Edmund's Feelings About Warings
Edmund doesn't understand the symbolism of the house - how could he? He is only ten years old and understandably ignorant of the class divide and the way in which a manor house symbolizes success, prosperity and influence. He isn't really mad about its appearance either. He thinks it's quite an ordinary looking house. Ugly even. He doesn't particularly like it - but he also loves it just as much as he hates it, because it it his family's, and as such, he is going to protect it and defend it from interlopers with all of his might.
Joseph Hooper Irony
Edmund's ancestors built Warings, and in time, it came to his father as an inheritance. This means that it is now his father's turn to be revered, respected and considered gentility. Joseph himself sees this as ironic; the house is a symbol of success, but he is a man of chronically low ambition, and he has not really achieved much at all. He only has the house because he inherited it, and in many ways the irony of this makes him feel like a fraud and even less of a success than he is.
Hooper Loneliness
Both Edmund and his father are extremely lonely after the death of Edmund's mother. This is ironic only because father and son have a distant, strained relationship without any closeness at all. The loneliness they feel after her death should be something that brings them together and if they had allowed it to be so, would also have made them feel far less lonely in the first place.
The Children are Getting Along
When Edmund is incapacitated, and Charles is free to spend his time with other children in the village, there is relative harmony between them as they are never together Their parents remark upon the copacetic atmosphere and are pleased that the boys are doing so well together, even patting themselves on the back for handling the transition so skillfully. This is ironic because the boys are not doing well together and actually hate each other. Their parents have not "handled" the transition at all, and have left their own devices far too much so that the situation between them is worse than it was before - it is just the fact that they are not spending any time together that is hiding this.
Charles' Perception of Normal Life
Charles is momentarily happy when he realizes that Edmund is going to be a while recovering from the accident, and that he himself caused it, which gives him a feeling of power. He spends his days with a new friend in the village, enjoying his surroundings and exploring the farm, which is a perfectly normal way for a ten year old boy to experience his life. The irony of this is that Charles knows it won't be like this for long and that soon his life will "get back to normal", in other words, that he will soon be bullied and terrorized again by Edmund. This is ironic because this is not normal at all. Charles' life has become the complete opposite of what a normal life is that he is no longer able to tell the difference.
