1. Describe what is ironic about "Charles" and "The Gift of the Magi". Explain how each author uses irony and the effect that each story has on readers. Be sure to use details about the characters and their actions to support your answer.

Jackson shows dramatic irony in "Charles" because the reader realizes before the narrator that Laurie's gleeful description of Charles's exploits are his own doings. The kindergarten teacher's statement at the end of the story confirms this suspicion. When the teacher said that she has no student named Charles, the conclusion is that Laurie made up his existence and has in fact been describing himself and his own misbehavior to his unsuspecting parents. Another example of dramatic irony in "Charles" can be found in the narrator’s and her husband’s avid desire to meet Charles’s mother. They do not know, as does the reader, that Charles's mother is in the narrator herself. Therefore, they already know Charles's mother-they just do not know she is the narrator herself.