Abstract

Long Day’s Journey into Night, written by American great playwright Eugene O’Neill, is an autobiographic family tragedy of O’Neill’s and also a great modern tragedy. O’Neill reveals the predicaments modern people face and their anguish and loneliness by showing the Tyrones’ real life. This paper analyzes the tragic features in Long Day’s Journey into Night on the basis of traditional tragedy concepts and modern tragedy beliefs. This paper studies how the play achieves the moving tragic effect from three aspects, namely, the characters tragic and uncontrollable destiny, the consistent and violent conflicts, and the tragic images. The paper is divided into three parts: introduction, content and conclusion. In the first part, a brief introduction about the author and the writing background is made, as well as the study of the play at home and abroad. In the second part, the three tragic features are carefully discussed. In the last part, a brief conclusion is drawn. 

Key Words: Long Day’s Journey into Night, tragedy, tragic features

Content

摘要：

Abstract:

Introduction-4

Chapter One The Characters’ Tragic and Uncontrollable Destiny-5

1.1 James Tyrone：Stingy and Failed Father-6

1.2 Mary Tyrone：Drug-addicted and Nervous Mother-7

1.3 James Tyrone：Cynic and Unaccepted Loafer-9

1.4 Edmund Tyrone: Pessimistic and Weak Patient-11

Chapter Two The Consistent and Violent Conflicts-12

2.1 Characters’ Dissatisfaction and Argument with Each Other-13

2.2 The Inward Contradiction of the Characters-14

Chapter Three The Tragic Images-17

Conclusion-19

Bibliography-20

Acknowledgments-21