Irony In Lamb To The Slaughter

Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl is a short story that creates a wave of emotion to the reader. Mary, the protagonist, is a complex character and seems to be a different person as the story progresses. The story’s involvement with a murder scene, a gruesome story would be expected, but instead Dahl puts a twist to the story which makes it not horrifying.

The story begins with Mary shown as a devoted and loving wife. This and the constant reminder that Mary is pregnant makes me feel as if I was on her side and against the husband straight away. The atmosphere that was set up by Dahl in the beginning of the story can give a bit of foreshadowing. There was intense tension in the room and silences here and there that hinted to the reader bad news was coming. At that point, the empathy that was built up for Mary was so strong that even when she killed her husband it did not change my …show more content…
The detectives needed to find the murder weapon to find the killer but instead, they got rid of the evidence by eating it. Another irony in this story was the dramatic irony. I knew that the officers were unknowingly eating the murder weapon which made me feel frustrated and angry. I felt as if I wanted to go into the story, yell how stupid they were being and expose the truth about Mary. This is an effect dramatic irony has on the reader, and creating an emotion in me made the story that much more engaging.

Dahl cleverly uses the quote “lamb to the slaughter” not only to describe what had happened literally, but also to describe the characters that have been innocent but put in a bad situation. The “lambs” in this case would be the husband, detectives and arguably the wife. I believe she should be considered a lamb even though she killed her husband, because her husband triggered her. Mary was pregnant and was devoted to her husband yet he implied he was leaving her for another