 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rage Against Order: James R. Keller Eugene O'Neill's use of myth in The Hairy Ape has been the focus of scholarly studies in the past. Michael Hinden observed the manifestation of the Dionysian myth in the drama; Ann D. Hughes identified some of the playwright's biblical allusions; and Patrick Bowles has drawn a parallel between Yank and such literary archetypes as the American Adam, the noble savage, and the wild man. However, no one has yet discussed the similarities between O'Neill's play and Milton's Paradise Lost, although the playwright clearly borrowed elements of structure and characterization from the seventeenth century epic. Like Milton's Satan, Yank, the central figure in O'Neill's play, is portrayed as an outsider who is entrapped and tormented by forces beyond his control and who longs for an unattainable bliss—a yearning that plunges him into a vengeful quest that ultimately proves degrading rather than fulfilling. This archetype has its most detailed portrayal in Milton's Satan.
The basic structures of the two works are also similar. They begin in infernal regions characterized by heat and commotion. In this setting, an individual vows to exact a dire revenge against someone who has injured his primitive pride. The task involves a journey out of the hellish location and a search for the object of revenge. Both revengers come to recognize that they cannot escape their wretched condition; and in each case the vendetta is both ineffectual and personally detrimental.
The ship on which O'Neill's stokers labor is a setting reminiscent of the cosmological structure of Paradise Lost. Just as Milton's epic begins with a portrait of hell and its inhabitants, O'Neill's drama opens in the infernal region of the ship, an area characterized by darkness, heat and enclosure. The stokehole is lit by a single bulb that “sheds just enough light through the murky air laden with coal dust to pile up masses of shadows everywhere” (117). The region is further marked by oppressive heat, pouring out of the furnaces that the stokers feed: “Then from these fiery round holes in the black a flood of terrific light and heat pours full upon the men who are outlined in silhouette in the crouching, inhuman attitudes of chained gorillas” (117). The previous passage also includes the imagery of forced restraint; the men appear to be bound to the furnaces. The playwright further suggests that the men are “imprisoned by white steel. The lines of bunks, the uprights supporting them, cross each other like the steel framework of a cage” (105). O'Neill's stokehole bears more than a passing resemblance to Milton's hell, where the apostate angels are enclosed in darkness and scorched by tormenting flames:
The imagery of imprisonment is also employed in Milton's descriptions of hell:
The ironic difference between the plight of the stokers and that of the apostate angels lies in the fact that the demons are at least permitted dominion over hell, a luxury that brings them some degree of comfort. The stokers, on the other hand, are forced to labor at the sound of a whistle for the benefit of others, specifically the same industrialists who create the steel that imprisons them.
Other imagery of O'Neill's stokehole is similarly reminiscent of Milton's hell. The chaotic movements of the demons as they construct their allegorical palace, “Pandemonium,” are echoed in the erratic activities of the stokers, who are engaged in continual struggle for domination over one another. Yank, their leader, presides over the chaos of O'Neill's opening scene just as Satan rules the crooked council in Book II of Milton's poem. Following the construction of Pandemonium, the demons must shrink themselves in order to fit into the edifice—all except Satan and a few of the most powerful “Seraphic lords,” who maintain their titanic dimensions and rule over the proceedings. Similarly, Yank is depicted as looming over the other stokers:
Around Yank swirls the chaotic activity of the stokehole.
The choral responses of the stokers to the occasional interjections of their peers are suggestive of the great rallying cries of the apostate angels. The former are crowded into a room, “shouting, cursing, laughing, singing—a confused, inchoate uproar swelling into a sort of unity, a meaning—the bewildered, furious, baffled defiance of a beast in a cage” (105). The demons similarly roar their defiance as their leaders call for war with heaven:
The appeals of Paddy and Long to their fellow stokers parallel the most prominent sentiments of Milton's fallen angels. Satan and his “horrid crew” are torn by opposing passions. They long for a restoration of heavenly bliss, but feel compelled instead to seek confrontation. Inspired by his vision of the sun in Book IV, Satan is reminded of God's glory and briefly considers reconciliation. However, doubting God's beneficence and reinforced by his own humiliation and anger, he abandons hope for salvation. In The Hairy Ape, Long voices the revolutionary sentiments of Marxism, blaming the “damned Capitalist clarss” for the stokers' suffering and calling for an effort to “force the bloody governments” (123). At the opposite end of the spectrum is Paddy, who does not seek opposition, but merely reminisces about the past, before sailors were confined to the engine room of the ship, when they could wander on the deck, feel the sun's warmth, and breathe the clean air.
