Question

Identify and evaluate the meaning and purpose of an example each of irony and satire from "The Devil and Tom Walker."

Answer 1

Irving writes that no one really knows what happened to Tom's wife, however when Tom finds the missing checked cloth with a heart and liver inside and observes the scene near it, he concludes that his wife must have battled the devil and eventually lost--not easily, though, because Tom notices that there were

"many prints of cloven feet deeply stamped about the tree, and several handsful of hair, that looked as if they had been plucked from the coarse black shock of the woodsman. Tom knew his wife's prowess by experience."

The description is ironic on a couple of counts. First, the fact that Tom's wife was so stingy and stubborn that she would have given the devil a harsh time bargaining and fighting fits into Irving's typical, ironic description of the nagging wife.  Secondly, the last sentence refers back to the abuse that Tom often suffered at the hands of his wife, and he almost sympathizes for the devil in regards to the battle between him and Mrs. Walker.

Answer 2

Answer:

In "The Devil and Tom Walker," the author Washington Irving depicts a man called Tom Walker, who sold his soul to the devil for a large sum of money. Tom becomes a usurer and begins to go to church, since he fears the devil will take his soul. On the other hand, he does not fully change, since he remains just as greedy as before. Thus, Irving uses satire to expose Tom's pretense.  

Besides, Tom is the universal friend of the needy and he acts like a "friend in need. The reason is that he provides loans to people in need of financial aid and then tricks them into debt.

Irving also makes use of irony to describe Tom's abduction by the devil. In that respect, Tom has never kept his word, but now he is forced to keep his promise to the devil and give up his soul.

In the end, Tom loses his patience and his religiousness, as he asks the Devil to take him if he has "made a farthing." At that moment, he hears three loud knocks at the door and he sees a black man holding a black horse, who is coming for him.