unexpectedly only to reveal his deep love for his sons. The emotional buildup is heightened by the brothers’ unspoken love for each other which they cover up with their verbal irony. Make this truly impactful with character development that provides useful context to the reader about each brother’s perspective.

Writing irony into a story like this highlights not just what is happening between brothers who fight but the unspoken relationship between father and sons and family.

The story beneath the story

Think of irony as creating a story underneath the events taking place on the page. In our scenario of our brothers being sarcastic and fighting each other, consider what is being said and what is not being said. Irony is your way of showing the reader that you understand that communication is beyond the words your characters speak — there is a deeper context.

That said, it is wise not to overuse tropes or make them cliché. Don’t make every character use verbal irony in every chapter or strictly rely on old tropes. Don’t lean too heavily on what is expected from the genre. Ask yourself as you write: What is expected of my characters based on who they are and what the story is — and how can I subvert this using irony?

One fun aspect of writing a story is to work themes into the subtext. Repetition of a statement that is supposed to highlight irony or deliver foreshadowing can read flat and redundant on paper. Remember, your readers are as smart and clever as you are. They will be able to put pieces of your story together. In fact, they encourage it.

Think of this as a creative way to explore your character arc and development. Perhaps a character makes a claim, “I’ll never become a sellout.” If every bit of their dialogue and interactions with other characters, their backstory of being working class, and their sharp criticisms of “the system” illustrate to the reader they truly don’t intend to sell out, you can use dramatic or cosmic irony to spin a cautionary or tragic tale and land your character somewhere he never intended to be.

Know your audience and their expectations

The expectation of a reader comes down to the story and the genre. However, knowing your reader’s expectations doesn’t mean you cannot subvert them. In fact, you should. When you think of the type of story that you’re trying to write, try to subvert expectations within the frame of the story.

For example, you can turn a romance novel into a murder mystery by showcasing what the character is willing to do for love versus simply a device to add excitement.

Readers love to feel the emotional stakes of the main character. If their loved one has been murdered, you can heighten the loss with dramatic irony — but don’t simply use this for its shock factor. This will be read as a forced plot device versus a tragic, ironic love story.

Think of all the times in your life when what you wished for did not turn out the way you expected — in fact, turned out closer to the exact opposite. How did this make you feel? What lessons did you walk away with? Use this as you develop your own character sketches in your stories.

Irony is great for adding suspense, creating drama, and showing character personality and development in stories. There are other types of irony, including historical irony, tragic irony, comic irony, and more. Use it sparingly to stir things up in your plot or between characters.

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