Biography
Eugene O誰eill痴 early life provided him
materials for his plays. He was born on October 16, 1888 in New York
City. James O誰eill, Eugene's father, was a famous actor and director.
Ella O誰eill, Eugene's mother, had been educated in a convent. She
became addicted to morphine after losing her second child. Eugene
also had an older brother Jamie who was an actor. All three of the
men in the family drank heavily.
Eugene was raised in the theater, accompanying
his father on tour. From age seven to fourteen, he went to Roman
Catholic Schools. Eugene attended Princeton University at the age
of eighteen, but dropped out after one year. Actually, he was about
to be thrown out for committing some kind of prank. After Princeton,
he decided he wanted to be a sailor. Before leaving for the sea,
he secretly married Kathleen Jenkins. This was done in secrecy because
his father did not approve of her. After six months at sea, Eugene
contracted malaria and came home to tour with his father's company.
Kathleen gave birth to his first child, Eugene Gladstone O誰eill, but Eugene
rejected them. A short time later, they divorced.
In 1912 Eugene was sick again with
tuberculosis and he spent several months recovering in a sanitarium.
It was at this time that Eugene began to write his plays. By 1914,
he had his first work, Thirst, and some other one act plays publicized.
In 1916, his plays were first performed by an experimental theater group.
Later that year, Eugene's love life had found a new spark. He married
Agnes Boulton, and had another son, Shane. After ten years with her,
it was out with old and in with the new again. He then married Carlotta
Monterey , an actress who played in one of his productions. O誰eill
dedicated his play, A Long Day's Journey Into Night to Carlotta.
This is the play that puts his life into a nut shell.
During O誰eill痴 lifetime, he wrote
many, many plays. His most recognized plays were Beyond The Horizon,
Anna Christie, Strange Interlude, and Long Day's Journey Into Night.
All four of these won the Pulitzer Prize in 1920, 1922, 1928, and 1956,
respectively. He won his last Pulitzer Prize three years after his
death! Also, in 1936 he won the Nobel Prize for literature.
Overall, he wrote over thirty plays in his lifetime.
Eugene's father died in 1920 and his
mother died in 1922. His brother Jaime also died at an early age.
Eugene O誰eill, the puzzling man himself, died on November 27, 1953 in
Boston, Massachusetts at the age of sixty-five.
Links to other biographies
Lucid
Cafe
The
Literature Nook
Mourning
Asides
Ron's
Eugene O'Neill Page
DePaul
University O'Neill Page
Nobel
Foundation Web Page
Pamela
Ruiz Playwright Report
Works Cited
Ruiz, Pamela. Eugene O地eill. 28 July 1995. Online.
Internet. 18 Feb. 1998. Available
http://members.tripod.com/~Emanthia/Oneill.html.
Klein, Leonard S., ed. World Literature in the
20th Century. 5 vols. New York:The
Continuum Publishing Company, 1983.
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