To All His Own Irony Essay

Sciascia frequently uses irony throughout ‘To Each His Own’ as a means to prove the futility of Sicilian mafia culture. ‘To Each His Own’ is a Giallo novel which allows Sciascia to demonstrate the flaws in Sicilian society. It is evident throughout the novel that Sciascia believes in justice and through the combination of reflecting the reality of Sicilian society and also by using irony, Sciascia is able to immerse readers in his message for reformation. Furthermore, Sciascia characterises the protagonist, Laurana, ironically to further reiterate this message. The role of irony in ‘To Each His Own’ is Sciascia’s way of applying sense to Sicilian culture to emphasise its flaws.
Laurana’s whole character is ironic as despite being an Italian

As Laurana studies history it is expected that he would understand the origins of the mafia and mafia culture in Sicily. However, due to his naivety, he is unable to recognise that he should not get involved in the murder. This irony reinforces Laurana’s role as the outsider and is important as it allows Sciascia to demonstrate the key message of ‘To Each His Own’, which is to highlight the flaws in Sicilian society. ‘This naivety allows Sciascia to portray the criminal in a believable way, which is why someone so naïve as Laurana is killed at the end of the novel’ . ‘Aspects that the reader would see as obvious, Laurana will stumble over. For instance, this occurs in the scene with Don Benito when he tries to explain to Laurana the danger of becoming involved in a case that concerns the mafia’ . When Laurana shared his first clue with people he barely knew Don Benito had ‘amazement not over the clue that has just been revealed but over the fact that the person who had revealed it should thereby have exposed himself to crossfire from both sides, police and assassins.’ Not only is Laurana ignoring omerta, the code of silence in Sicily,

In plenty of the dialogue with people Laurana visits to try and solve the crime, aspects of Sicilian society are revealed both explicitly and implicitly through the use of irony. The old doctor Roscio repeats the proverb ‘The dead man is dead; let’s give a hand to the living’ but then states ‘a Sicilian visualizes a murdered man and his murderer, and the living man who’s to be helped is the murderer.’ The original idea of the paradoxical proverb implies that the injured man should be saved no matter who he is. The adaptation of the proverb is purposefully ironic and demonstrates how despite the proclaimed religiousness of Sicilians, the way Sicilians behave does not correlate with their beliefs. Through adapting a proverb and applying it to Sicilian society, the contrast between modern society is clearly demonstrated. Sicilians would help the murderer because the murdered man deserved to die which is not a Christian way of thinking. It presents how Sicilian people hold askew morals due to generations of mafia culture which even religion cannot seem to change. This not only emphasises how embedded Sicilian societal conventions are but also how reformation will be a difficult