Just as Milton's cosmology includes a sharp distinction between heaven and hell, the filth and darkness of the stokehole is contrasted to the supernal bliss of the ship's deck, a region occupied exclusively by the social elite. O'Neill indicates that Scene Two should convey “the beautiful vivid life of the sea ... sunshine on the deck in a great flood, the fresh sea wind blowing across it” (113). Mildred Douglas, the daughter of a rich industrialist, decides to visit the stokehole to “discover how the other half lives” (114). She insists on wearing her bright white dress despite the second engineer's persistent assertion that the dress will be ruined by the oil and dirt of the hole. It is the angelic brilliance of Mildred's garment that startles Yank, creating the confrontation between the two characters. Mildred's unexpected arrival in the engine room initially alarms the stokers because her appearance is so incongruous with the surroundings. She is described as a “white apparition in the full light from the open furnace doors” (119), and Yank later insists that he had thought she was a ghost: “And dere she was wit de light on her! ... I tought she was a ghost, see? She was all in white like dey wrap around stiffs” (123).
The confrontation between Yank and Mildred is embarrassing for the former, who is raving at the time the latter enters the engine room. Thus the sentiment that inspires Yank to pursue his vengeful journey is wounded pride. The fear that Mildred initially evokes from Yank causes him to lose face with his comrades, who had previously respected him. After the incident, Yank becomes the object of mockery and derision. Consequently, Yank vows revenge in order to regain his lost esteem. This motivation is identical to that of Milton's Satan, who is spurred in his trespass against God by the sudden arrival of Christ, who displaces him in the hierarchy of angels. Satan had been second only to God prior to Christ's creation. The demotion causes the renegade angel to revolt against God's authority, and once he is vanquished and God's omnipotence is unquestioned, Satan decides to pursue a subversive revenge by destroying God's new creation—mankind.
The apostate angel also has broader considerations when he decides to pursue his course to the new world. Just as Yank is motivated by both social concerns and a desire to establish himself among his peers, Satan recognizes that his offer to be the perpetrator of the suggested evil will confirm his authority in hell. Thus Yank and Satan make their journeys in order to consolidate their power over their comrades. Milton indicates that “Monarchal pride” and consciousness of “highest worth” move Satan to offer his services (II, 428-429). Again, when Satan considers reconciliation with God on his journey to the new world, it is the memory of his social responsibility that serves to dissuade him. He confesses that he must live up to boasts he made when he seduced the fallen angels into a revolt against God:
Both Yank and Satan are chiefly concerned with maintaining their social standing, a sentiment that moves them to strike out against vulnerable individuals who represent an oppressive authority to which they have no access. Satan believes that he can injure God by spoiling God's creation. Similarly, Yank's dreadful purpose gradually broadens from a desire for revenge against a single individual to a general compulsion to assail an entire segment of the social strata. Long informs Yank that Mildred was merely “a representative of 'er clarss,” and Yank's objective gradually broadens when he discovers that Mildred's father is the owner of Nazareth Steel, the company that created the metal that confines the stokers in the engine room. Yank is thus inspired to join the I.W.W., an organization that he has been led to believe will wage war against the social elite.
The initial lack of direction in Yank's revenge is also reminiscent of the journey of Milton's Satan. Knowing only that God has created a new world and that there is a new race who could potentially be vulnerable, Satan braves the realm of Chaos and enters the creation, not knowing how he will fulfill his dire revenge. His journey is one of discovery in which his means of evil becomes apparent only gradually. This same lack of focus is manifest in Yank's excursion to Fifth Avenue in New York, where he blindly expects to encounter Mildred, even though there is no reason to believe that she is present. His evil purpose is revealed to him by degrees, culminating in his abortive attempt to join the I.W.W.
Satan's bewilderment at the sight of paradise parallels Yank's begrudging awe at the glamor and wealth of Fifth Avenue. Satan is initially transfixed by the beauty of Adam and Eve, who reflect their creator's glory, exhibiting “Truth, Wisdom, [and] Sanctitude” (IV, 293). Moreover, when the fiend approaches Eve to seduce her to transgress, he is at first disarmed by her innocent beauty:
Yank is similarly astonished by the wealth and pretentiousness of the exclusive shops and expensive goods on display. He particularly recoils from the sight of monkey fur priced at two thousand dollars (127). In addition, Yank recognizes that, as Virginia Floyd has phrased it, “Capitalism and Christianity are ... linked in a mutually beneficial conspiracy to exploit the poor masses” (243). He asks Long why the wealthy urbanites are in church, to which the fellow stoker replies: “Arskin' Jesus to give 'em more money” (126). However, just as in the case of Satan, whose malice remains undaunted, Yank continues his desperate plan for revenge. Satan completes his task by seducing Eve, while Yank, unable to locate the object of his contempt, directs his anger toward the rich of New York, propositioning the women and assaulting the men.
Both malcontents are temporarily thwarted by figures of authority representing the dominant power structure. Shortly after Satan's arrival in paradise in Book IV, he is caught squatting like a toad, whispering in Eve's ear, and causing her to dream contemptible dreams. Gabriel dispels Satan from paradise with a show of God's sovereignty. Yank is, likewise, hindered in his malignant plans by authorities who arrest him for causing a rich socialite to miss his bus. However, like Satan, who returns to Eden to continue his villainy, Yank, while temporarily jailed, is eventually released to further his vengeful course.
