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"Irony ... is a virtue in the Aristotelian sense. That is, irony is of a state of character lying in a mean. Just as courage is a mean lying between rashness, its excesses, and cowardice, its defect, so, too, irony is a mean lying between vicious extremes ... irony is a kind of paradox -- an important paradox, moreover, typically prized, although not always for the same reason ... The paradox of irony is ... a kind of poise, not in the Pythagorean or classical sense of a harmonious arrangement of parts either found in or fashioned into a beautiful whole but rather in the sense of delicate, or, better, precarious balance achieved in the suspension between polar and irreconcilable opposites -- a poise no less beautiful ... nor less virtous than its classical counterpart" (Herzog, "The Practical Wisdom of Beethoven's Diabelli Variations," Musical Quarterly 79 (1995): 35-36). In literature, irony is a technique of indicating, as through character or plot development, an intention or attitude opposite to that which is actually or ostensibly stated (Random House Dictionary)