cynicism vs irony

cynicism

noun
  • A distrustful attitude. 

  • An emotion of jaded negativity, or a general distrust of the integrity or professed motives of other people. Cynicism can manifest itself by frustration, disillusionment and distrust in regard to organizations, authorities and other aspects of society, often due to previous bad experience. Cynics often view others as motivated solely by disguised self-interest. 

  • A skeptical, scornful or pessimistic comment or act. 

irony

noun
  • Socratic irony: ignorance feigned for the purpose of confounding or provoking an antagonist. 

  • Contradiction between circumstances and expectations; condition contrary to what might be expected. 

  • Dramatic irony: a theatrical effect in which the meaning of a situation, or some incongruity in the plot, is understood by the audience, but not by the characters in the play. 

  • The quality of a statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean something different from, or the opposite of, what is written literally; the use of words expressing something other than their literal intention, often in a humorous context. 

  • An ironic statement. 

adj
  • Of or pertaining to the metal iron. 

  • The food had an irony taste to it. 

How often have the words cynicism and irony occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )