The Irony Throughout the Story in Lamb to the Slaughter, a Short Story by Roald Dahl - Essay Example

In most cases, sarcasm can be depicted in various ways. In a dramatic one, particular events and actions of a specific literature piece are understood by the audience. However, the characters of the play do not understand it. Situational sarcasm presents actions that just result in unexpected outcomes.  On the other hand, verbal sarcasm majors on mockery. Characters use words to mean just the opposite of their primary intent. The irony throughout the story in Lamb to the Slaughter, a short story by Roald Dahl, is depicted in various ways.

Similarly, the above forms of sarcasm are also illustrated in multiple sections of the piece. Well, below are various instances where sarcasm has been used in the book: The Title of the Piece The title, Lamb to the Slaughter, is a good example of verbal sarcasm. Primarily, the topic presents a creature that is about to be killed. The character, Mary, destroys a murder weapon by giving people to eat. She would have presented out the lamb quite well, had she been judged guilty of murdering her spouse.

Sarcasm in the Murder Weapon The murder weapon and how it ends up is also an acceptable example of irony. Maloney uses a frozen lamb's leg to hit her husband hard, thereby killing him. Initially, her husband threatens to leave her, and she takes quite an unusual course of action. It shows an unexpected situational irony because Mary had just received his husband from work with kisses and gestures of kindness. For instance, Mary takes her husband's coat and prepares for him a drink to relax after a day's hard work.

When he dies on the spot, Maloney snaps and figures out how to get rid of the leg murder weapon. She thinks that the best way of getting rid of it was to have people eat it. Once they eat the weapon, its existence would be no more. Finally, she decides to cook the leg and give it to the police investigators of the murder crime to eat. The creature saved her from life imprisonment or jail sentence. Similarly, dramatic sarcasm is a presented example, since the audience knows what's happening, but the characters don't.

The audience realizes that the policemen eat the murder weapon-the the very thing that would help them to catch the murderer of their colleague.