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Examples Of Irony In The Princess And The Tin Box

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Authors’ Purpose in Using Irony Essay

Imagine a person wearing a medal for the fastest sprinter in the world has a speedometer attached to him. He is getting ready to sprint in a 100-meter race. Two seconds after the whistle blows and he takes off, his speedometer reads 1 mph. That was unexpected, which is the whole point of irony. Irony is found in many stories. Although readers may think irony used in stories are for temporary effects of the moment it is read, the author has a bigger purpose than just enhancing their story. The authors of “The Sniper”, Liam O'Flaherty, and “The Princess and the Tin Box”, James Thurber, utilize situational irony to present the moral of each story.

Thurber uses situational irony in “The Princess and the Tin Box” to mock how decisions made by princesses in fairy tales are illogical. On the princess’ eighteenth birthday, her father commands that she would choose the best gift amongst five princes, and marry the prince that brought the gift she chose. The first four princes brought gifts made completely out of jewels. The fifth and final prince was unique, as he brought the princess a small tin box made of gravel. As the other princes laughed at such a gift, the princess “examined it with great interest and squealed with delight, for all her life she has been glutted with precious stones and priceless metals but she had never seen tin before or mica or feldspar or hornblende” (Thurber 2). In most fairytales, the princess would choose the “unique” gift. The quote shows that the princess in this parody does consider the fifth prince’s gift. Thurber is setting his readers up to believe she will choose the fifth prince’s gift. However, his situational irony is executed when the princess chooses the third prince’s gift: a platinum-and-sapphire jewel box. The princess provides her reasoning by stating, “It is a very large and expensive box, and when I am married, I will meet many admirers who will give me precious gems with which to fill it to the top. Therefore, it is the most valuable of all the gifts my suitors have brought me, and I like it the best” (Thurber 2). If she were to choose the tin box, it would not have added to her wealth. A jewel box made out of platinum and

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