A Long day's journey into the night

 

                                               A Long day's journey into the night

                                                                                        By Eugen O 'Neill

     

               

        

                                                                                 ( Eugene O 'Neill :- 1888 - 1953  )

Eugene O’Neill was one of the greatest playwrights in American history. Through his experimental and emotionally probing dramas, he addressed the difficulties of human society with a deep psychological complexity. O’Neill’s disdain for the commercial realities of the theater world he was born into led him to produce works of importance and integrity.

O'Neill  is the only American playwright to have won the Nobel prize for literature, and the only dramatist to have won four Pulitzer prizes. He introduced psychological and social realism to the American stage; he was among the earliest to use American vernacular, and to focus on characters marginalised by society.

Long Day's Journey into Night is a play written by Eugene O'Neill that was first performed in 1956. The play is considered an American masterpiece, was awarded a Pulitzer prize in 1957.This play is autobiographical play of O'Neill.

The plot of Long Day's Journey into Night focuses on a dysfunctional family trying to come to grips with its ambivalent emotions in the face of serious familial problems, including drug addiction, moral degradation, deep-rooted fear and guilt, and life-threatening illness.

-: Thinking Activity on A Long Day's journey into the night :- 

Que:-1 Can we say that this play's main themes is  addiction, past memory, escapism ?

Long day's journey into Night is a play revolved around many themes. In this play we can find addiction, past memory and escapism as main themes.

The wife of Tyrone and mother of Jamie and Edmund, she struggles from a morphine addiction that has lasted over two decades. While she has broken the addiction several times, she always resumes her morphine use after spending more time with her family.

The Past, along with forgiveness, is one of two dominant themes in the play. At different parts, the Past plays different roles. On one hand the past is a burden. Mary speaks with a terrible fatalism, claiming that nothing they are can be helped: past sins and mistakes have fixed their present and future irrevocably. 

The past also takes the form of old hurts that have gone unforgiven. We hear the same arguments again and again in this play, as the Tyrone's dredge up the same old grievances. Letting go is impossible, and so the Tyrones are stuck.

Jamie , in his attempt to escape his own failure to make something of himself. His attempt to to escape reality. So we can find addiction, past memory and escapism as main themes in this play.

Que:-2 "American dreams" capitalisation, failure of capitalisation ? Can we find these element what is the structure of this play ? 

Capitalisation is said to provide the opportunity to achieve " The American Dream"in the play. With good work , ethics, financial sense. 

However, this dream is hopelessly outdated and become increasingly difficult to achieve.O'Neil in Long Day's Journey concern about this failure and reveals the reality of " The American Dream" in the capitalist society. He represents the failure of American man, American values, American culture. 

Mary's words show that Tyrone is a practitioner of " The American Dream" and he comes to this land for the financial success. The Tyrones are hopeless people that by drinking and consuming morphine try to escape from the reality to their life. Tyrone is the result of capitalism. Tyrone's soul is destroyed by possessiveness and greed. They come to point that they have been betrayed by " The American Dream" has created for them.

Que:-3 Can we say that all four character are in guilt of the past memory and they are dependent on each and they wanted to escape from past but could not. How do you look this concept?

Yes we can say that all four characters are in guilt of the past memory and they are dependent on each other. They wanted to escape from past but could not.

James Tyrone who is blamed by his son Jamie. He sent his wife Mary in senetoriam. But there is no great treatment of morphine addiction. And in past he make mistake on the birth of Edmund. 

He sent Mary cheap hospital and she became morphine addicted. This past memory  dream to become nun and pianist. But after meet with James Tyrone her dream not completed. She guilt about her past and also talks about it. The four characters has guilt.  

In the play , The four characters are wanted to escape from their past memory but they could not. They have addiction of alcohol and morphine. Mary taking morphine for escaping the past memory. The other three taking alcohol for escaping reality and past memory. They try to escape from past but they could not escape. 

Que:- 4 Can you do comparison between Mourning Becomes Electra and Long day's journey into the night ? 

 [Source :- Greek mythology, Oedipus, Electra complex]

The both play Mourning Becomes Electra and Long Day's journey into the night written by Eugene O'Neill. Mourning Becomes Electra is play based on Greek play The Oristeia. The same story telling about Greek legend in the O'Neill's play. Here he put the character of Ezra Mannon.   Long Day's Journey Into Night is story about James Tyrone who is not king or legend. This story connect with O'Neill's own personal life. This play as semi autobiography. The both play has Oedipus complex. 

 In Mourning Becomes Electra we find the psychoanalytic term Electra complex. Which represents girls sense of competition with her mother for the affections of her father. In this play Lavinia daughter of Christine and Ezra Mannon. Lavinia loves her father Ezra Mannon. Also we find the Oedipus complex which is the psychoanalytic term. That represents the children more affection to their opposite gender parents. Especially boy with his mother. In this play Orin the son of Christine and Ezra Mannon who loves his mother Christine.  

In the play Long Day's Journey Into Night we have find Oedipus complex. Edmund is more connected with his mother. Edmund loves Mary and always worried about her morphine addiction and health. Mary is the representative of Electra complex she has love for her father. She also loves his son Edmund. And she is more worried about Edmund's health. 

