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Aleppo University

Faculty of Art and Humanities

Department of English

A Freudian Reading of Eugen O’Neill’s Plays

By
Abdulsattar Al-Shawi

Supervised by
Prof. Iman Lababidi

1439 - 2018
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Abstract

This study focuses on how humans’ behaviors are affected by the structure of their psyches.

It aims at a better, deeper, and more profound understanding of Eugene O’Neill’s drama from a

Freudian perspective. Freud, the establisher of the traditional psychoanalysis, concluded that the

way humans behave, act, or think can be analyzed psychologically. O’Neill provided

psychoanalysis with rich materials including characters and events full of psychological struggles

and conflicts. Whether O’Neill intended his plays to be psychological ones or not, this notion is

not the main purpose of this study. However, Freudian concepts, ideas, and theories can be traced

in every page. O’Neill tackled mainly the structure of the American society and its influence on

the psyche of its members. From familial clashes to social battles, O’Neill tried to examine the

effects of surrounding on the actions of the individual. Defense mechanisms such as denial,

projection and sibling rivalry are employed heavily by O’Neill’s characters. From O’Neill lens,

the “American Dream” has become a psychological curse for his characters by giving them false

illusions deriving their psychic needs wild until they become out of the characters’ control. The

main objective of this study is to examine the psyches of O’Neill and his characters at work and

to testify the ability of psychoanalysis in providing a more authentic meaning to a literary text.
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Acknowledgements

I thank the Almighty for granting me all help and guidance. I would like to thank my

supervisor Prof. Iman Lababidi, who helped me conduct this study with her immense philosophical

insights and critical comments. I also owe a lot to the Head of the English Department, Prof. Adnan

Al-Sayyed. I cannot but offer my thanks to the staff of English Department at Aleppo University.

Finally, I would like to thank all my colleagues, friends, and family members, who enhanced my

research with their encouragement, patience, and prayers.

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Table of Contents

Abstract II

Acknowledgment III

Introduction 1

Chapter one 11

Chapter two 20

Chapter three

Conclusion

Work cited

Work consulted
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Introduction

This study focuses on a prominent figure in American drama by the name of Eugen O’Neill

from a psychoanalytic point of view. Basically, psychoanalysis is a method for treating mental

illness and also a theory which explains human behavior founded by the well-known psychologist

Sigmund Freud. The study concentrates on the major tenants of Freud’s theory such as the

conscious, the unconscious, the preconscious, the id, the ego, and the super ego and their effects

on O’Neill’s writings and characters. Freud’s theory on personality and behavior will be

questioned critically to test its validity in the eyes of today’s psychoanalysts.

The name of Sigmund Freud has been connected strongly with psychoanalysis. It is notable

that when asking about psychoanalysis, in most cases, the name of the Austrian neurologist will

be mentioned immediately. His lexicon has become embedded within the vocabulary of Western

society. Words he introduced through his theories are now used by everyday people, such as anal

(personality), libido, denial, repression, cathartic, Freudian slip, and neurotic.

Born on 6 May 1856 Freiberg, Moravia (now Pribor in the Czech Republic), Sigismund

(later changed to Sigmund) Freud was raised in a Jewish family but he was non-practicing. In

1873, Freud began to study medicine at the University of Vienna. After graduating, he worked at

the Vienna General Hospital. He collaborated with Josef Breuer in treating hysteria by the recall

of painful experiences under hypnosis. In 1885, Freud went to Paris as a student of the neurologist

Jean Charcot. On his return to Vienna the following year, Freud set up in private practice,

specializing in nervous and brain disorders. The same year he married Martha Bernays, with whom

he had six children.

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Freud’s fame lies in his theory of the unconscious, a term which was used before Freud.

Freud theorized and popularized this term which becomes a very controversy idea from that time

until this very day. Freud started his career in medicine as a positivist due to his study of the

neuroscience; however, and through many clinical cases, Freud discovered that some human’s

behaviors and diseases do not have any “physical” causes. Freud broke from positivists and

neurobiology arguing that there is something more than the biological and chemical processes in

the “mind”. For him, the brain, simply put, indicates neurology, the chemical and biological

processes among the brain’s cells; however, the mind is the psychological part of the human’s

personality that cannot be tested in a laboratory. The theory of the mind cannot be tested against

the positivism’s methods which makes it vulnerable to any criticism. Freud believed that the mind

with its division, which will be discussed later, had a greater influence on the human’s behavior

than we think it has. Freud believed that events in our childhood have a great influence on our

adult lives, shaping our personality. For example, anxiety originating from traumatic experiences

in a person's past is hidden from consciousness, and may cause problems during adulthood (in the

form of neuroses).

Freud’s theory of the unconscious mind was inspired through a case known as The Case of

Anna O. The case of Anna O (real name Bertha Pappenheim) marked a turning point in the career

of a young Viennese neuropathologist. Anna O. suffered from hysteria, a condition in which the

patient exhibits physical symptoms (e.g., paralysis, convulsions, hallucinations, loss of speech)

without an apparent physical cause. Her doctor, and Freud's teacher, Josef Breuer succeeded in

treating Anna by helping her to recall forgotten memories of traumatic events. During discussions

with her, it became apparent that she had developed a fear of drinking when a dog she hated drank

from her glass. Her other symptoms originated when caring for her sick father. She would not
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express her anxiety for his illness but did express it later, during psychoanalysis. As soon as she

had the opportunity to make these unconscious thoughts conscious her paralysis disappeared.

Breuer discussed the case with his friend Freud. Out of these discussions came the germ of an idea

that Freud was to pursue for the rest of his life. In Studies in Hysteria, Freud proposed that physical

symptoms are often the surface manifestations of deeply repressed conflicts.

However, Freud was not just advancing an explanation of a particular illness. Implicitly he

was proposing a revolutionary new theory of the human psyche itself. This theory emerged “bit by

bit” as a result of Freud’s clinical investigations, and it led him to propose that there were at least

three levels of the mind (which is different from the physical brain) the conscious, the

preconscious, and the unconscious.

“Freud proposed a topographical model of the mind whereby the mind is similar to an

iceberg having visible and hidden parts. The surface, visible, and rational part of the mind is the

conscious mind. The conscious mind is the surface part of the mind that contains the thoughts that

are the focus of our attention now. You may eat some food if you are hungry. These are the kind

of thoughts that originate in the conscious mind” (McLeod, S. A.). Freud stated that” a state of

consciousness is characteristically very transitory; an idea that is conscious now is no longer so a

moment later, although it can become so again under certain conditions that are easily brought

about” (Complete 317). So the thoughts and emotions existing in the consciousness do not remain

in this area of mind for a long time; they retrieve to the preconscious area; nonetheless, these

thoughts can be recalled to consciousness at will.

The second layer in Freud’s theory of the mind is the preconscious layer. “It includes all

mental activities which are not presently active but stored somewhere in our memory. It can be
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easily accessed when required” (McLeod, S. A.). For example, you are not thinking about your

grandmother’s last name, but now being mentioned, you can call it to your consciousness from the

preconscious in an apparent ease. If you cannot, this is another problem. Jonathan Lear in his book

Freud defined preconscious as:

“An arena of the mind or of mental activity that while not conscious is

distinct from what Freud called the unconscious. These may be thoughts that are

simply unconscious in the sense that we are not consciously aware of them or they

may be actively kept out of conscious awareness. Still, even these repressed or

disavowed thoughts tend to have an articulated propositional structure. They thus

tend to cluster in articulated structures of propositional thought. In this way they

differ from the wishes and fantasies of the unconscious.” (245)

The preconscious exists just below the level of consciousness, before the unconscious

mind. It is like a mental waiting room, in which thoughts remain until they 'succeed in attracting

the eye of the conscious' (Freud, Complete 306). Mild emotional experiences may be in the

preconscious but sometimes traumatic and powerful negative emotions are repressed and hence

not available in the preconscious.

