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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
April Fools
Explanation and Analysis—Sikhs and Israelis:
In the first chapter, "April Fools," Stash and Vanden, Camden graduates and Evelyn's friends, visit for a dinner with Patrick and Timothy Price. The party discusses frivolous concerns from the social pages in the newspaper, including the daunting "Death of Downtown" article. This continues until Tim makes reference to the political situation in Sri Lanka in an attempt to steer the conversation to more erudite grounds. But, ironically, Tim doesn't know what he's talking about:
“Oh ho ho,” Tim says warningly. “That affects us? What about the massacres in Sri Lanka, honey? Doesn’t that affect us too? What about Sri Lanka?”
“Well, that’s a cool club in the Village.” Vanden shrugs. “Yeah, that affects us too.”
Suddenly Stash speaks without looking up. “That’s called The Tonka. [...] It’s called The Tonka, not Sri Lanka. Got it? The Tonka.”
Vanden looks down, then meekly says, “Oh.”
“I mean don’t you know anything about Sri Lanka? About how the Sikhs are killing like tons of Israelis there?” Timothy goads her. “Doesn’t that affect us?”
First, Timothy corrects Vanden because she confuses Sri Lanka with "the Tonka," a fictional club in Greenwich Village. Then he tries to explain the "massacres" in Sri Lanka. These really happened: in the late 1980s, the Sri Lankan government, controlled by the island's Sinhalese majority, committed a series of attacks against the Tamil minority in the northeast. But these were not, as Price claims, conflicts between the Sikhs and Israelis—there has never been a significant population of either Sikh or Israeli people on Sri Lanka. In an attempt to seem intelligent and impress Vanden, Evelyn, and the other guests, Tim is obviously and humorously wrong. (This would have been even more clear to readers when the novel came out in 1991, when the conflict in Sri Lanka was still international news.) This failed reference ironically shows the foibles of the Wall Street bankers in the novel. While each of the male characters is wealthy and successful, none of them seem to have the requisite intelligence to achieve such success.
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Explanation and Analysis—Rich Man:
In the first chapter, "April Fools," Patrick and Price head to Evelyn's apartment; walking down the street, he whistles a musical-theater standard that seems wildly out of character:
It’s cold for April and Price walks briskly down the street toward Evelyn’s brownstone, whistling “If I Were a Rich Man,” the heat from his mouth creating smoky plumes of steam, and swinging his Tumi leather attaché case.
Price whistles "If I Were a Rich Man," a song from the 1964 Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof. Reb Tevye, a Jewish milkman in imperial Russia and the show's protagonist, sings in the song about what he would do if he were not poor and persecuted for his religion. Tevye's ambitions are, in fact, rather modest; he imagines a house with "a fine tin roof with real wooden floors below" to improve upon his current dilapidated home.
The irony here is, of course, that Price is a rich man. As he whistles, Price blows "smoky plumes of steam" from his mouth—he is literally blowing hot air, gleefully singing about a poverty that he never has to experience. Patrick confirms Price's wealth as he usually does, by referencing one of his expensive possessions: a "Tumi leather attaché case." This ironic allusion points to a tension at play throughout the book: despite the exorbitant wealth of Patrick and all his friends, they all still strive for more and more wealth and feel inferior to the rich men around them.
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Explanation and Analysis—Everyone:
After Price leaves the dinner party at the end of the first chapter, "April Fools," Patrick confronts his girlfriend Evelyn. Patrick is "fairly sure that Timothy and Evelyn are having an affair," but given Patrick's own infidelity, he does not seem especially disturbed about it. In fact, he thinks Price is "the only interesting person I know," and, ironically, tries to convince Evelyn to just go for him instead. But Evelyn rebuffs Patrick's statements by responding with a telling hyperbole:
“Why don’t you just go for Price?”
“Oh god, Patrick,” she says, her eyes shut. “Why Price? Price?” And she says this in a way that makes me think she has had sex with him.
“He’s rich,” I say.
"Everybody’s rich,” she says, concentrating on the TV screen.
“He’s good-looking,” I tell her.
"Everybody’s good-looking, Patrick,” she says remotely.
“He has a great body,” I say.
“Everybody has a great body now,” she says.
Patrick confronts Evelyn demurely, listing Price's virtues: he is rich, good-looking, and has a great body. But as Evelyn astutely describes, "everyone" has all these qualities. Due to the appearance-obsessed world of Wall Street bankers, everyone they know has impeccable grooming and fitness—and lots of money.
Of course, not everyone has these qualities, even if everyone that Patrick and Evelyn spend time with does have them. Patrick and his friends all try to be richer and better than those around them, so in this striving environment it would be literally impossible for everyone to be good-looking and rich. But, as often shown among the elite set shown in the novel, everyone must have these qualities, lest they be mocked and ostracized. Evelyn's hyperbole in this moment thus gets to the heart of their social situation: because everyone is perfectly manicured and fabulously wealthy, these aesthetic perfections become boring, repetitive, and meaningless.
