ony one can avoid being specific. Although to argue the other side, irony can allow gruesome details as well. In Blundens Undertones of War a lance-corporal was making tea in the trench when Blunden passed by him. A few moments later a shell exploded behind him and upon inspection he wrote, For him, how could the gobbets of blackening flesh, the earth-wall sotted with blood, with flesh, the eye under the duckboard, the pulpy bone be the only answer? At this moment, while we looked with dreadful fixity at so isolated a horror, the lance-corporals brother came round the traverse (Norton 32). Can literature be understood and enjoyable without the use of irony? Rupert Brooke answers this question in his poetry, often hinting at irony with a simple straightforwardness. Of course literature can be understood without irony, if it were used in every work redundancy would be a problem. In his poem IV. The Dead Rupert Brooke gives good example of poetry without irony: These hearts were woven of human joys and cares,Washed marvelously with sorrow, swift to mirth.The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs, And sunset, and the colours of the earth. These had seen movement, and heard music; knownSlumber and waking; loved gone proudly friended;Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone;Touched flowers and furs and cheeks. All this ended (Brooke 2).Brooke gives a vivid account of life and the actions one goes through while living and simply states at the end of the stanza All this is ended. He doesnt use irony to give an excuse to death. Straightforward writing leaves very little room for imagination where the use of irony tends to allow the reader to fill in the blanks.Fussell states that the use of irony is used in situations. I would have to agree with Fussell due to the examples I have used in this paper fall under this category. He ...