The final layer in the mind is the unconsciousness. It is the most genuine idea in Freud’s

theory. The unconscious mind comprises mental processes that are inaccessible to consciousness

but that influence judgements, feelings, or behavior.

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The unconscious for Freud, can be defined in several different ways, but it

is primarily the storehouse of instinctual desires and needs. Childhood wishes and

memories live on in unconscious life, even if they have been erased from

consciousness. The unconscious is, in a sense, the great waste-paper basket of the

mind – the trash that never gets taken out: ‘in mental life nothing which has once

been formed can perish – … everything is somehow preserved and … in suitable

circumstances … it can once more be brought to light” (Pamela 17)

According to Freud, the unconscious mind is the primary source of human behavior. Like

an iceberg, the most important part of the mind is the part you cannot see. Our feelings, motives

and decisions are actually powerfully influenced by our past experiences, and stored in the

unconscious. According to Pamela Thurschwell:

"The unconscious mind serves also as our biologically based instincts for the primitive

urges for sex and aggression. Freud argued that our primitive urges often do not reach

consciousness because they are unacceptable to our rational, conscious selves. People have

developed a range of defense mechanisms (such as repression) to avoid knowing what their

unconscious motives and feelings are" (54).

Freud stressed the significance of the unconscious in shaping our personalities. The

unconsciousness governs our behaviors to a great degree. The capacity of the unconscious can be

so powerful to the extent that it can be out of the conscious’ control. Let us consider the following

case: “It started in 1987, when Kenneth Parks got into his car, drove 20 kilometers to the home of

his in-laws, entered their house with a key they had given him and using a tire iron he brought
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with him, bludgeoned his mother-in-law to death. He got back in his car and, despite being covered

with blood, drove straight to a nearby police station and confessed, turning himself in. “I think I

have just killed two people,” he told the stunned cops. The Supreme Court of Canada dropped all

the charges, and Parks avoided a death penalty because he was “asleep” (staff).

“The unconscious of one human being can react upon that of another without passing

through the conscious” (Freud, Dreams 34). In Parks’ case, the unconscious took control while

he was asleep because the unconscious projects itself during dreams. Freud believed that the

influences of the unconscious reveal themselves in a variety of ways, including dreams, and in

slips of the tongue, now popularly known as 'Freudian slips'. Freud gave an example of such a slip

when a British Member of Parliament referred to a colleague with whom he was irritated as 'the

honorable member from Hell' instead of from Hull.

After constructing a model of the mind, Freud started building up a new model of what he

called “the psychic apparatus”. For him, the human psyche consists of three entities the id, the ego,

and the super ego. Each of these three bodies has its own contribution to the constructing of the

human’s psyche, and each one of them develops at a certain age. These are not physical areas

within the brain, but rather hypothetical conceptualizations of important mental functions.

Although each part of the personality comprises unique features, they interact to form a whole,

and each part makes a relative contribution to an individual's behavior.

The first and essential part of the psyche is the id or it. It is the first part to construct the

psyche presenting at birth. The id contains all the inherited (i.e., biological) components of

personality present at birth, including the sex (life) instinct – Eros (which contains the libido), and

the aggressive (death) instinct - Thanatos. Eros (in Greek methodology, the god of love) or the life

instinct consists of the basic instincts of survival, pleasure, and reproduction. That is why they are
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sometimes referred to as the sexual instinct because they are important to the continuation of the

species. The energy created by the life instincts is known as libido. Thanatos (the Greek

personification of death) or the death instinct is the second major part of the id. Freud believes that

people who experience traumatic events in their lives try to reenacting these events. In Beyond the

Pleasure Principle, Freud proposed, “the goal of all life is death” (147). All people have a wild

desire to die originated in the id; however, the Eros succeed in tempering this desire.

Freud assumes that a new born baby’s psyche consists only of the id. After a period of

time, babies start developing the other parts of the psyche. The most animalistic part of the psyche,

the id, works on the pleasure principle. The pleasure principle strives to fulfill our most basic and

primitive urges, including hunger, thirst, anger, and sex. When these needs are not met, the result

is a state of anxiety or tension. It is the driving force of the id which seeks immediate delight. The

pleasure principle controls children’s behaviors. Sigmund Freud noticed that very young children

often try to satisfy these often biological needs as quickly as possible, with little or no thought

given whether or not the behavior is considered acceptable. The influence of the id decreases

gradually with time. The reality principle of the ego takes charge, yet the id never disappears; it

remains hidden in the deepest part of the unconscious.

After a period, children develop what is to be known as the ego. “The ego is 'that part of

the id which has been modified by the direct influence of the external world.” (Freud, Ego 25).

The ego evolves from the id when children begin to realize the consequences of their actions and

behaviors. The ego works as a mediator between the animalistic and unrealistic id and the external

reality. Similar to the id, the main goal of the ego is seeking pleasure. However, and unlike the

chaotic id, the ego achieves his aims following socially accepted strategies. In many respects, the

ego is much weaker than the headstrong id. When in clash, the ego points the id in the right
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direction and claims some credit at the end as if the action were its own. The ego is 'like a man on

horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse.' (Freud, Ego 15). The ego

works according to the Reality principle in which the ego satisfies the desires of the id, which the

ego cannot fight, in a realistic, effective, and appropriate way. It accedes to the demands of reality

and society. The reality principle takes into consideration the risks, requirements, and possible

outcomes as we make decisions to fulfill the needs of the id. For example, in a state of hunger, the

id will urge you to fulfill its needs as soon as possible by stealing food no matter what the

consequences. The ego, after all, modifies the action making it buying instead of stealing.

The ego, when under the instance demands of the id and the super ego, deploys certain

strategies Freud called defense mechanisms to avoid the feeling of anxiety and guilt. Freud once

stated, "Life is not easy!", and so is the function of the ego which is in a middle of a fierce combat

between the ego and the super ego. Although these mechanisms are not under the control of the

conscious mind i.e. they cannot be operated at will, they tend to be more natural or in some way

unconscious. One of the most important mechanisms is repression. This was the first defense

mechanism that Freud discovered. Repression is an unconscious mechanism employed by the ego

to keep disturbing or threatening thoughts from becoming conscious. Thoughts that are often

repressed are those that would result in feelings of guilt from the superego. For example, in the

Oedipus complex, aggressive thoughts about the same sex parents are repressed. Another defense

mechanism is displacement in which aggressive attitudes are being redirected into an incapable,

powerless target. For example, someone who is angry with his supervisor at work cannot direct

his feelings of anger towards him/her; instead, he might get him, start yelling for no reason, break

things or even hit one of his family members.

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The last part of our discussion and the final component to be developed in the psyche is

the super ego. While starting to develop at the age of five, “the super ego is the part of psyche

which contains the moral values not just acquired by the parents but also the ideals matching the

social standards. The super ego is mainly comprised of two parts the ego ideal and the conscious”

(McLeod, S. A.). The ego ideal is the part of the superego that includes the rules and standards for

good behaviors. These behaviors include those that are approved of by parental and other authority

figures. Obeying these rules leads to feelings of pride, value, and accomplishment. Breaking these

rules can result in feelings of guilt. The conscience is composed of the rules for which behaviors

are considered bad. When we engage in actions that conform to the ego ideal, we feel good about

ourselves or proud of our accomplishments. When we do things that our conscience considers bad,

we experience feelings of guilt. The super ego can be thought of as the direct opposite of the id. It

tries to rein the id preventing him from taking charge of the ego; it also urges the ego to act

moralistically rather than realistically. The super ego works on both the conscious and the

unconscious. We might experience guilt without knowing exactly the reason for that feeling. When

acting in the conscious mind, we are aware of the resulting feelings. "The superego, like the id,

become perceptible in the state which it produces within the ego: for instance when its criticism

evokes a sense of guilt," wrote Anna Freud in her book The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense

(211).

