Study of the works of Eugene Gladstone O'Neill, b. 1888, American playwright.

"Eugene O'Neill often characterized himself as a psychologist, asserting that "authors were psychologists...and profound ones, before psychology was invented." Though many of O'Neill's plays do reflect insights derived from early psychoanalytic method, contemporary students of psychology might bristle at O'Neil's characterization of his capacity to observe and describe the human condition. It might be better to characterize the so-called Father of American Tragedy as a kind of arm-chair philosopher, and this book attempts such a task. Through a close re- examination of Eugene O'Neill's oeuvre, from minor plays to his Pulitzer-winning works, this study proposes that O'Neill's philosophy of tragedy, though derivative of the larger Western approach to dramatic art, offers a unique account of why tragedy matters in today's world. In addition to offering a new paradigm through which to interpret O'Neill's work, this book argues that O'Neill's theory of tragedy is a robust description of the value of difficult theatre, with more explanatory scope and power than its historical counterparts. This volume enters the discussion of tragic value by way of the plays of Eugene O'Neill, and through this study, Killian makes the case that O'Neill refused to allow Plato to define the terms of tragedy's merit, as most Western theorists have. He argues that O'Neill's theory of tragedy is non-cognitive and locates the value of a play not in what we learn from it, but rather in its ability to make us feel emotions that are difficult to come by in everyday experience. This book is significant for students and scholars of performance studies, literature, and philosophy"--

Praise for the earlier edition: "Students of modern American literature have for some years turned to Fifteen Modern American Authors (1969) as an indispensable guide to significant scholarship and criticism about twentieth-century American writers. In its new form--Sixteenth Modern American Authors--it will continue to be indispensable. If it is not a desk-book for all Americanists, it is a book to be kept in the forefront of the bibliographical compartment of their brains."--American Studies

A critical study of the Greek tragic vision in the context of other plays taken for the purpose manifests that the conceptualization of tragedy has followed three paradigmatic shifts. The Greeks believed in Divine universe higher than the mundane which impacted upon the latter for good and bad in response to its own moral order and its canons. For example, Sophocles' Oedipus is fated to commit parricide and incest even before his birth. Euripides' Medea takes help from the sun-god. Aegeus goes to Delphi to know the reason of his remaining issueless. Medea is a sorceress and invokes the supernatural powers to kill her foes. In other tragic visions like that of Shakespeare's, Neoclassical and Modern tragic vision, it's is hardly so. The application of various perspectives of Aristotle, Aurobindo, Jung, Joseph Campbell, George A. Kelly, Tony Wolfe etc. would help us unfurl the skein tragic tangles in the life we human beings.

Study of the plays of Eugene O'Neill, 1888-1953, American playwright.

In the face of seemingly relentless American optimism, Eugene O'Neill's plays reveal an America many would like to ignore, a place of seething resentments, aching desires, and family tragedy, where failure and disappointment are the norm and the American dream a chimera. Though derided by critics during his lifetime, his works resonated with aud...