Eugene_O'Neill

Last and Best Phase(1934-1953)
The Iceman Cometh《卖冰的人来了》 long Day’s Journey into Night《长日入夜行》
His Major Plays:
Early Phase (1912—1920) One-act plays :Bound East for Cardiff 东航加迪夫 (1916). describes the dying sailor Yank and his dream about the security and peace which could never exist
O‟Neill‟s Themes:
Human existence and predicament: life and death, illusion and disillusion, alienation and communication, dream and reality, self and society, desire and frustration, etc.
The three distinct periods of O’Neill

Early Phase (1912—1920)
Bound East for Cardiff (1916)
Second Phase (1920-1934)
Beyond the Horizon The Emperor Jones《琼斯皇帝》 Anna Christie 《安娜.克里斯蒂》 The Hairy Ape《毛猿》 Desire under the Elms 《榆树下的欲望》
His characters in the plays are described as seeking meaning and purpose in their lives in different ways, some through love, some through religion, others through revenge, but all meet disappointment and despair.
Second Phase (1920-1934) O'Neill's first full-length play, Beyond the Horizon天边外(1920), won him the first Pulitzer Prize源自文库 Its theme is the choice between life and death, the interaction of subjective and objective factors.
Last and Best Phase (1934-1953) The Iceman Cometh送冰人来了 (1946) proves to be a masterpiece in the way it is a complex, ironic, deeply moving exploration of human existence, written out of a profound insight into human nature and constructed with tremendous skill and logic. Long Day's Journey Into Night长夜漫漫路迢迢 (1956) Describe the daily life of the Tyron, their grumble, sarcasm, quarrel, talk and reconciliation, seems to have little theatricality, however, naturally indicating the corrosion of human nature of good things by the vulgar life.
Eugene O'Neill is unquestionably America's greatest playwright. In his life, he won the Pulitzer Prize four times as well as he was the only dramatist ever to win a Nobel Prize (1936). He is widely acclaimed “founder of the American drama. The famous American drama critic and professor John once said: “before O‟Neill, the United States had theatre, after O‟Neill, it had dramas.”
The major events of his life
1. On October 16, 1888, O'Neill was born in a theatrical family of New York. 2. He grew up in New London, Connecticut, and spent his early years with his parents on theatrical road tours. 3. In1906, He received university education for one year and later traveled all over the world. 4. In 1914, he attended Professor George Pierce Baker's drama workshop at Harvard 5. In the summer of 1916, his first one-act play Bound East for Cardiff performed in Winston troupe. 6. Beyond the Horizon performed in 1920, and he won the first Pulitzer Prize as well as Nobel Prize in1936. 7. In his old age, O„Neill suffer from Parkinson‟s disease. His last play Long Day's Journey Into Night was published after his death.
Anna Christie安娜.克里斯蒂is more of a success because it deploys the developing complexity of O'Neill's personal vision, showing us that life is a closed circle of possibilities from which it is impossible to escape.
The Emperor Jones琼斯皇(1920) The Hairy Ape 毛猿 (1922), Desire Under the Elms榆树下的欲望(1924). These plays foray into race relations, class conflicts, sexual bondage, social critiques, and American tragedies on the Greek model. The Great God Brown大神布朗(1926), which fuses symbolism, poetry, and the affirmation of a pagan idealism to show how materialistic civilization denies the life--giving impulses and destroys the genuine artist Strange Interlude奇异的插曲 (1928)
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