Mourning Becomes Electra | Author Biography

In 1888, Eugene O'Neill was born in New York City to a theatrical family. His father was the noted actor James O'Neill, who became famous for his starring role in Alexander Dumas's Count of Monte Cristo. During his childhood, Eugene traveled with his family on the theatre circuit.

Eugene O'Neill
Eugene O'Neill

In 1906 O'Neill attended Princeton University before being expelled for a drunken prank later that year. In 1907, he moved to New York, where he held several jobs. In 1909 he sailed to Central America to prospect for gold. Critics believe that his experiences in Honduras provide the setting and background for one of his most successful plays, The Emperor Jones. Disillusioned with the work, O'Neill returned to New York.

O'Neill worked as a seaman on ships sailing to South America, Africa, and Europe. His experiences as a sailor and working odd jobs on foreign waterfronts became the basis of his early maritime plays, such as Thirst (1914), Bound East for Cardiff (1916), The Long Voyage Home (1917), and The Hairy Ape (1922).

O'Neill returned to New York in 1911 and supported himself working odd jobs and living among the poor and downtrodden. These experiences provided the background for such later plays as The Iceman Cometh (1946) and Long Day's Journey into Night (1956). He worked as an assistant stage manager and actor with his father's theatre company, which provided him with theater experience.

In 1912, O'Neill worked as a reporter for the New London Telegraph. Diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1913, he spent six months in the Gaylord Farm sanitarium.

During his convalescence, O'Neill decided to become a playwright. After recovery, he entered Harvard to study with George Pierce Baker. He became involved with an experimental theater group, the Provincetown Players, who in 1916 put on his first produced play, the one-act Bound East for Cardiff.

O'Neill won the Pulitzer Prize four times and received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1936. At the time, he was only the second American writer to receive that international honor, the first being novelist Sinclair Lewis.

Despite his financial and critical success, O'Neill retreated into seclusion in the late 1930s. Though he continued writing, theater companies infrequently performed his plays. He returned to the stage with The Iceman Cometh in 1946. He died in 1953.

It took the posthumous revival of Long Day's Journey into Night in 1956 to reestablish his esteemed position in the American theater. The success of O'Neill's plays since then proves his stature among the most prominent of American dramatists.