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Eugene O'Neill

Eugene Gladstone O'Neill (October 16, 1888 – November 27, 1953) was an American playwright. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into the U.S. the drama techniques of realism, earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish playwright August Strindberg. The tragedy Long Day's Journey into Night is often included on lists of the finest U.S. plays in the 20th century, alongside Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.[1] He was awarded the 1936 Nobel Prize in Literature. O'Neill is also the only playwright to win four Pulitzer Prizes for Drama.

For other uses, see Eugene O'Neill (disambiguation).

Eugene O'Neill

Eugene Gladstone O'Neill
(1888-10-16)October 16, 1888
New York City, U.S.

November 27, 1953(1953-11-27) (aged 65)
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.

Playwright

Kathleen Jenkins
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(m. 1909; div. 1912)​
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(m. 1918; div. 1929)​
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(m. 1929)​

O'Neill's plays were among the first to include speeches in American English vernacular and involve characters on the fringes of society. They struggle to maintain their hopes and aspirations, but ultimately slide into disillusion and despair. Of his very few comedies, only one is well-known (Ah, Wilderness!).[2][3] Nearly all of his other plays involve some degree of tragedy and personal pessimism.

Legacy[edit]

In Warren Beatty's 1981 film Reds, O'Neill is portrayed by Jack Nicholson, who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance.


George C. White founded the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center in Waterford, Connecticut in 1964.[34]


Eugene O'Neill is a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame.[35]


O'Neill is referenced by Upton Sinclair in The Cup of Fury (1956), Dianne Wiest's character in Bullets Over Broadway (1994), by J.K. Simmons' character in Whiplash (2014), by Tony Stark in Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), specifically Long Day's Journey into Night, and O'Neill's play, Long Day's Journey into Night, is referenced by Patrick Wilson's character in Purple Violets (2007).


O'Neill is referred to in Moss Hart's 1959 book Act One, later a Broadway play.

Museums and collections[edit]

O'Neill's home in New London, Monte Cristo Cottage, was made a National Historic Landmark in 1971. His home in Danville, California, near San Francisco, was preserved as the Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site in 1976.


Connecticut College maintains the Louis Sheaffer Collection, consisting of material collected by the O'Neill biographer. The principal collection of O'Neill papers is at Yale University. The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, fosters the development of new plays under his name.


There is also a theatre in New York City named after him located at 230 West 49th Street in midtown-Manhattan. The Eugene O'Neill Theatre has housed musicals and plays such as Yentl, Annie, Grease, M. Butterfly, Spring Awakening, and The Book of Mormon.

Tomorrow, 1917. A short-story published in The Seven Arts, Vol. II, No. 8 in June 1917.

[39]

S.O.S., 1918. A short-story based on his 1913 one-act play Warnings.

The Ancient Mariner, 1923, a dramatic arrangement of .

Coleridge's poem

The Last Will and Testament of an Extremely Distinguished Dog, 1940. Written to comfort Carlotta as their "child" Blemie was approaching his death in December 1940.

[40]

Poems: 1912-1944, published 1980.

The Calms of Capricorn, unfinished play, published in 1983.

[41]

The Unfinished Plays: Notes for The Visit of Malatesta, The Last Conquest and Blind Alley Guy, published in 1988.

[42]

The Eugene O'Neill Award

O'Neill, Eugene; Bogard, Travis (1988). Complete Plays 1913–1920. . Vol. 40. New York: Literary Classics. ISBN 0-940450-48-8.

The Library of America

O'Neill, Eugene; Bogard, Travis (1988). . The Library of America. Vol. 41. New York: Literary Classics. ISBN 0-940450-49-6.

Complete Plays 1920–1931

O'Neill, Eugene; Bogard, Travis (1988). Complete Plays 1932–1943. . Vol. 42. New York: Literary Classics. ISBN 0-940450-50-X.

The Library of America

at Standard Ebooks

Works by Eugene O'Neill in eBook form

at Project Gutenberg

Works by Eugene O'Neill

at Project Gutenberg Australia

Works by Eugene O'Neill

at Open Library

Works by Eugene O'Neill

at Internet Archive

Works by or about Eugene O'Neill

at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)

Works by Eugene O'Neill

(public domain in Canada)

Works by Eugene O'Neill