On The Absurdity And Trend Of Redemption Of The Tyrone Family In Long Day's Journey Into Night

Eugene O'Neil was a celebrated American playwright who was hailed as “the father of American play”.He has created a great number of plays and won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1936.Long Day's Journey into Night is one of the late works of O'Neil with a strong autobiographical color.Present studies are mainly focused on the overall study of the play and other plays of O'Neil,discussing pessimistically alienated existential state with Sartre's existentialism,or discussing themes,symbolic techniques,etc.Some scholars analyze Mary's living plight from perspective of feminism,showing sympathy for her suffering.And some others study Jamie's tragedy of Oedipus complex from the view of psychoanalysis,etcetera.In general,most studies regard the play as a tragedy.Living a life filled with twists and turns,O'Neil explores the living predicament of human beings and tries to find the road to self-redemption based on his personal life experience.O'Neil not only delineates the morbid and absurd life of a family,but also endows the play with profound meaning,exploring a road for human's out of predicament.The thesis attempts to analyze the absurd life of the Tyrone family and explore the trend or possibility of self-redemption of soul for modern man in existential predicament according to the absurd philosophy of Albert Camus combining with Schopenhauer's philosophy of will and Jung's idea on self-redemption of human soul.The thesis first analyzes the darkness in human nature,which is,being shrouded in desire for money,illusion,jealousy,sextual desire,and so on,human falls into the absurd existence.In the blind chase of desire,the Tyrone family lose humanity and deprive themselves of harmony and spiritual meaning in life.Therefore,they fall into great absurdity and pain in complaining and hurting each other.This is the tragedy of modern man.Then,the thesis analyzes that the Tyrone family's awakening of consciousness makes it possible for their self-redemption of soul.In their self-introspection,confession and revolt with consciousness,the light of redemption shines in the darkness.Through studying the Tyrone family's tragedy,conclusion can be drawn as follows: Long Day's Journey into Night fully reveals the dark and absurd state of human existence,which is in the blind desire for money,sex and alcohol,loss of faith,jealousy,indulgence in illusion,humans are alienated from affection and fall into nihility and meaninglessness.However,people should not escape from reality in absurd life,shift the blame onto others or cover up absurd reality,but confront it with spirit of revolt.The way for modern man to self-redemption of soul is to recognize the real self and make self-introspection,self-analysis and confession on soul,realizing the root cause of absurdity and generating consciousness of self-redemption in the depth of soul to make it possible for them to self-redeem.This is one of the important themes that O'Neil's depicted in the play.With the exploration of the absurd existence of the Tyrone family and light of redemption,there will be enlightenment on modern man,that is,when faced with absurdity of life,people should carry a lucid consciousness,being conscious of their own existential state,and dare to introspect and revolt so that they could finally achieve self-redemption of soul.This is philosophical thinking and enlightenment of life conveyed by O'Neil in his play.