Satan's efforts, despite their initial success, ultimately prove futile. Early in the epic, the narrator indicates that Satan was released from bondage on the fiery lake so that with all his malicious efforts he would heap further damnation on himself and bring forth nothing but “infinite goodness, grace and mercy” for mankind (I, 211-220). Yank's efforts are equally ineffectual. He waits for Mildred when she is scheduled to disembark from the ship, intending to spit on her; but she never appears. On his excursion to Fifth Avenue, he once again fails to locate her, and his attempt to harass the local inhabitants proves unavailing. He verbally and physically abuses the people around him, and yet no one even notices him. When he strikes a wealthy man in the face, he gets his only response: a complaint that Yank has made him miss his bus. And the fruitless endeavors continue when Yank visits the I.W.W. and offers his services in the forcible overthrow of the government. He quickly discovers that the union's moderate program does not include bombings and is thrown out of the building. It is in frustration and defeat that Yank retreats to the zoo, knowing that he can accomplish nothing in contemporary society. He is effectively locked out of civilization.
Both Satan and Yank undergo degradation in the course of their respective works, Satan's being both psychological and physiological. He has already lost some of his “Original brightness” in Book I of Milton's epic; and as he perpetrates his numerous evil acts, he declines ever further, assuming the shape of various creatures—a cormorant, a member of a herd, a toad, and finally a serpent. He is apprised of his diminishing stature by the angels who capture him in Book IV: “Think not, revolted Spirit, thy shape the same, / Or undiminisht brightness, to be known / As when thou stood'st in Heav'n upright and pure ...” (835-837). In addition, the apostate angel becomes increasingly evil as the epic progresses. Initially he experiences remorse, wishing to restore his lost position; but gradually he becomes entirely unrepentant.
Yank's descent is entirely psychological, involving a gradual recognition that he is indeed a “filthy beast” without a place in contemporary society. In Scene One, he boasts that he is the one who makes the world move (112). By the end of the drama, this initial pride is replaced by frustration and self-loathing. Yank learns that he will never be accepted, and his physical decline is realized figuratively when he tries to identify with a gorilla in the zoo. He releases the beast and is subsequently crushed by it and locked in the cage. Having finally recognized his kinship with the ape, he takes its place in the zoo.
Yank shares other psychological traits with Milton's Satan. Both have illusions of personal power that are gradually replaced by a recognition of their own impotence. Satan is bold enough to challenge God's authority and later believes that he has the capacity to destroy God's creations; both of these delusions prove false. Yank originally believes that he is the instigating force in an industrial society, setting all of the machinery in motion with his strength; as Ann Hughes says, he “believes in the myth that gives him the delusion of significance” (8). However, his tragedy includes the realization that he has no prestige in the society that exploits him. Also, both malcontents complain that they do not belong anywhere, and both recognize that they cannot escape their own personal hell. Satan “beweeps [his] outcast state” and envies the good fortunes of humanity (IV, 105-107). He is caught between two equally oppressive states:
Yank describes his position in similar terms. He is trapped between two worlds, neither of which is hospitable to one like himself.
Yank is, in Patrick Bowles' words, “caged within the prison of the self” (3); he cannot escape the torments of the stokehole even when he leaves the ship. Like Satan, he recognizes that hell is a state of mind, involving the pain of deprivation and an unfulfilled yearning for heavenly bliss. Both reveal the anguish of being locked out of creation.
The rationale behind O'Neill's decision to borrow from Paradise Lost seems plain. In Milton's Satan, he found a paradigm for the alienation and dehumanization of the modern industrial worker (Bowles 2). Like Satan, the modern laborer is inspired by his recognition of heavenly bliss, but is tormented by the knowledge that he can never attain that state for himself. Thus this comparison details the lamentable state of the proletariat, whose lives are characterized by continual labor and humiliation and who are frustrated by their inability to gain access to the powers of domination in order to effect personally advantageous change.
WORKS CITED
Bowles, Patrick. “The Hairy Ape as Existential Allegory.” The Eugene O'Neill Newsletter 3:1 (May 1979): 2-3.
Floyd, Virginia. The Plays of Eugene O'Neill. New York: Ungar, 1985.
Hinden, Michael. “Ironic Use of Myth in The Hairy Ape.” The Eugene O'Neill Newsletter 1:3 (January 1978): 2-4.
Hughes, Ann D. “Biblical Allusions in The Hairy Ape.” The Eugene O'Neill Newsletter 1:3 (January 1978): 7-9.
Milton, John. Paradise Lost, in John Milton: The Complete Poems and Major Prose, ed. Merritt Y. Hughes. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1957, pp. 211-469.
O'Neill, Eugene. The Hairy Ape, in Selected Plays of Eugene O'Neill. Garden City, New York: Nelson Doubleday, 1979, pp. 99-142. (CONTENTS) |
|
© Copyright 1999-2008 eOneill.com |
