Irony In Nadine Gordimer's 'Once Upon A Time'

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The selections in Chapter 5 all convey a very compelling message about identity and rites of passage. Irony plays a major role in three pieces of literature in this chapter “Flood”, “Cinderella”, and “Once Upon a Time”. Irony allows readers to grasp the false sense of reality portrayed in an author’s work through the use of drama, sarcasm (verbal), and situations that take place throughout the work. Irony is a figure of speech used in most cases to give a different meaning to sayings that usually have completely opposite interpretations.
In Nadine Gordimer’s “Once Upon a Time”, the narrator seems to intertwine two stories that are coupled with dramatic irony. One story is about the author in first person. The other is her telling a story about a wife, husband, little boy, housemaid and a gardener in third person. The first part of the story you learn about how the narrator was asked to write a children’s story
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“Flood” tells the story of a town in Peru “flooded” with gang violence. This emotional account tells of young boys fantasizing about the life of gang members that eventually leads them to trouble. The situations that occur lead you to believe that there will be a good outcome, but as you read it becomes evident that it will not be. The story has a surprising outcome at the end when it is decided to burn the “University” (93) or prison down in order to stop the riot. “They weren’t going to take the University back. They were going to set it on fire. They began the cataclysm. Renan didn’t turn away. The walls crumbled to ash and the tanks fired cannon shots. There was singing. The bombs fell and we felt the dry mountains shake.” (99), this exert exemplifies how the author’s function of irony. He says that there was singing which is usually something happy but then goes on to say that the building was destroyed. Though filled with sadness, the narrative leaves a sense of