I did not understand that she was hiding her feelings under irony, that this is usually the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when the privacy of their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded, and that their pride makes them refuse to surrender till the last moment and shrink from giving expression to their feelings before you.
 Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground (1864). copy citation

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Author Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Source Notes from Underground
Topic hiding feelings irony
Date 1864
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/600/600-h/600-h.htm

Context

“"Why, you…"
"What?"
"Why, you … speak somehow like a book," she said, and again there was a note of irony in her voice.
That remark sent a pang to my heart. It was not what I was expecting.
I did not understand that she was hiding her feelings under irony, that this is usually the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when the privacy of their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded, and that their pride makes them refuse to surrender till the last moment and shrink from giving expression to their feelings before you. I ought to have guessed the truth from the timidity with which she had repeatedly approached her sarcasm, only bringing herself to utter it at last with an effort. But I did not guess, and an evil feeling took possession of me.” source

Meaning and analysis

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