Oh, the Irony. Trump’s Triumph and the Next Four Years

There was a sense after the Sept. 11 attacks, and the wars and recession that followed, that irony was dead—that the use of cynicism and sardonic distance from current events in literature and commentary was no longer suitable for such sobering times. That consensus (ironically!) collapsed quickly. Now, two decades later, surveying the seismic triumph of Donald Trump and the GOP in the US presidential election, we can finally conclude the opposite was true all along: We are living in an age of irony.

Irony, in the classical sense, is a state of affairs that’s deliberately contrary to expectations. For a lot of Americans and other fans of liberal democracy around the world, that no doubt nicely describes the surprise outcome of Nov. 5. But it turns out, once you start looking for them, ironies can be found everywhere in the outcome of the recent election, and appreciating them just might give us a useful guidepost for the next four years. “What meanings we make of the various ironies that color this past election and will color Trump’s new term will shape the ongoing reconfiguration of American politics for the foreseeable future,” says Raymond Malewitz, an associate professor of English at Oregon State University.