 In this both play we find psychoanalytic theory of Electra complex and Oedipus complex. Both play has character they have Oedipus complex term. Edmund and Orin both loves their mother. They more affected with their mothers Mary and Christine. The both play shows the psychoanalysis theory. 

Que:-5  How do you read Mary's character as a feminist reader how do you interpret her character ?

 Mary Tyron is the wife of Tyrone and mother of Jamie and Edmund, she struggles from a morphine addiction that has lasted over two decades. While she has broken the addiction several times, she always resumes her morphine use after spending more time with her family.

As a feminist reader I have put Mary's character in the centre of the play. Her character is most and more important in the play. She becomes morphine addicted. She always guilt in her past memory. She has tension of her son Edmund. 

She much connect with Edmund. Mary in the whole play try to escape from reality of her life by addiction of morphine. But she couldn't escape from the reality of life. Mary lost all the things in play. She loss her dream, youth, love and health. She has dream to become nun and pianist but after meet with James Tyrone her dream lost. By addiction of morphine she lost her health. 

 At the end of the play  she is full in morphine addiction and her mental health was not good. She blameless character in play but she has guilt about her past memory. She try to escape by morphine but it for just some minutes. After she except the reality of life. Her character is pure and innocent. We see her soul and life is imprisoned in the past memory. And she wants to escape from his past.

Que:- 6 How you see "Lacan's psychoanalysis " theory, and interpretation with special reference of "Long day's journey in to the night" ?
 

 

   Lacan holds that human psyche is formed of three orders (the Imaginary, the Symbolic and the Real) which mold theu nconscious mind and motivate human actions and reactions. He believes that in the formation of the first psychic order, the Imaginary, "the child, in the presence of his mother, begins to manifest his needs.

 It is here that he encounters the mother as a speaking subject" . It is a world of satisfaction for the child where" the infant emerges from satisfaction, and not from frustration, to construct a world" that is the realm of ideal completeness in which the child feels no lack or loss, since it is governed by the illusive joyful unity of the child and its mother.

Moreover there are no traces of language in this order. When the child is six-month old, Lacan holds, it starts to distinguish itself from its mother in a phase that Lacan terms the Mirror Stage in which the child sees its own image distinct from that of its mother, and thereby the illusion of unity with the mother crumbles down.

O'Neill's play Long Day's Journey Into Night, the play dramatizes one day of Tyrone family's life through which the personalities of its members are revealed via their memory and also their disputes each other. 

O'Neill shows that the mind of all four members of the family is haunted by the past, and all suffer from some lacks they try to compensate for by such means as drinking alcohol, using morphine, acting as an actor or a man of literature, while they constantly fail to do so, as they are entangled in the web of ideology and the law of the other imposed on them , though in different ways.

The noteworthy features of O'Neill 's play is the fogginess of the stage throughout the play that creates a gloomy atmosphere , and signifies the delving into the unconscious mind , since fog is the symbol of unconsciousness . Every character of the long Day's Journey Into Night wishes to re- experience the lost union of the imaginary order which they ultimately find, nonetheless, impossible to regain.

Que :- 7 Do you find split personality in Mary's character ? How and where ? Explain in detail . 

Mary Tyron is one of the female character of the play ' A Long Day's Journey into Night '. She is wife of Tyron and mother of Jamie and Edmund. She is struggle from a morphin addiction.

She has split personality. Her mental health disturbed when she taking morphine.  She always in the guilt of the past memory. As a mother she always worried about the health of Edmund. After taking morphine she has different personality. She is in the past. She thinks about past memory and blame on James. 

She remember about her dream and she taking with Cathleen about it. At the time of birth of Edmund the doctor gives morphine to relief the pain. After that she addicted of morphine and by taking it she effort to escape from the reality of life. 

Her split personality in the play we see when she taking morphine her behaviour change with family members and in the normal stage her behaviour is different. There were see split personality of her. As a mother she do all her responsibilities and taking care of her son. She much worried about Edmund's health. 

Que :- 8  Mary and Fog ! What is connection between Mary and Fog . Or Fogginess how she interpreted "Fog" ? What are the relevance of fog in this drama.

    A Long Day’s Journey  Into Night, by Eugene O’Neill, is a deeply autobiographical play. His life was rampant with confusion and addictions in his family. Each character in this play has a profound resemblance, and draws parallels and connections with a member of his own family. The long journey that the title of the play refers to is a journey into his past.      

Fog is a recurring metaphor in the play; it is a crucial symbol of the family's impenetrable confusion. It is referred to in the text as well as stag direction in this play. O'Neill uses the Fog outside the house as an atmospheric element that has an ominous presence this play. Tyrone family members and the surrounding that O'Neill grew up in were tained by broken dreams, lies, disease, past issues, alcoholism and drug addiction.The symbolic implications of fog in the play are descriptive of the struggle in the minds of this deeply conflicted family. 

Fog can represent a number of different things in the play, but generally, for all of the characters, fog is dark, isolating and unstoppable. Fog represents Mary's mental state after she takes her medicine, which she is addicted to. Mary and Fog both connected. The Fog is easily identifiable as Mary's morphine high, representative of her cloudy mental state. 

Mary sinks back into her addiction as the night falls and slowly regresses further away from reality and her family. The fog signifies the state of mind that she is in. 

For Mary , this fog is represented as an alternative or Refuge from reality. She can hide herself in the fog so that her family can be oblivious to her addiction.

Thank you.....