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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
Irony
Explanation and Analysis—Mel’s Aggression:
In an example of situational irony, Mel clearly expresses at the start of the story his belief that love and violence cannot coexist (telling his wife Terri that what she had with her abusive ex-boyfriend Ed “was not love”) before later behaving in violent ways toward Terri while telling her that he loves her. The irony of Mel’s actions comes across in the following passage, which follows Mel's story about an elderly couple who survive a car accident because of their love for each other:
Mel said, "I was going to tell you about something. I mean, I was going to prove a point. You see, this happened a few months ago, but it's still going on right now, and it ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we're talking about when we talk above love."
"Come on now," Terri said. "Don't talk like you're drunk if you're not drunk.”
"Just shut up for once in your life," Mel said very quietly. "Will you do me a favor and do that for a minute?”
Mel gets heated because he doesn’t feel he was able to communicate what he wanted to about the elderly couple and, when Terri cajoles him for “talk[ing] like [he’s] drunk,” he snaps at her, telling her, “Just shut up for once in your life.” Though he says this quietly, the effect is still chilling. Until this point in the story, Mel has been slightly passive aggressive toward his wife, but never overtly aggressive. At this point, readers can pick up on the fact that Mel is hypocritical when it comes to his views on love—he waxes poetic about the purity of love but, in reality, aggression (verbal violence) and love are intertwined for him, the same way that they are for Terri.
The story also employs a broader form of situational irony. Although it is titled "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," and although the characters spend the entire story trying to capture the true nature of love, an actual understanding of love seems to elude them by the end of the narrative.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—Mel the Mechanic:
Near the end of the story, a drunken Mel uses the word “vessel” when he means to say “vassal,” and Terri corrects him. In his passive-aggressive response to his wife’s correction, Mel metaphorically refers to himself as “just a mechanic,” using this metaphor as a form of verbal irony:
“All right,” Mel said. “So I’m not educated. I learned my stuff, I’m a heart surgeon, sure, but I’m just a mechanic. I go in and fuck around and fix things. Shit,” Mel said.
“Modesty doesn’t become you,” Terri said.
“He’s just a humble sawbones,” I said.
When Mel metaphorically refers to himself as “just a mechanic,” he is using verbal irony, saying that as a surgeon he merely “fuck[s] around and fix[es] things” inside a patient’s body in the same way that a mechanic tinkers with the parts inside of a car. Both Terri and Nick (the narrator) notice here that Mel—who went through medical school and rigorous surgical training—is being intentionally (and disingenuously) self-disparaging, with Terri telling Mel that “modesty doesn’t become [him]” and Nick sarcastically calling Mel a “humble sawbones.”
It is notable that, with the character of Mel, Carver is suggesting, in some ways, that he is just a mechanic. As a cardiologist, Mel understands the human heart in a practical and rational way, but not in a deeper or more emotional way. He has been talking about love all night but doesn’t seem any closer to expressing—or embodying—it, as seen in his passive-aggressive response to his wife and his mistreatment of her throughout the story.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—National Safety Council:
During Mel’s story about the elderly couple he treated who were badly injured in a car accident, he notes that their seatbelts likely saved their lives. His wife Terri then interrupts him, using verbal irony to comment on this statement, as seen in the following passage:
"I'd say she was worse off than he was. Ruptured spleen along with everything else. Both kneecaps broken. But they'd been wearing their seatbelts and, God knows, that's what saved them for the time being."
"Folks, this is an advertisement for the National Safety Council," Terri said. "This is your spokesman, Dr. Melvin R. McGinnis, talking." Terri laughed. “Mel,” she said, "sometimes you're just too much. But I love you, hon," she said.
Terri uses verbal irony here when mocking Mel for his focus on seatbelt safety. When she says "Folks, this is an advertisement for the National Safety Council" and pretends to be speaking from Mel’s perspective, she is ironically pointing out how strange it is for Mel to be speaking at this casual gathering with their friends about the importance of seatbelts. Terri makes her sarcastic intentions clear by then telling Mel directly, “[S]ometimes you’re just too much.”
Here, as elsewhere in the story, Terri seems to be drawing Nick and Laura’s attention to the fact that she is aware that Mel is drunk and not behaving appropriately. Carver juxtaposes the messy relational dynamic between Terri and Mel with the easeful and loving dynamic between Nick and Laura, suggesting that couples who speak less (and don’t try to perform their love or put it into words) can sometimes actually communicate (and embody) their love more deeply and effectively.
Related Themes:
