How Does Roald Dahl Use Irony In Lamb To The Slaughter

World famous British author Roald Dahl, stretched the mind and imaginations of young children. He was an inspiring author who was greatly admired for his techniques of grasping the reader's attention with literary devices. One of the many short stories Dahl is known for is “Lamb to the Slaughter”. This story follows Mary Maloney, a pregnant housewife who kills her husband using a frozen leg of lamb. Mary then sets up a crime scene and tricks the investigating officers into eating the now-cooked lamb, disposing of the evidence. This is one of the many short stories written by Roald Dahl using significant literary devices to set the mood and tone for the story. Roald Dahl does an excellent job using different forms of irony such as dramatic irony

Of course I’ll give you money and see you’re looked after. But there needn’t really be any fuss.” (Dahl 3). Patrick points out the obvious and expresses that it is ”kind of” a bad time when it is an extremely bad time making this verbally ironic. Telling his 6-month pregnant wife that he is leaving her couldn't be a worse time. Patrick mentions all of this as if it isn't a big deal but being that she is pregnant and extremely in love with him makes it an incredibly big deal. This example creates dark humor and tension. It creates dark humor because it is humorous that he says this when the two of them both know it is horrible timing. It also creates tension since this is an extremely sensitive topic being discussed. This tension results in the readers feeling anxious about not knowing how this pregnant woman will

A detective who was also Patrick's coworker claims “‘Personally I think the weapon is somewhere near the house.’ ‘It’s probably right under our noses. What do you think, Jack?’ And in the other room, Mary Maloney began to laugh.” (Dahl 11). This is verbal and dramatic irony because the officers are stating that the murder weapon is “right here on the premises… probably right under our noses” and that is exactly where it is but the police officers are unaware. This is dramatic because the readers know exactly what they are eating and what it was used for but the police officers do not. This verbal irony creates dark humor because the police officers stated exactly where the murder weapon was without actually knowing that was really the case. Given that we know they are right but they are unaware, this is essentially an inside joke with the audience. Again since this “joke” has to do something with murder which is “dark” it creates dark humor. This example concluded Dahl's penchant for dark humor and ended his story with his specialty,