Eugene O’Neill (1888-1953) is one of the most important American playwrights of the twentieth century. He was awarded four Pulitzer Prizes and the 1936 Nobel Prize in Literature. The son of an actor in a touring company and the morphine-addicted daughter of a pastor, he grew up in an extremely confrontational family environment. He loved long sea voyages, and actually worked at sea for a time until he contracted tuberculosis in 1913, and had to enter a sanatorium. During his convalescence, he decided to take up playwriting. He was the first American dramatist to adopt the techniques of realism, as his contemporaries in Europe had already done, revolutionising the theatre of his homeland by introducing the American vernacular onto the stage, spoken by fully rounded characters with an inner life and psychological depth. His works show a genuine acceptance of marginalised characters who strive to achieve their dreams and ambitions but never succeed, ending up in stagnation and despair. His depression, alcoholism, and pessimism are all reflected in his plays, as is the redemptive symbolism of the sea.

 

A short list of his plays:
Anna Christie, Marco millions, Desire under the elms, Mourning becomes Electra, The iceman cometh, Long day's Journey into night, A moon for the misbegotten.

 

Don't cry. The damned don't cry. (Mourning becomes Electra)

 

They's no peace in houses, they's no rest livin' with folks. Somethin's always livin' with ye. ( Desire under the elms)