A Psychoanalytic reading aims to better understand the inner workings of human behavior

by conceptualizing meaning from everyday human experiences such as anxieties, trauma,

sexuality, repression of the unconscious and dream meanings, as well as the meaning of death. A

psychoanalytic criticism of a literary work focuses on the text as a window into the mind of the

author. Psychoanalytic criticism imagines the text as a display of the author’s psychology, a
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window into his or her particular neuroses. Interpreting the text, then, becomes an exercise in

finding direct and indirect evidence of the author’s childhood traumas and psychological

instabilities and/or inconsistencies. This is what some critics called psych biographical criticism.

Ultimately, Freud’s dream theories influence these readings because they examine the literary

work as they would a dream as an expression of hidden desires and anxieties. Another way to

apply psychoanalysis to literary works is to consider the psychological makeup of the individual

characters within the work. A character in a literary work would be treated as a patient in a

psychologist’s clinic hoping to understand the common ground of human’s behavior. A final way

that critics can use psychoanalysis to interpret a literary work is to analyze the degree to which the

work aims to tap into the fears and/or desires of the reader. In this mode of interpretation, the

reader becomes the patient or the subject of psychoanalysis as much as the author was in the first

scenario.

This study deals with the drama of Eugen O’Neill as one of the most celebrated dramatist

in America from a Freudian point of view. It consists of an introduction, three chapters and a

conclusion. Chapter one is entitled A Freudian Reading of O’Neill’s Beyond the Horizon. It deals

with O’Neill’s Beyond the Horizon focusing on one of the most familial complexes which is the

sibling rivalry between the two protagonists Robert and Andrew. Chapter two is entitled A

Freudian reading of O’Neill’s The Hairy Ape. It tackles O’Neill’s The Hairy Ape and the influence

of the social class on the psyche of the protagonist Yank and his search for identity. Chapter three

approaches the masterpiece of O’Neill Long Day’s Journey into Night and the effect of O’Neill’s

own psyche and childhood experiences in shaping his literary style. The conclusion houses the jest

of the research and a summary of the achievements of each chapter.

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Chapter one

A Freudian Reading of O’Neill’s Beyond the Horizon

While reading Beyond the Horizon by O'Neill, one cannot but remember W. B. Yeats

saying "a struggle that has no mending, one woman and two men" (quoted in Daniels 75). This

sentence can be considered a summary of one of the earliest plays that established O'Neill's

undying fame. In presenting near-to-real characters, O'Neill provided psychoanalysis with rich

materials in an attempt to better understanding of the human psyche, behavior and inner working

of the mind. In Beyond the Horizon, Eugene O’Neill reveals that dreams are necessary to sustain

life. Through the use of the characters of Robert Mayo, Andrew Mayo and Ruth, O’Neill proves

that without dreams, man could not exist. Each of his characters are dependent on their dreams, as

they feed their destiny. When they deny their dreams, they deny their destiny, altering their lives

forever. O’Neill also points out, that following your dreams, brings you true happiness, something

none of his characters experience.

The play is structured in an artistic way. It consists of three acts, two scenes each. This

gives the impression that O'Neill made it a journey-like into the deep psyche of his characters. The

first scene is indoor indicating trapping, prisoning and frustration. The second scene is in the open

landscape giving the impression of freedom and dreams. This notion is made clear in the first act;

in the first scene, every character obeys his/her own nature, nothing is outside the book. This is the

conscious, clear, rational part of each character. In the second scene, each character fights their

own natures pushed by a specific derive emerged from the unconscious; the thing which leads

them to their tragic end. O'Neill rebuffed the influence of the Freudian theory on the human psyche

on the structure of his play. He claimed that his play is as naturally structured as possible. In a

replay to an inquiry on Freudianism in his plays, O'Neill wrote:

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"There is no conscious use of psychoanalytical material in any of my plays. All of them

could easily have been written by a dramatist who had never heard of the Freudian theory

and was simply guided by an intuitive psychological insight into human beings and their

life impulsions that is as old as Greek drama" (Goyal 95).

Approaching the play from psychoanalytic lens, it is clear that it is comprised of individual

human beings, each with a psychological history that begins in childhood experiences in the family

and each with a pattern of adolescent and adult behavior that are the direct result of that early

experience, and by examining each character's early childhood, we can frame an understandable

result of their current actions and their own true nature. The use of the word nature in this context

is equivalent to the term unconscious. Robert Mayo is the main protagonist of the play. Due to his

in-door uprising because of his illness, the unconscious of his is composed in a way that suits his

childhood experience. His dreams of traveling to far, strange, exotic places is a direct result of the

lack of freedom he suffered during his early childhood. On the other hand, Andrew, his brother, is

a true child of the soil; born and raised to work in the land. He is as described by Robert "you are

the Mayo branch of the family"(Horizon 5). Although brothers, Andrew is the direct opposite of

Robert. Andrew is husky, sun-bronzed, handsome in a large manly-featured fashion, a son of the

soil. Ruth Atkins is the turning point of the play; she is the element that pushes the play forward

and changes the lives of the two Mayos. She lives in a neighboring farm of the Mayo's, an out-

door girl in her twenties with an undeniably pretty face. What we know about Ruth's childhood is

that she lived her early childhood as an orphan raised by her mother. This lack of an affectionate

father derived her to the compassionate Robert instead of the manly-featured Andrew. However,

after a period of time, Ruth started to recognize her love to Andy following her own nature as a

materialistic girl altering the fate of the two brothers forever.

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All the main characters, Robert, Andrew, and Ruth, make destructive decisions due to their

psychic structure, childhood, and uprising. Robert Mayo is a dreamy young man always looking

to the great beyond wondering what is out there. He is charmed with the unknown and the unseen.

He always wonders about the "mysteries of the East". This trail in his personality is due to, indeed,

his early childhood as an indoor-child because of his sickness. The consciousness of Robert is

formed in a way pushing him to travel as far as possible to make up the lack of freedom he suffered

during his childhood. The unconscious, however, is formed in a different way. He was forced to

stay home leaving behind a great opportunity to travel for a reason he does not seem to understand.

Robert's desire to travel expressed at the begging of the play is not at all a materialistic one.

Indeed, his main goal is not collecting money; his desire to travel is to compensate a lack in his

character. He is following his own nature by doing so. The clearest indication of Robert's reason

for travel is stated when Robert tells Andrew that "I've never considered that practical side of it for

a minute, Andy" (Horizon 6). The first time we meet Robert, he is engaged in day dreaming,

waiting the next day to ride the sea and achieve success, in his own sense of the word, to experience

the feeling of fulfilment.

The essential derive of the play is the sibling rivalry occurring between the two poles

Robert and Andrew. The thing that makes it difficult to analyze is that the relation between the

two brothers is an extraordinary, in a positive sense, way. "They ain't like most brothers. They've

been thick as thieves all their lives, with nary a quarrel I kin remember" (Horizon 15). Declared

Mr. Mayo at the beginning of the play. To solve this puzzle, we need to consider a fundamental

principle in psychoanalysis: you cannot get what you consciously want, but you get what you

unconsciously need. The notion that human beings are motivated, even driven, by desires, fears,
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needs, and conflicts of which they are unaware—that is, unconscious—was one of Sigmund

Freud’s most radical insights, and it still governs classical psychoanalysis today.

“Sibling rivalry is a type of competition or animosity among siblings for the attention of

the parents” (Tyson 14). It is one of the familial complexes that Freud discussed. In this case,

Robert and Andrew are in a conflict zone unconsciously. Both of them are not aware of the motives

behind their actions. On the conscious level, they both believe that they have a special relation

between them; however, their actions reflect the opposite because they are under direct control of

the unconscious. Robert wants to get rid of the picture that his family drew to him. He wants to

deride the picture of the sick child he was. The effect of this idea seems clear in the following

conversation between Robert and Andrew.

"Robert: All of you seem to keep harping on my health. You were so used to seeing me

lying around the house in the old days that you never will get over the notion that I'm a

chronic invalid, and have to be looked after like a baby all the time, or wheeled round in a

chair like Mrs. Atkins. You don't realize how I've bucked up in the past few years" (Horizon

15).

