‘Irony,’ says Quintilian, is that figure of speech or trope ‘in which something contrary to what is said is to be understood’ . His formula has stood the test of time. It passes intact into Dr Johnson's dictionary . It survives virtually intact in ours:Irony is the use of words to express something other than, and especially the opposite of, [their] literal meaning.

Many years ago Wilamowitz desiderated a systematic collection of the texts which relate to the different types of poetry composed by the great lyric poets of Greece. He hoped that if we could only crystallize our admittedly scanty information about the characteristics of, say, the Paean or the Dirge, we might be able to reach a slightly better understanding than we have now of the formal structure and artistic design of the poems and fragments which have come down to us (...) under these titles. Indeed, this kind of knowledge is very important. (shrink)