"If he is a royal, then you are a royal too" (p.150)
Ohene Nyarko says this quote to Abena when they visit Kumasi. This quote is full of dramatic irony because Abena actually is descended directly from Asante royalty; however, she does not know this because her father, who was born to the royal family, left his family to marry her mother and become a simple farmer. The irony of this moment is pushed further by the fact that the person Ohene Nyarko is referring to approached Abena to ask if she was James. James is her father, the son of Quey and Nana Yaa, but Abena has never heard her father's real name. This scene is darkly humorous since Abena's desire to marry Ohene Nyarko has long been unrequited specifically because people see her family's status as so low. Ohene Nyarko is able to make this joking comparison between the old man and Abena because it seems so far-fetched that she would be related to anyone wealthy or important.
The Jazzing and Jazzmine
In Willie's chapter we see that the young woman aspired to become a jazz singer in New York but could not get a job at the Jazzing because her skin was too dark. Instead, she got a job cleaning at the jazz club, and through this experience and the troubles she had with her husband she lost her love of singing. When she finally recovered the joy she used to take in singing, she was only able to direct it into singing at church, so her son Sonny grew up thinking she had only ever loved church music. Sonny later got a job at Jazzmine, a new jazz club, and met a jazz singer named Amani who got him hooked on dope. There are multiple layers of irony in these jazz clubs. Neither Sonny nor Willie see how closely their interests intersect, which is ironic because Sonny has always felt like his mother doesn't understand him. Amani also serves as an ironic representation of the life Willie thought she desired, showing how there are troubles to be found in every walk of life.
Effia and Esi
Effia and Esi are Maame's two daughters who never meet, something that saddens Esi greatly. However, they get extremely close to meeting, and lived very different lives in the same exact building for a time. Gyasi writes that Effia became furious at her new husband when she learned that there were dungeons under the Cape Coast Castle holding slaves, which she realized when she heard a faint crying sound through a grate in the floor. Esi is held in this same dungeon before being sent to the United States as a slave, and the reader knows that Esi must have been taken as a captive after Effia had already gone to the castle since Effia's brother Fiifi is seen in Esi's chapter with a higher status role than when Effia was sent away.
Effia and Esi's life outcomes are ironic on the whole because Esi was born with a much higher social status. Effia was born when Maame was a captive, and because her mother ran away, she was raised by a woman who beat her and sold her to a white man because of the money it would bring to the family. Esi, on the other hand, was born to two parents of high social status who cared for her deeply. Their positions of status are reversed because of Effia being married to a Westerner, giving her and her son power, and Esi being taken as a slave. This irony shows that social status is ephemeral, and this will become a theme as Esi and Effia's descendants have their own troubled paths.
Marjorie and Marcus
The intersection of Marjorie and Marcus in the last chapter of the book has dramatic irony because they never directly acknowledge that they are related to one another. They even visit the Cape Coast Castle together, the place where both of their ancestors coexisted for a time—Esi in the dungeon and Effia in James Collins' quarters. Though the dramatic irony is not resolved, Marjorie and Marcus feel the connection of both coming from the same place and wanting to get in touch with their family roots.