Robert unveils his love to Ruth, though he was well aware that his brother is in love with

her, in an attempt to gain the attention of his parents. After declaring that he is going to marry

Ruth, his parents were overjoyed with the news. In this case, we see the Id at work in Robert. “The

id is devoted solely to the gratification of prohibited desires of all kinds—desire for power, for

sex, for amusement, for food—without an eye to consequences” (Tyson 25). In other words, the

id consists largely of those desires regulated or forbidden by social convention. Robert acted out
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of the Id ignoring the consequences of his action on his brother Andrew, Ruth, his whole family,

and especially on himself. He reacted to a sexual urge which the ego decided to accede.

Upon hearing about the new relationship between Robert and Ruth, Andrew reacted to the

news by telling everyone that he decided to travel with Dick Scott, the captain of the ship, instead

of Robert. The motive behind this decision is due to two defense mechanisms: denial and

displacement. The psyche of Andrew instantly operates what is known as displacement.

“Displacement is the shifting of actions from a desired target to a substitute target when there is

some reason why the first target is not permitted or not available. Displacement may involve

retaining the action and simply shifting the target of that action. Where this is not feasible, the

action itself may also change. Where possible the second target will resemble the original target

in some way” (Displacement). Andrew is offended by his brother; however, he redirected his anger

not to his brother nor his family, although he had a bitter fight with his father, but to his own self.

Andrew chooses to go against his own self and nature accepting to travel against his wish instead

of staying home seeing Robert and Ruth together. The second mechanism operating in this case is

known as denial. Denial “is a defense mechanism in which the existence of unpleasant internal or

external realities is denied and kept out of conscious awareness. By keeping the stressors out of

consciousness, they are prevented from causing anxiety” (Denial). After hearing the news, Andrew

reacted as normally as possible denying any injury. He didn’t shout, cry nor fight with anyone. He

acted as if what happened was meant to be. "[Evasively.] I've always wanted to go, even if I ain't

said anything about it" (Horizon 20). Declared Andrew desperately. James Mayo, Robert's and

Andrew's father, noticed that Andrew is not aware of what he is doing. James knew that his son is

running against his own nature.

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"James MAYO—[Shaking his finger at ANDY, in a cold rage.] You know I'm speakin'

truth—that's why you're afraid to argy! You lie when you say you want to go 'way—and

see things! You ain't got no likin' in the world to go. Your place is right here on this farm—

the place you was born to by nature—and you can't tell me no different. I've watched you

grow up, and I know your ways, and they're my ways. You're runnin' against your own

nature, and you're goin' to be a'mighty sorry for it if you do. You're tryin' to pretend to me

something that don't fit in with your make-up, and it's damn fool pretendin' if you think

you're foolin' me. 'S if I didn't know your real reason for runnin' away! And runnin' away's

the only words to fit it. You're runnin' away 'cause you're put out and riled 'cause your own

brother's got Ruth 'stead o' you" (Horizon 21).

For each of the characters, tragedy results, because they did not follow their destinies. Ruth

because of her haste in deciding to marry Rob, has grown to hate him. She realizes that she never

loved him and wishes Andy would come home and save her from her prison of marriage. Ruth

Mayo, having married the wrong Mayo brother, must see her marriage fall apart, along with the

farm. Her consolation is that the absent Andy still loves her and he will be a final refuge for her.

Andy does not give Ruth the response she desires and she becomes more bitter and cold as the

years pass. Rob, because of Ruth’s treatment of him, has grown depressed and no longer dreams.

He realizes what he has been deprived of and thinks he still has a chance to reclaim it. Rob was a

failure as a farmer, just as Andy predicted. “Farming ain’t in your nature… as a place to work and

grow things, you hate it” (Horizon 84). His true nature tried to lead him down the right path, but

he refused it. Rob’s life could never work out as long as he is trapped behind the hills surrounding

his farm. For Robert Mayo the hills surrounding the Mayo farm are a physical symptom of the

restrictions, the limitedness and the monotony of farm life. The restrictions slowly suffocate him
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and eventually destroy his imagination, so he can even no longer dream of a happier life. Andy’s

punishment is that he is never truly happy. He spent eight years running from who he is and where

he belongs. Andrew, who has changed during the eight or so years of the play’s action from a

healthy young farmer into a tense, hard, even ruthless–and unsuccessful-speculator, is the greatest

failure of all, for he has spent eight years running away from himself and has been changed from

creator to parasite.

The symbol of the hills surrounding the Mayo's farm is a significant sign to a better

understanding of the psyche of the main characters especially Robert. From a psychoanalytic

perspective, the symbol refers to all indirect and figurative representations of unconscious desire.

The hills for Robert serves as a signifier; however, what the symbol of hills signifies is the most

important aspect in this field. The hills accompany Robert throughout his psychic development

even to his death. They serve as a symbol for the lack of freedom that Robert suffers from. They

give the picture of the prison Robert trapped in and the broken dreams he has lost. "Oh, those

cursed hills out there that I used to think promised me so much! How I've grown to hate the sight

of them! They're like the walls of a narrow prison yard shutting me in from all the freedom and

wonder of life" (Horizon 34). The sight of the hills keeps changing throughout the play depending

on the psychic status of Robert's mind. At the beginning, they are the road to freedom; the magical

carpet that will carry Robert to the mystery he is bound of; however, before his death, they gave

the impression of the prison Robert is jailed in.

At the third and final act of the play, all three major characters reach the point of no return.

At this state, no one can escape his tragic end. Robert is suffering from a serious illness in his lungs

and grew very sick due to his hard work in the land. At his death bed, Robert escapes from the

window of his room to the open field to meet his final destiny there. But the question that should
 22

be asked is this: why did Robert choose the open farm to die there? Was it a conscious or

unconscious choice for him? The answer of this question is a defense mechanism known as

regression.” It is the temporary return to a former psychological state, which is not just imagined

but relived” (Tyson 15). Regression can involve a return either to a painful or a pleasant

experience. In the case of Robert, he wants to be as he wishes to be, a dreamer. He wants to forget

the indoor Robert who abandoned his dreams. Robert expresses his overwhelming happiness to

meet the hills and sun, which reminds him of his early youth, in his last speech.

"ROBERT—[In a voice which is suddenly ringing with the happiness of hope.] You

mustn't feel sorry for me. It's ridiculous! Don't you see I'm happy at last—because I'm

making a start to the far-off places—free—free!—freed from the farm—free to wander on

and on—eternally! Even the hills are powerless to shut me in now. [He raises himself on

his elbow, his face radiant, and points to the horizon.] Look! Isn't it beautiful beyond the

hills? I can hear the old voices calling me to come—— [Exultantly.] And this time I'm

going—I'm free! It isn't the end. It's a free beginning -the start of my voyage! Don't you

see? I've won to my trip—the right of release—beyond the horizon! Oh, you ought to be

glad—glad—for my sake"(Horizon 63).

To sum up, a psychoanalytic perspective reveals a much different love story than the one

ordinarily associated with Beyond the Horizon. As the play illustrates, romantic love is the stage

on which all of our unresolved psychological conflicts are dramatized, over and over. Indeed, it’s

the over‑and‑over, the repetition of destructive behavior, that tells us an unresolved psychological

conflict is “pulling the strings” from the unconscious. All of the characters discussed above

illustrate this principle, though its operations are, at once, most dramatic and most camouflaged—
 23

that is, most repressed. Beyond the Horizon shows us how effectively romantic relationships can

facilitate our repression of psychological wounds and thereby inevitably carry us, as the play's

closing line so aptly puts it, “that was always the cure for me. It is too late for this world, but in

the next, I will not miss the secret” (Horizon 63).