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Morning
Explanation and Analysis—I Don't Smoke:
In "Morning," Patrick gives a long list of his apartment's garish, expensive decor. He describes his coffee table laden with fancy ashtrays—but, ironically, Patrick clarifies that he does not use them:
A glass-top coffee table with oak legs by Turchin sits in front of the sofa, with Steuben glass animals placed strategically around expensive crystal ashtrays from Fortunoff, though I don’t smoke.
Patrick's disuse of his expensive possessions is one of the fundamental ironies of the novel: he makes personal choices exclusively for aesthetics, even when they explicitly (by his own admission) do not align with his actual life. He buys the ashtrays so that his houseguests can notice his taste and wealth, even if they are apparently otherwise useless to him. This irony is greater given the fact that Patrick assaults and murders most of his houseguests in the novel.
But there is another layer to this irony, because Patrick indeed does smoke. Patrick smokes cigarettes while drunk or high and has smoked cigars since he was a student at Harvard, as he discusses with his old girlfriend Bethany. This is an example of Patrick as an unreliable narrator—here he flatly lies to the reader, seemingly to protect his healthy image. Patrick's life is full of ironies and lies, both toward the people around him and the reader.
Date
Explanation and Analysis—You Have Reservations?:
In the chapter "Date," Patrick goes out with a woman named Patricia Worrell. She wants the two of them to go see her friend's band, playing at Radio City Music Hall. But Patrick hates live music and insists that they get dinner at Dorsia, the hottest new restaurant in the city, instead. Here is their conversation, over the phone, about Dorsia, full of dramatic irony:
“Dorsia?” she asks and then, suspiciously, “You have reservations there? I mean for us?”
“Yes,” I say. “Eight-thirty.”
“Well …” She emits a little laugh and then, faltering, “It was … well, what I mean is, I’ve seen them. I just wanted you to see them.”
“Listen. What are you doing?” I ask. “If you’re not coming I have to call someone else. Do you have Emily Hamilton’s number?”
This scene is ironic because, despite his indications to Patricia, Patrick does not have reservations at Dorsia. Thanks to the book's first-person narration, the reader is well aware of this fact, having had an up-close view of Patrick's increasingly infuriating attempts to get into the highly-selective restaurant. When Patrick lies on the phone to Patricia, the reader knows immediately that Patrick is on the brink of panic, the dramatic irony ratcheting up the tension.
Patricia, though, fully believes Patrick, and they agree to go to Dorsia. Immediately after their phone call, he frantically tries to secure a reservation, but the maître-d' laughs him off, telling him that reservations and the waitlist are closed. Patrick and Patricia, much to both of their chagrin, go to a different restaurant instead. The dramatic irony here creates the terror, ridiculous and humorous, that Patrick feels in trying to secure a reservation. And the dramatic irony is also simply Patrick's personality: he believes he can tell women whatever he pleases, that he can lie as often has he wants to maintain his image, and that he will somehow cover it up later.
End of the 1980s
Explanation and Analysis—Reason To Be Sad:
In the chapter "End of the 1980s," Patrick goes out to brunch with Jean at Nowheres. Patrick appears weak and morose, and Jean tries to get him to smile. But she still knows nothing of his murders or his run-ins with the law, which makes the scene an instance of dramatic irony:
“Come on, smile,” she urges sometime later. “You have no reason to be so sad.”
“I know,” I sigh, relenting. “But it’s … tough to smile. These days. At least I find it hard to. I’m not used to it, I guess. I don’t know.”
“That’s … why people need each other,” she says gently, trying to make eye contact while spooning the not inexpensive sorbet into her mouth.
Jean tries to calm down Patrick by telling him that he has "no reason to be so sad." At the end of the previous chapter, Patrick returned to Paul Owen's apartment—which was being sold—to relive the experience of probably his most brutal rape and murder. The realtor in the apartment suspected Patrick of some kind of foul play, which makes Patrick terribly anxious. As a result, anyone would have plenty of reason to be upset at lunch with Jean; Patrick has begun to be wracked with guilt and fear, as the consequences for his murders become more and more inevitable. But Jean doesn't know this, which makes her comment sound absurd and dramatically ironic. This entire brunch shows Patrick flatly lying to Jean about what he is feeling—despite their improving rapport, he still never tells her about any of his crimes—while he remains unable to control his fidgety, disturbed appearance. The dramatic irony comes from the contrast between Patrick's statements and appearance. Without any knowledge of his violent behavior, Jean cannot understand why Patrick looks "so sad."
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