Irony interests me. You might recall that 9-11 was supposed to blow irony out of the water. We heard this from commentators who believed irony was no more than an indulgence of the self-indulgent, a patois of flip egoists that could never survive such a ruthless eruption of reality. Yet irony survived nicely. After all, it comes down to us from World War I, a cataclysm infinitely more traumatic than 9-11 that for millions made the conventional expression of conventional sentiments impossible. If it remains occasionally necessary for ironists to say “I love you” or “I am a patriot” — and it is, for ironists do and ironists are — they know how to say it by not saying it. Irony, in short, is more than a style; it’s an intricate language that in times of turmoil and mendacity remains more necessary than ever.
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Swift proposed that the Irish sate their empty bellies by eating babies. I’m guessing the outlandishness of this idea made it easy for Ebert’s old English class to conclude Swift was making fun of something even if they weren’t sure exactly what. Nobody really believed the Irish should eat their babies! they guessed — and they were right. But Ebert allows that the ideas presented in his Q&A “accurately reflected Creationist beliefs.” It’s malarkey that apparently becomes irony because Ebert publishes it under his name. It’s like found art — a hunk of whatever relocated in a gallery.