 24

Chapter Two

A Freudian Reading of O’Neill’s The Hairy Ape

Human beings are bestowed with intellectual powers as they have been inventing new

worlds and discovering new horizons. Miraculously, the world has been made a globalized village

due to such intellectual powers of human beings. Unfortunately condition of low class workers

does never change despite of hard work even they can’t enjoy the basic needs of life. They are

born in poverty; live like animals and die unnoticed and helplessly in the end. They believe that

poverty is in fate by generation to generation and can’t be changed by them. In society their

condition has been most pitiable as they have inability in thinking and progress due to perceived

low belief in minds of their self-identity. Social class has a significant influence on the individual

psychic development to the extent that the psyche of an individual cannot be separated from the

common psyche of the social class that he belongs to; however, loss of social identity and the

deprivation of the feeling of belonging, as in the case of Yank, lead to more damaging

psychological problems.

The Hairy Ape, which consists of eight scenes, is one of the most interesting and thought-

provoking works written by Eugene O'Neill. The theme of The Hairy Ape is the contradiction

between individuals and society and the process of finding self-belonging. According to critics, in

The Hairy Ape, Yank and Mildred represent low and upper classes while Capitalists are responsible

for sufferings of workers as they exploit them for materialistic benefits. By caging them in low

environment, they chain them mentally metaphorically so that they would not be able to raise any

question against wages, human rights, environment or capitalistic system. Yank’s perceptions as

well as his thinking make him believe that neither he belongs to human beings nor animals but to
 25

tragic end. In The Hairy Ape, Yank is victimized of animalism as his sufferings make him to escape

in past by losing grip in present and to loosen grip on present means failure in future. Lake of

education and skills destroy humanism while sense of deprivation that he perceives from parents,

close relations, church, friends, society or the social groups; develops illogic savageness and

aggressiveness in his behavior.

The symbol of the cage appears frequently throughout the play. The cage in this case is not

only physical; it is also the mental and psychological cage of the workers. Yank appears in a

luxurious transatlantic liner sailing on the sea. In contrast, his living space is rather narrow. “It is

a cramped space in the bowls of a ship, imprisoned by white steel. The lines of bunks, the uprights

supporting them, cross each other like the steel framework of a cage.” The firemen in their

forecastle are “the bewildered, furious, baffled defiance of a beast in the cage” (O'Neill, Ape 1).

This is the first description of cage. It not only has the symbolic meaning of prison, but also

connects the workers with beasts, which echoes with the cage in which the gorilla stays.

In fact, they care for nothing and have no thoughts, but shouting, cursing, laughing, and

singing—“a confused, inchoate uproar swelling into a sort of unity, a meaning—the bewildered,

furious, baffled defiance of a beast in a cage.” When working in the stokehole, they are “outlined

in silhouette in the crouching, inhuman attitudes of chained gorillas” (Ape 1). They are just beasts

in the cage in the eyes of the upper class. In addition, after Yank’s watch has come off duty, he

doesn’t wash himself, so his fellow workers make joke of him “it will stick to you, it will get under

your skin. It makes spots on you—like a leopard” (Ape 16). This indicates that dirt is connected

with beasts. In this respect, readers can have a more comprehensive understanding of the symbolic

meaning of cage.
 26

Self is a psychological term that explains that self is inner personality. Oxford dictionary

defines “self” as “a person's essential being that distinguishes him or her from others; particular

nature and qualities which make them individual and unique” (“self,” def. 1.2.a). Self seems

complex aspect of study as everyone has different personality traits, abilities and preferences. Even

sometimes a person himself cannot understand what is really going on in his or her mind. He may

not be able to explain exactly what he thinks, why he thinks in that way, or why does he behave in

this manner.

Sense of self is the way a person thinks about his traits, beliefs, and purpose within the

world. It is a truly dynamic and complicated concept because it covers both the inner and outer. A

person is living and interacting with outside world all the time whether he is sitting in class or

talking with a friend. He is doing things which help to define his role in this world. Why is he

interested in a particular class? Why this person is considered his friend? The following section

will attempt to answer these questions.

In the first act of The Hairy Ape, a group of firemen workers gather in the forecastle of a

transatlantic liner drinking beer, singing and dancing. The scene seems as realistic as possible

indicating the harsh conditions the working class is suffering from. Yank, the protagonist of the

play, "broader, fiercer, more truculent, more powerful, more sure of himself than the rest" is

physically the strongest one among the mob and the most delusional too. He is not aware of the

conditions surrounding him and his mates; his is completely isolated from the outer world. For

him, he is achieving his ideal-self. It is what a person would like to be. It consists of goals and

ambitions, it is dynamic and forever it is changing. Paddy, an old Irishman who likes to drink

heavily, and he is known for his rendition of "Whiskey Johnny" and spouting philosophy and
 27

stories of the past when intoxicated, is the first shock Yank faces in his way to explore his real

self. Paddy started to object the working conditions they are suffering from, and the big gap

between the firemen and the passengers on the ship. Yank's continual references to Paddy as "dead"

and "old" and not "belonging" with the other men aboard the Ocean Liner reveals Yank's own

rejection of freedom. "Well den, we belong, don't we? We belong and dey don't. Dat's all" (Ape

5).

Yank seems fairly content as if not proud to be a fireman. He defends the ship as his home

and insists that the work he does is vital—it is the force that makes the ship go twenty-five knots

an hour. His self-esteem is at its peak to the extent that the reader feels that Yank is like a god

force on the ship.

"I'm de ting in coal dat makes it boin; I'm steam and oil for de engines; I'm de ting in noise

dat makes yuh hear it; I'm smoke and express trains and steamers and factory whistles; I'm

de ting in gold dat makes it money! And I'm what makes iron into steel! Steel, dat stands

for de whole ting! And I'm steel—steel—steel! I'm de muscles in steel, de punch behind

it" (Ape 8).

Yank is trying to define himself in term of social identities. For psychoanalytic critics, human

beings are able to act as both individual persons and being a part of social groups. A person acts

as a unique personality in one context but displays collective similarities as a group member in

another. Human beings are very good at varying the degree to which they act in terms of either

individual differences or collective similarities. The psychological problem that Yank is facing is

his loss of identities both personally and socially. He is delusional and far away from reality. The

activation of denial as a defense mechanism cut any connection between Yank and reality. He is
 28

trying to deny the existence of any problem in his life work convincing himself that he is a god-

like person which leads to his harmful shock when he finally faces Mildred Douglas.

Mildred Douglas is introduced in Act II. The sitting of the act is associated with her social

status "The impression to be conveyed by this scene is one of the beautiful, vivid life of the sea all

about—sunshine on the deck in a great flood, the fresh sea wind blowing across it" (Ape 9).

Mildred is the pale and feeble daughter of the owner of Nazareth Steel. She has been lavishly

spoiled and enjoyed every possible privilege money can buy. In college, Mildred studied sociology

and is on a crusade to help the poor. In other words, she is a number one high-class woman. O'Neill

chose wisely the sitting and characters of act II as a direct opposite of the sitting and the characters

in act I both socially and psychologically. While on the Ocean Liner Mildred asks permission to

visit the lower portions ship to view how the "other half" ,Yank and the firemen, live. She chose

to wear a white dress in her visit to the portion ignoring the warning of the engineer. The white

dress is sit as a contradiction to the dirty black skin of Yank. There are also enormous physical

differences between Mildred and the firemen. She is skinny, pale and wears white. The firemen

are characteristically blackened by coal dust, dirty and muscular.

Upon the first encounter with Yank, Mildred is shocked by the appearance of the fireman.

She reacted unconsciously to this encounter asking to be escorted out of this hole of hell "Take me

away! Oh, the filthy beast!" Yank is perceived as an animal by Mildred acting from her upper class

manner. Although Mildred should be considered the antagonist of The Hairy Ape, she is equally

victimized by class as Yank. Though Mildred has more education and cultural experience than

Yank, she still cannot escape her cultural identity. Mildred describes herself as the waste of her

father's steel company, as she has felt the benefits, but not the hard work that brought them. She
 29

shares with Yank the need to find a sense of usefulness or belonging—the fate of both characters

were decided before they were born. Thus, Yank and Mildred desperately search to find an identity

that is their own.

