Irony occurs when situations turn out the opposite way than one might expect or when words mean the opposite of what was intended. There are small and large examples of irony throughout Jane Eyre.
It is ironic in a larger sense that Jane ends up the happiest and most successful of the children in the Reed household when she was the one abused and constantly told she was worthless. It is ironic that although Jane is sent to the Lowood School to be humbled and abased, she ends up married to a wealthy man and rises up in society to be above the people who humiliated her, like Mr. Brocklehurst.
Smaller ironies show up at the beginning of the novel. As we will later find out, it is ironic that when the kind doctor questions her, young Jane rejects the idea of going to live with her Eyre relatives. Mrs. Reed has told her they are very poor and lower class, and Jane has believed this lie. Ironically, if she had been reunited with them, she would have found out they were kind, educated, middle-class...
(The entire section contains 3 answers and 890 words.)
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