I. Brief Introduction

　　1.17th century

　　lYe Bare and Ye Cubb （1665） by William Darby

　　2.18th century

　　lAmerican subjects began to be treated seriously. The first tragedy is The Contrast （1787） by Royal Tyler. It is considered ※typical American play§ about American soldiers.

　　3.19th century

　　lpoetical plays, esp in the first half of a group of playwrights

　　lafter civil war: realism, melodrama, emotional incidents （domestic melodrama）, with simple plots

　　4.20th century

　　separation from the old tradition

　　l1920s: ※Little Theatre Movement§ began after 1912, Washington Square Players, Provincetown Players （New York City, Greenage Village）. They are freed from the conventional theatre and can be as experimental as they like.

　　l1930s: Eugene O＊Neil, Clifford Odets

　　lPost-war: second climax of American drama, Arthur Miller: Death of a Salesman

　　l60s: Theatre of the Absurd, Edward Albee

　　II. Eugene O＊Neil

　　1.life

　　2.works

　　（1）Bound East for Cardiff

　　（2）Beyond the Horizon

　　（3）The Emperor Jones

　　（4）The Hairy Ape

　　（5）Desire under the Elms

　　（6）The Iceman Cometh

　　（7）Long Day＊s Journey into Night

　　3.point of view

　　His purpose is to get the root of human desires and frustrations. He showed most characters in his plays as seeking meaning and purpose in their lives, some through love, some through religion, some through revenge, all met disappointment. The characters seem to share O＊Neil＊s perplexities of human nature. As a result of his tragic and nihilistic view of life, his works, in general, indicated chaos and hopelessness.

　　4.The Hairy Ape

　　Yank

　　5.style

　　（1）O＊Neil was a tireless experimentalist in dramatic art. He paid little attention to the division of scenes. He introduced the realistic or even the naturalistic into the American theatre.

　　（2）He borrowed freely from the best traditions of European drama, especially the stream of consciousness.

　　（3）He made use of setting and stage property to help in his dramatic representation.

　　（4）He wrote long introduction and directions for all the scenes, explaining the mood and atmosphere.

　　（5）He sometimes wrote the actors＊ lines in dialect.

　　6.His position

　　He was the first playwright to explore serious themes in theatre. With him, American drama developed into a form of literature. And in him, American drama came of age （mature）. He came only after Shakespeare and Bernard Shaw in the world of drama.