Yank feels himself insulted in some unknown fashion in the very heart of his pride. The

story here begins to change Yank's life. This is the greatest blow to yank's belief as well as to his

concept of belongingness. His pride and sense of security have been shattered by the hands of a

woman's insult. It makes him to realise that he "does not belong"(Ape 15). After that crucial

incident he no longer feels that he "belongs" Yank in the search of his identity, discovers firstly

that he is alone, lonely and the world is impossible to live in, and secondly, that steel is no power

within him, but a prison but it also makes the cage in which Yank is imprisoned.

Throughout the play, he broods the words ‘hairy ape’ used for him. Desire for

revenge burns hot on his heart. His confident sense of belongingness is gone. He realizes that the

ship belongs to her, and he is simply a slave working to maintain her in luxury. He is no longer in

harmony with his work; now he does not share or clean himself like other stokers and comes to

look like the hairy ape. The thought that he is a hairy ape becomes an obsession with Yank. In the

prison he actually imagines that he is a hairy ape imprisoned in a cage. It is in prison that he comes

to know of the I.W.W. and suppose that he can have his vengeance by joining the organization.

Maddened by the thought that she is the owner of the steel which has been used to cage him in, he

bends the bars of his cell and comes out, the very next moment the hose is used upon him and he

is caged in once again.

Yank, the hairy ape, is rejected by civilized society. He has been rapidly

disintegrating. He cannot go back so he continuous to go down. Regression alone is possible for

 30

him. Rejected by society, he goes to the zoo, thinking that there at least he must belong. He is a

hairy ape and so naturally he belongs to the brotherhood of the apes. Reaching the monkey-house,

he stands face to face with a gorilla in its cage and talks to it as to a friend. They are both members

of the same club and so they will stick together up to the end. Thinking that with the help of the

gorilla he would be able to wreck his vengeance on society, he flies off the bars of the cage and

sets the gorilla free. He calls him a ‘brother’ shakes hands with it, and wants to lead it to the fifth

avenue. But the gorilla wraps his arms round him and crushes him to death. It throwing its body

into the cage and walks off menacingly.

Yank, as an animal-like figure, is derived by the pleasure principle described by Sigmund

Freud in Project for a Scientific Psychology "it is the seeking of pleasure and avoiding of pain in

order to satisfy biological and psychological needs"(98). Specifically, the pleasure principle is the

driving force guiding the id. Freud described this principle in his book Reflections on War and

Death, and he proposes that "illusions commend themselves to us because they save us pain and

allow us to enjoy pleasure instead." Freud adds; "we must therefore accept it without complaint

when they sometimes collide with a bit of reality against which they are dashed to pieces"(45).

Yank is a spurious man from the beginning of the play. He forces himself to believe that he is

better than his mates are because he "belongs". This action is done on the part of Yank to hide his

traumatic experiences, which he went through when he was a child as the death of his mother or

to compensate for his social status as a repressed member from the working or lower class.

The Hairy Ape contains an extremely significant social conflict in its projecting of the

bourgeois and the proletariat. Mildred and Yank are representative of the highest and lowest

societal classes, the bourgeois and the proletariat. However, while Mildred and Yank's lifestyles
 31

are extremely different, they share similar complaints about class. Mildred describes herself as the

"waste product" of her father's steel company. She has reaped the financial benefits of the

company, but has felt none of the vigor or passion that created it. Mildred yearns to find passion—

to touch "life" beyond her cushioned, bourgeois world. Yank, on the other hand, has felt too much

of the "life" Mildred describes. Yank desires to topple the class structure by re-inscribing the

importance and necessity of the working class. Yank defines importance as "who belongs." Class

limits and determines both Mildred and Yank's financial resources, educational opportunities,

outlook on life, and culture. The Hairy Ape reveals how deeply and rigidly class is inscribed into

American Culture and the cultural and financial boundaries it erects.

O'Neill has been compared to virtually every literary figure in the Western world and is

considered the first great American playwright. His plays deal specifically with the American

tragedy, rooted in American history and social movements. O'Neill had broad vision and was

sometimes criticized when this vision seemed to exceed his skill. Some critics even believed

O'Neill aimed too consciously at greatness. His dramas are marked by expressionistic theatrical

techniques and symbolic devices that function to express religious and philosophical ideas. By

bringing psychological depth, poetic symbolism and expressionistic technique to the American

theatre, O'Neill raised the standards of American theatre.

In conclusion, most of the characters in The Hairy Ape are victimized by their social class

which has a direct access to their social, biological and psychological lives. In The Hairy Ape,

Yank is under the mercy of his conflicted unconscious. Avoiding the harsh realities of the working

class using different defense mechanism such as denial and repression at the beginning of the play,

he is shocked harshly when facing the true reality that he could not escape which leads him to his
 32

downfall. Yank, after all, is a mere ape, controlled by his essential derives for power and

fulfillment. The play, as a whole, is a search for identity that has been lost forever, and one of the

most controversial plays written by O’Neill.

 33

Chapter Three

Freudian Reading of O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night

Eugene O'Neill's great posthumously produced play, Long Day's Journey into Night,is

clearly a psychological play. The two events depicted as occurring on a single day, the mother's

return to morphine addiction and the youngest son's' discovery that he has contracted tuberculosis,

allow for the portrayal of the psychological history and interrelationships of a disrupted Irish-

American family; as is well known, it is the playwright's own family. Since the play is an aesthetic

condensation of the events of everyday life, a large number of defensiveness interactions among

the characters appear.

Before starting to deal with the play, it is crucially important to be acquainted with the term

Psychbiographical criticism. The same psychologist who established Psychoanalysis, Sigmund

Freud, invented this approach to literary criticism. This approach depicts a piece of writing, or any

form of art, as a picture of the artist's own psyche. Freud introduced this approach while

investigating the psychological determinants of Leonardo da Vinci’s artistic creativity. This

approach is essential in understanding the play in hand, Long Day's Journey into Night. The play

was written in part as a way for O'Neill to show the world what his family was like and in what

sort of environment he was raised. O'Neill wanted to create a play that would lay forth his own

background in a forgiving nature, which is why he strove not to bias the play against any one

character. For information on what his childhood was like, one does best to read Long Day's

Journey into Night and examine the character of Edmund, who is an autobiographical character.

O'Neill was the son of a Broadway actor and a mother who disliked Broadway. He suffered from
 34

tuberculosis, which caused him to have a nervous breakdown early in life. O'Neill's mother

suffered from morphine addiction around the time of O'Neill's birth; just like Mary, the mother,

who suffered the same addiction and Tyrone, the father, who has the same career, a Shakespearian

actor, and the same quality, being a stingy. As for O'Neill himself, he can be associated with the

character of Edmund, who is sick, dreamy and unable to tolerate the idea of being a human

choosing instead to be a seagull. The autobiographical elements can be traced in almost every line

in the play. It has the same events, crisis, conflicts, and language, to the name of certain characters.

The mastery of O'Neill is made clear in his ability of transforming Long Day's Journey into Night

from simply an autobiographical work into a universal play dealing with universal themes.

In Long Day’s Journey into Night, Eugene O’Neill tackled mainly the relation of man to

his surrounding and even the individuals around, and by doing so, he attacked fiercely the whole

structure of the American society. As illustrated in chapter one, O’Neill rebuffed any influence of

Freud on his writings; however, Freudian concepts and ideas seem to be on every page. The reason

for the numerous examples of Freudian concepts derives from the fact that both the play and

psychoanalysis are about family, or more precisely "familial relationships. O’Neill refused the

ideal picture drawn for America and rejected the concept of “the American Dream of Success”.

O’Neill dealt with the American society not like the ideal society but families having their own

crisis just like any other normal family from a different country or a different culture. Long Day’s

Journey into Night discusses the collapse of the “American Dream” which becomes the “American

Nightmare”. The present study highlights O'Neill's exploration on human consciousness and the

influence of culture in both familial and social contexts in Long Day's Journey into Night.

