Joe Schmo

Mrs. Skow

College Prep English II

6 February 2002

Eugene O’Neill

    Eugene O’Neill, a leading twentieth century American dramatist, has been called the “the Father of Modern American drama, not only because he was the first major American playwright, but also because of the influence of his work on the development of American theater and other dramatists (Meyer 1782). O’Neill’s conflict-filled and dysfunctional family became the focus of his writing.  “In one sense, all of O’Neill’s dramatic art is autobiographical, for it is directed toward the understanding of his own life and of his inner self” (Carpenter 47).  The writings of Eugene O’Neill are personal and based on the scaring effects of his childhood and the more willful characters appear bent on self-destruction.               

    As a playwright, O’Neill’s dramas were very realistic and contrasted dreams and the real world.  His plays involved human tragedy and were autobiographical:

            The romantic dreamers of O’Neill’s plays have all imagined an impossible Perfection, they have necessarily despaired of realizing it.  Each drams described the tragedy of a man who envisions the perfect, struggles vainly to achieve it and Finally accepts inevitable defeat. (69)

            O’Neill’s masterpiece Long Day’s Journey into Night is an example of a play where the characters are bent on self-destruction.  The play begins in the Tyrone family’s house where the four family members use their problems to destroy one another.  James Tyrone, the father, is an actor whose insensitive compulsive cheapness torments his family.  Hi is in denial about his alcoholism and drinks to forget his past career mistakes and unhappiness.  The mother Mary is a morphine addict and is a dreamer who lives a life of denial.  Her identity is based on lying and hiding her morphine addiction, James’ cheapness and her regret over her marriage to him.  James and Mary have two sons.  The first son Jamie is an alcoholic and his “alcoholism is part of his total alienation” (Peck 2: 612).  He drinks to forget his personal and professional failures.  His father constantly reminds him of his worthlessness.  The other son, Edmund, is extremely sensitive and afraid of life.  He wants to be a writer and wishes that he was a sailor. He has tuberculosis and struggles with this illness.

            The characters in Long Days Journey into Night live their lives by tormenting themselves and e ach other.  Each character tries to face themselves and make a confessing of their problems, but each confession invokes another confession.  “The predominant image of the play is a blanket of fog that cushions and isolates the family from their selves and each other is occasionally pierced by the foghorn, summoning the characters to confront their pain, loss and denial (612).

            O’Neill understood the characters because this is what he went through.   “The play is based on O’Neill’s own dysfunctional family, stricken by narcotic addiction, bitter recriminations, alienation and the seductive allure of the American dream (612).  The realistic style of Long Day’s Journey into Night is an exact replica of O’Neill’s summer with his family in New London, Connecticut. The play is powerful and realistic in its portrayal of a family bent on self-destruction (Bloom, Long Day’s 10).

            The Ice Man Cometh is autobiographical and shows the scarring effects of O’Neill’s childhood and the self-destructive nature of the characters.  The play is set in a bar in downtown New York.  Harry Hope is the proprietor and in his saloon 15 derelict salesmen in their fifties and sixties spend their nights drinking.  Each is trying to keep their hopes alive on alcohol and pipe dreams.  They have created an illusion that they are successful and this illusion is predicated on alcohol (12).   

            Eventually, the men reveal the nature of their pipe dreams.  Harry Hope reveals that “he has become obsessed with the idea that he must save them all by getting to recognize and reject their lying, pipe dreams and free them from the guilt they feel for not living up to them (Nelles).  The men are annoyed at Harry because he has pointed out their failures and urged them to change, but instead of changing they come back to the bar and accept their failures.  “They have faced the truth, but it has robbed them of the last, painful trace of hope (Bloom, Eugene 23).  Although each man confessed their pipe dreams, they still accept the state of denial and remain self-destructive.

            O’Neill knew that this play was about his life.  There are moments in the play that suddenly strip the secret soul of man stark naked.  As always, that naked soul was O’Neill himself” (59).  The characters in the play are based on men that O’Neill met when he was a beachcomber.  The Iceman Cometh is an “example of the highly personal revolt which O’Neill pulled out of his own suffering” (Bloom, Long Day’s 24).

            Another of O’Neill’s plays that delves into his own suffering and experiences is Desire Under the Elms.  The main characters of this play are Ephraim Cobot, Simeon, Abbie and his children Peter and Eben.  Ephraim has been married three times and Simeon is his third wife.  Peter and Eben hate their father because the land that he owns was inherited from their mother and they believe that Ephraim worked her to death on the farm.  Eben decides to seek his fortune in California during the Gold Rush and steals money from Ephraim to finance his venture.  Eventually Eben returns to the farm and begins an incestuous relationship with his stepmother Abbie. 

            “Desire Under the Elms was the last of O’Neill’s realistic and naturalistic plays and one of his most effective” (Gerber).  The incestuous act between Abbie and Eben creates confusion and problems within the family and also is a metaphor for the family of O’Neill.  O’Neill was very confused about the relationships within his own family.  He brings forth the “the daring reduction of human motives to the simple impulses of love, hate lust, and greed to give an impression of human nature” (Gerber).  Even though incest was not part of O’Neill’s family, his mother came to rely on Eugene and pitted him against the father.  Thus, Desire Under the Elms conveys the autobiographical aspects of O’Neill’s works and the self destructive nature of his characters.

            Eugene O’Neill was a preeminent playwright of the 20^th century whose plays were a mirror of his life.  Long Day’s Journey into Night, The Iceman Cometh and Desire Under the Elms examine the dysfunctional family and its impact upon its members. In each of these plays the characters are self-destructive and cannot change.  These characters based on O’Neill’s life experiences and his dysfunctional family became the source of his inspiration.

Works Cited

Bloom, Harold, ed.  Eugene O’Neill.  New York: Twayne, 2001.

- - - , ed.  Long Day’s Journey into Night.  New York: Twayne, 1994

Carpenter, Frederick.  Eugene O’Neill.  Rev. ed.  New York:  Twayne, 1979.

Gerber, Philip.  “Eugene O’Neill.”  MasterPlots:  Fiction Series. 2^nd ed. Rev. ed.  Salem, 2004.  MagillonLiteraturePlus.  Ebsco. WTHS. 4 Jan. 2005.

Meyer, John T.  "Eugne O'Neill."  Ed. Frank N. Magill.  Magill's  Survey of American Literature.  Vol. 2.  New York:  Salem, 1991.

Peck, Robert, ed.  Beachem’s Popular Fiction. 12 vols. New York:  Simon & Shuster, 2002.

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