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Editor’s Foreword

This "Pre-Laconics" issue of Laconics compiles papers published in the "eOneill.com Essays" section from 1999-2005.

My original concept of "eOneill.com Essays" was as an online publishing house where essays on O'Neill and the theatre could be published in a timely manner and without the constraints and limitations of a conventional literary journal. It would be open to all—high school students and heads of university departments—and everything submitted would be published, as long as it was of an appropriate subject matter and not illiterate.

Over the years, I've received numerous queries as to how submitted essays were evaluated for publication. When I've replied with the above explanation, I've received a polite "thank you" in response, the inquirer never to be heard from again. I finally came to the realization that for the "publish or perish" types who inhabit most American universities, eOneill.com was not an acceptable place to publish their papers since, because of its "open door" policy, it "didn't count."

This matter has been hotly debated on this website, and a peer reviewed version of the "Essays" section has been considered. But I keep coming back to Professor Charles Carpenter's words which appeared on our "Forum" in June of 2001:

I have a lifetime of paying attention to modes of publication behind me, having been a college librarian before I was a professor, a specialist in literary bibliography, and a modern drama bibliographer ad nauseum (well, from 1974 to 1993). Moreover, I have a project underway—the drama chronology—that I intend to publish on a website well before I try to publish it as a book (if I ever do). So maybe my perspective will be of some value.

I think it's wonderful that you have made online publication of original essays possible for a great variety of people. There's a continuum of types of material that you'll probably see over the years, ranging from essays you will clearly not care to duplicate if you are to keep the website respectable, to essays that are clear candidates for journal publication but which may profit from comments by scholars. I don't think you should ever expect to contribute to anyone's quest to publish rather than perish; "published" in academe still means printed versions of essays carefully refereed by specialists. The referee business is NOT a business you will want to get into; talking profs into doing the job of evaluation, then getting them to finish the work and return it in a reasonable time has driven many journal editors insane. However, supplying the service of putting something online and inviting comments is potentially a great contribution, if only people take advantage of the opportunity.

In between these poles I can visualize high-quality secondary school essays, made noteworthy mostly because they ARE by high school students; trial-run essays by college undergraduates and graduate students (some of which you might reject until revised with help from mentors); essays by people unconnected with academe—some more interested in thea-tah than in dramatic literature, some trying to get their feet wet with opinions or observations that strike them as worth airing, and others who have had unique experiences involving productions or acquaintances; and some who send informational essays that are worth adding to a storehouse of material on O'Neill even if they are not of the quality or interest that could get them published in a journal.

You are now running forums that have their own particular value and interest; you are copying published essays and books; you are duplicating a variety of other reference material; and you are trying to attract essays even the best of which probably won't end up in print unless they are revised. That's a very substantial contribution. I'm primarily a Shavian, and we have no website that does any of these things. It must be frustrating to have very little participation in contrast to the tons there might be, but all you can do is the best you can do, and you are doing it very well.

Heeding Professor Carpenter's advice, Laconics is not a peer reviewed vehicle. However, as The Eugene O'Neill Review continues to distance itself from Fred Wilkins' Eugene O'Neill Newsletter, Laconics will serve as a destination for the pithy, provocative, far-flung articles embraced by the original Newsletter. The Review currently favors long essays of 25-30 pages, and will be less inclined to publish shorter essays, such as conference papers in the form in which they were presented.

Laconics welcomes provocative articles of any length concerning the life, times, and work of Eugene O’Neill and his contemporaries. Please submit papers (with digital images, if appropriate) to the Laconics Editor.

—Harley Hammerman