Long Day's Journey into Night marks the climax of O'Neill's development both

psychologically and artistically. Long Day's Journey is O'Neill's own autobiographical family
 35

drama. Dedicating the play to his wife, Carlotta, O'Neill wrote, "I mean it as a tribute to your love

and tenderness which gave me the faith in love that enabled me to face my dead at last and write

this play- write it with deep pity and understanding and forgiveness for all the four hunted Tyrones"

(7). O'Neill acknowledges that writing the play let him work through his conflict feelings toward

his family.

The play consists of a father, a mother, and two sons. The father, as an actor is always

drunk and scrooge. The mother is a sweet idiot drug addict. The elder brother is a cynical drunkard

and the younger son is a sick and troubled boy. The play deals with these psychological problems

one by one. It explains why each character becomes the person he is now, and the motives behind

their choices and actions. Mary says: "The things life had done to us we cannot excuse or explain.

The past is the present. It is the future, too" (Day 33). Circumstances trapped them in a destiny

they cannot escape. As they tell of themselves, they become larger than their own small lives. They

are in a search-journey for something; however, they themselves do not know what exactly they

are looking for.

The title of the play, Long Day’s Journey into Night, is rather a symbolic one. It is, indeed,

a journey of exploration of the psychological needs of the characters. Each character, in one way

or another, reveals his psychological “disease”. For mother, Mary, it is a sad journey into fog of

dope and dream. She exclaims: “I really love fog because it hides you from the world and the

world from you. You feel that anything has changed, and nothing is what it seemed to be. No one

can find or touch you any more” (Day 38). For Jamie, it is a hopeless journey into the night of

cynicism and despair, "The truth is there is no cure and we've been saps to hope" (Day 29). For

the father, James Tyrone, it is a tragic journey down the wrong road, away from the earlier triumph,

he believes: "Maybe I can't help being, although all my life since I had anything I've thrown money
 36

over the bar to buy drinks for everyone in the house, or load money to sponges I knew would never

it back" (Day 59). On the other side, for Edmund, the younger son, it is a journey beyond night,

"It was a great mistake, my being born a man, I would have been much more success as a seagull

or a fish" (Day 63).

The play, as it is clear by now, deals with a “family”. From a psychoanalytic perspective,

the family is the first block which the psyche of a person is built on. Louis Tyson explains that

"family is important to psychoanalytic theory, because we are each a product of the role we are

given in the family-complex" (16). Family, with all its troubles and problems, directs the course

of live for each member of the Tyson family. Dramatically, the psychoanalysis of these conflicting

characters and their contrasting journey is the essence of the play. If a psychoanalyst were

cataloging the problems of Tyson family, he would probably be concerned that the family is

repressing what Freud called the pleasure principal. Freud believed that the pleasure principal (the

idea that if necessity did not dictate working, humans would simply do things for their own self-

gratification) is innate in all humans, and when they repress it, there are consequences that may be

harmful.

O’Neill presented the character of Tyrone as the most affected character by his repression

of the pleasure principle. The course of life Tyrone chooses, and his abandonment of his dream of

becoming a successful Shakespearean actor for financial profits aided in his psychological

downfall. Tyrone was running after the “American Dream” which is a dream of self-improvement

mainly through economic means by repressing one’s aims and dreams. As a result, Tyrone can be

seen as a model for every American person in their quest for their dreams. Just as society damaged

Tyrone psychologically through the myth of "The American Dream", he in turn damaged his

family by extending and even magnifying those same values.

 37

One of the main conflicts in the play occurs between Tyrone and Jamie. Jamie blames his

father for the situation of the family especially that of his mother as a morphine addict. Mary is

the most alienated character in the play. She is a victim of the false values of the American Dream.

She, as a woman with a very dysfunctional psyche, employs many defense mechanisms in an

attempt to avoid her pitter reality. One of the defenses Mary uses is projection. According to Albert

Rothenberg, projection is “a defense against unconscious or preconscious drives, fantasies, or

conflicts through which these internal psychic products are perceived and represented as coming

from outside the self. Mary does not trust herself and feels guilty about beginning to take morphine

again, but she defends herself by blaming those around her” (52). At the edge of her psychological

breakdown, Mary sees everything around her as a threat. She observed that “living in this

atmosphere of constant suspicion, knowing everyone is spying on me, and none of you believe in

me, or trust me” (Day 66).

Mary’s use of morphine is a mean to cut her off her present and transform her into her

idealized past when she had the dream to be a nun or a pianist. In fact, she uses different kinds of

defense mechanism in order to avoid facing any of her problems. Tyson believes that defenses are

"the processes by which the contents of our unconscious are kept in unconscious. In other words,

they are the processes by which we keep the repressed repressed in order to avoid knowing what

we feel can't handle knowing" (18). Mary is living through the most complex defense, regression

that is the temporary return to a former psychological state, which is not just imagined but relived.

It is a defense because it carries out thoughts away from some present difficulty as when Mary

flashes back to his past in order to avoid the unpleasant realities of her present life. Mary employs

a lot of flashbacks to her idealized past not just because she wants to avoid the present; she even

relives the events in her mind. "Like dreams, regressive states usually hold some symbolic meaning
 38

coming from the unconscious" (Tyson 15). Mary’s use of denial is clear enough in her attempt to

avoid facing her son, Edmund, disease, attempts to deceive herself with the comforting belief that

Edmund is only suffering from a summer cold:

Jamie: [genuinely concerned] It's not just a cold he's got. The kid is damned sick.

Mary: [turn on him resentfully] Why do you say that? It is just a cold! Anyone can tell that!

You always imagine things. (Day 8).

Edmund is the most realistic character when it concerns facing the present. Near the end of

the play, in one of the most touching dramatically scenes, he admits he is ill and attempts to break

through his mother's denial of his illness. At this stage, Mary has almost sunk into oblivion in her

denial of her son disease, Edmund desperately says to her "Mama! It isn't a summer cold! I've got

consumption!" (Day 72). These are powerful words, because in saying them aloud, Edmund

accepts his illness and gives up his own tendency to denial. But the insight is weakened because

the plaintive words are primarily addressed to his mother - he is more concerned with breaking

through her denial than with understanding or changing himself. There is in- sight but not triumph

because his breakthrough is primarily a cry of despair and rage at a withdrawn, rejecting mother

Self-deception, regression, denial, dream and the other kinds of defenses can be seen

among the other characters as well. Jamie, cynical but honest, deludes himself in his search for

personal redemption through alcoholism and whoring. Jamie's affairs with women follow a pattern

in psychoanalysis that stems from oedipal complexes. He feels like he is in conflict with his father

for his mother. He accuses his father of Mary's misery. These feelings "manifest themselves in a

pattern called the good girl/bad girl attitude, which places women into two groups in the mind of

the man affected. They are either good girls like Mom or bad girls and thus disposable" (Tyson
 39

19). However, it is likely an oedipal complex is not all of Jamie's motivation for having careless

affairs. He is also probably relieving the anxiety he has over the possibility of his family's failure.

In Long day’s journey into Night, among all the negative and dark visions and relations,

we have a relation that is positive and fulfills healthy sexual marital bond between the spouses. It

had its origin in Mary’s sensual part of love and desire for marriage with stage actor James Tyrone.

Her desire appears unusual, as Mary had in fact committed herself to the service of the church as

a nun. However, after her first encounter with handsome James Tyrone, she bowed to her sensual

part of feminine nature. In fact, his handsome male outlook acts as a powerful stimulation of her

erotic sensual self that overrides her religious commitment. Mary recalls her stimulation for

marriage in such words: "If you think Mr. Tyrone is handsome now, you should have seen when I

first met him. He had the reputation of the best looking man in the country" (Day 55).

All of the flashbacks, even if they depict happy memories reveal a dysfunctional family

pattern. Long Day's Journey demonstrates key psychoanalytic concepts including the idea that

family defines the person; that social pressures can push a family into dysfunction; and that people

are defined and can be understood through their sexual habits. All of the Tyrones first put on mask

to hide the truth but later on their masks are dropped and the reality of them is revealed. They are

looking for happiness that never comes. Only Edmund can save himself from the misery and he

makes a triumphant over the failure and suffering, and just he comes to the truth about the family's

dreams and accepts the reality about himself, he say: "Mom! It isn't a summer cold! I've got

consumption!" (Day 73). If O'Neill wanted to show the dark side of "The American Dream", then

he was successful. If he wanted to prove that people and their problems fit well into a

psychoanalytic model, he succeeded there as well.

