Entry #19: Dramatic Irony

So here's how this post is going to work. I know I already used irony, but I wanted to devote part of this post to my favorite character of the novel, Captain America Edgar Derby. The rest will be normal.

Dramatic Irony takes place when there is a discrepancy between the reader's understanding of a scene and a character's understanding of a scene, usually because the reader has knowledge the character does not. The inevitable fate of Edgar Derby is perhaps the second best example of dramatic irony of the book, surpassed only by the fire bombing of Dresden. The death of Derby is dramatic irony because the reader knows of his death because of Billy Pilgrim meddling with time, but Derby does not.

Goodbye, Captain America.

The reader is informed of his death in the first page, "One guy I knew really was shot in Dresden for taking a teapot that wasn't his." The bottom of the second-to-last page reads, "Somewhere in there the poor old high school teacher, Edgar Derby, was caught with a teapot he had taken from the catacombs. He was arrested for plundering. He was tried and shot. So it goes."
Kurt Vonnegut: The only man who can make me sad over a character's death even though I already know they're dead. Props to you, sir.