 40

The large preponderance of these three defenses throughout the play clarifies the essential

structure of the family portrayed. When such defenses are characteristically used within a family,

insuperable barriers to communication exist. Through denial, there is blank non-acceptance of

reality; through projection, inner guilt is blamed on others and through rationalization or

intellectualization, the distortions of truth are made to appear reasonable, even intellectually

stimulating. Furthermore, group denial often operates to produce psychological disintegration in

at least one of the family members, and, in this case, denial contributes to the breakdown of the

drug-addict mother. When the psychological suffering of a family member is defended against and

denied by the other members of the family, the suffering person becomes helpless. Although she

herself may try to deny her illness, she feels that others deny her suffering because it is too great

for them to bear and she feels lost and overwhelmed. Also, since her illness is not accepted by the

others, no real effort is made to help her.

As a final word, the play is all the more tragic because it leaves little hope for the future;

indeed, the future for the Tyrones can only be seen as one long cycle of a repeated past bound in

by alcohol and morphine. This play was awarded the Pulitzer Prize when it was first published,

and it has remained one of the most admired plays of the 20th century. Perhaps most importantly,

it has achieved commercial success because nearly every family can see itself reflected in at least

some parts of the play. The Tyrone family is not a unique family, and it is easy to identify with

many of the conflicts and characters. The play has a unique appeal to both the individual audience

member and to scholars of American drama, which explains its popularity and enduring acclaim.
 41

Conclusion

"In solving the riddle of Sphinx, Sigmund Freud unknowingly laid the foundation for a

new school of literary criticism, for it was he who solved, as well, the riddle of Hamlet"(Kaplan

155). Psychoanalytic literary criticism once viewed as a method of solving the riddle of the creative

works. The present scene in the field of literary interpretation comes closer almost to the concept

of "Nietzsche's contention that there is no truth, only an array of interpretation"(Armstrong 341).

Whatever might be the relevance of Freudian methods to literary criticism, undoubtedly it has

furthered the cause of critical pluralism. It cannot be claimed that Freud's critical method is the

ultimate monistic formula for literary interpretation. This method has his own limitations too. As

Freud admits that" before the problem of the creative artist, analysis must, alas, lay down its arms"

(Freud, History 17). However, Freud's approach has indeed, opened up new insights in the field of

literary criticism, more so bringing into its fold radical imagining and application.

In O'Neill's Beyond the Horizon, the two protagonists, Robert and Andrew Mayo, brothers

on a New England farm, are markedly different in character. Andrew, strong, prosaic, and efficient,

is a born farmer; his father confidently trains him to take over the farm after he is gone. Robert,

sensitive and idealistic, detests the rude life of the farm. He dreams continually of a romantic

existence ‘beyond the horizon’ he can see from the farmhouse window. In order to improve his

health, it is decided that an uncle, Captain Dick Scott, will take him on a voyage to distant parts of

the world. Rob is excited by the prospect of traveling to the Orient and the South Seas. But on the

night before his departure he and Ruth Atkins, fiancée of his brother Andrew, accidentally discover

their love for each other. Swept away by his emotions, he gives up the sea voyage and promises to

spend his life taking care of Ruth and her infirm mother. Andrew, bitter, impulsively goes to sea

in Rob’s place.
 42

But through the ‘accident’ of Rob’s romantic infatuation for Ruth each of the main

characters of the drama has been forced to betray his own nature. Rob, dreamy and inefficient, is

a poor farmer, and under his management the farm rapidly degenerates. When Andrew returns

after three years his love for Ruth has faded, and he feels his place is not on the farm. He goes off

to Argentina and becomes wealthy through trading and speculation. The paralyzed Mrs. Atkins,

shrewish and petulant, makes life miserable for both Rob and Ruth. The disasters follow one after

the other; their baby dies, and Rob’s lungs become diseased. Still an idealistic dreamer, Rob looks

ever forward to a better life ‘beyond the horizon,’ but his dream has become virtually a

pathological delusion. In the final act Andrew returns from South America and finds a specialist

to treat Rob; he confesses that through gambling in grain (i.e., betraying his true nature as a man

of the soil) he has lost most of his fortune. The specialist gives Rob little chance to survive, but

before he dies, he tells Andrew and Ruth they must marry after he is gone. Then he drags himself

out onto the road where, lying on the edge of a ditch, he can see the sun setting over the horizon

he has never crossed.

The message of Beyond the Horizon is that each of us must follow out his own nature to

its fulfillment; not to do so is to bring misery to one’s self and to others. The main dramatic interest

lies in the character of Rob: soft-minded, impractical, and indecisive, he nevertheless has a truly

poetic sensitivity which might have brought him fame and happiness had he lived according to his

nature.

In The Hairy Ape, O'Neill presents the social class clash in the American society and its

influence upon the psyche of the individual. Yank represents the oppressed class i.e. the working

class, and Mildred is the oppressor i.e. the high class. The clash between Yank and Mildred is a

psychological battle as well as a physical one. Yank, at the begging of the play, considers himself
 43

an essential part of the ship. He is "steam and oil for de engines"(Ape.7). His self-esteem is at its

peak to the extent that the reader feels that Yank is like a god-force on the ship.

Yank's loss of identity plays a major role in his psychological development. He is denying

his own self as an ape. Sense of self is the way a person thinks about his traits, beliefs, and purpose

within the world. It is a truly dynamic and complicated concept because it covers both the inner

and outer. Yank is controlled by the pleasure principle. As stated by Freud, "illusions commend

themselves to us because they save us pain and allow us to enjoy pleasure instead"(Freud, War

45). Yank is trying to believe in something that he is not at all. He is just another caged ape in the

prison of the bourgeois.

Long Day's Journey depicts a very long, painful, heavy and endless day in the New London

summer home of the Tyrone family in the year 1912. The year 1912 was the most crucial year in

O'Neill's life. In that year, he attempts suicide in Jimmy-the-Priest's saloon in New York City, met

his first wife, lived during the summer with his dope-filled mother and stingy father in New

London, learned that he had tuberculosis, and entered a sanatorium on Christmas Eve of that year.

He left it six months later with the belief that he must be an artist or nothing. I will not discuss

O'Neill's family here, but his autobiography shows that from the beginning of its composition,

O'Neill had the general plan for Long Day's Journey clear in mind. He himself

remembered that the play would cover one day in a family's life, a day in which things occur which

evoke the whole past of the family and reveal every aspect of its interrelationships. It is a deeply

tragic play, but without any violent dramatic actions. The reason for the excellence of Long Day's

Journey is not immediately apparent. Perhaps it is most remarkable for what it is not. It is not a

drama of action and violence; although the emotions involved find violence expression in words.
 44

O'Neill in Long Day's Journey copes with an American way of life that has been shaped

based on "The American Dream". It is similar to Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, Williams'

A Street Car Named Desire in that they portray the materialistic society where characters

experiencing financial and emotional crisis. Most significantly, they examine characters trying to

overcome obstacles to prosperity and happiness. They are looking for what "The American Dream"

has created for them; prosperity, success, fame, and a life full of happiness. By Tyrone, O'Neill

shows how he longs for something more than his ordinary life. Tyron desires for money and

escaping from his miserable life. He looks for what James Adams claims in 1931 that "The

American Dream of a better, richer, and happier life for all our citizens of every rank is the greatest

contribution we have made to the thought and welfare of the world" (Adams 4).

Finally, this study is an exploration from inside to outside, from individual to collective,

from unconscious to conscious. In short, it was a revelation of man from family to society. In

addition, it considered O'Neill's idea about the reality and provided an opportunity to see how

O'Neill revealed the truth of "The American Dream" that is "The American Nightmare".
 45

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