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CONTENTS ESSAYS: * * * * * Editor’s Foreword About one year ago, 5-9 June 2003, the Eugene O’Neill Society convened at the Hotel de L’Univers in Tours, France for its Fifth International Conference. Participants delivered over three dozen papers and presentations, toured chateaux, tasted wine, talked a lot, and ate very well. Sheila Hickey Garvey, President of the Society, highlighted the banquet celebration by awarding the O’Neill Medallion to longtime O’Neill producer Paul Libin. Two days later, Society members bussed to nearby Le Plessis, the chateau which O’Neill rented and in which he wrote Mourning Becomes Electra (1929-1931). Gil and Elizabeth Barrios, the current owners, hosted a lovely cocktail party on the grounds of the restored estate, which in addition to their family home is now a bed & breakfast inn (check out the link on <www.eoneill.com>). We’re pleased to publish in this issue selected papers from last year’s proceedings. We begin with two short depictions of O’Neill’s daily living at Le Plessis: one theoretical; one personal and anecdotal. In the first, Brian Rogers links the isolation of O’Neill in France with the loneliness of the Mannons in nineteenth-century New England. Richard Eaton and Madeline Smith follow with an account of Manuel Komroff’s visit to Le Plessis which paints another devastating portrait of Carlotta (for a variant picture, see George Monteiro’s article). Deeper in the issue, Stephen Black contributes a major essay on Mourning Becomes Electra and tragic theory. Eschewing tendentiousness and bookish pronouncements, Black follows the lead of philosopher Stanley Cavell and discusses tragedy as a life-changing event, for the characters involved, certainly, but also for the audience who witnesses the action. In the “Performance Review” section, three distinguished scholars, Marvin Carlson, Judith Milhous, and Egil Törnqvist, report on recent productions in London, City Opera in New York, and Amsterdam (see also Martha Bower’s account of Ivo van Hove’s production of More Stately Mansions). The images from Howard University’s production of Homecoming (the first play in the long trilogy) in 1944, included in Glenda Gill’s essay, might further encourage us to rethink casting possibilities for O’Neill’s plays. “The Genius of O’Neill,” by playwright Tony Kushner, who wrote the program notes for Mourning Becomes Electra at the National Theatre in London, and whose Angels in America bears the imprimatur of an O’Neill play, originally appeared in the Times Literary Supplement and aptly concludes our batch of essays. Between first and last, there are many other riches to be found in the contents herein. Writing about the Wooster Group, the most exciting and disciplined avant-garde performance company in the US, Johan Callens breaks down its cross-gendered in blackface production of The Emperor Jones in a lengthy essay which skillfully illuminates the particular acting and directorial choices which might otherwise remain obscure to the reader not familiar with these artists’ carefully wrought performance theories and strategies. “Anna Christie,” which has gotten a lot of attention in the last several issues of this journal, gets a new twist in Katie Johnson’s feminist re-reading of that play, which includes an analysis of what made Pauline Lord’s original performance palatable to a mass audience. In a lighter vein, William Davies King and Felicia Hardison Londré discuss O’Neill and, respectively, pulp fiction and parody in the 1920s. Fresh critical acumen also inspires Steven Bloom’s dramaturgical analysis of Long Day’s Journey into Night, in which he builds a strong case, based upon an age-old technique and despite the evenness among the four principal roles, for identifying Mary as the true focal point of that great drama. Several people, without whom this issue would not have been possible, deserve special thanks. Stephen Black, Jackson R. Bryer, and Brenda Murphy lent their expertise as advisory editors in the vetting of submitted essays. An editorial board of nine members, now in the formative stages, will eventually serve this function. Most of all, we thank Fred Wilkins, the soul and longtime lifeblood of the Eugene O’Neill Review. We are grateful for his many kind words of support. We wish him well in retirement, but we plan to keep his generous spirit active as our guiding principle for each successive issue. —Zander Brietzke* * * * *
Editor
Editorial Board The Eugene O’Neill Review (ISSN 104094483) is published annually in the spring by Suffolk University in cooperation with the Eugene O’Neill Society, whose members receive a copy as part of their membership. (For information on membership, write to the Eugene O’Neill Society, P.O. Box 402, Danville, CA 94526.) Non-member subscription rates are $35/year for individuals in the US and Canada, $35/year for all institutional and overseas subscribers. Back issues are available at $10 each. Checks and money orders for non-member subscriptions and back-issues payments (US dollars only) should be payable to the Eugene O’Neill Review and should be sent to the publication coordinator, Department of English, Suffolk University, 41 Temple Street, Boston, MA 02114-4280.
We welcome articles, reviews and news
concerning the life, times and work of Eugene O’Neill and his
contemporaries. We favor long essays (25-30
pages) and reviews of about 800 words, as well as letters. Articles
should be sent to the
publication coordinator and adhere to MLA Style (in-text citation,
endnotes, works cited). Submit three copies of your work, together with
a brief biographical note, to Ingrid Strange at the above address (tel.
617-573-8271). For reviews, please contact the respective editor in
advance of writing: Robert S. McLean for performance reviews (<robertsmclean@juno.com>);
Kurt Eisen for book reviews (<keisen@tntech.edu>).
Feel free to contact Zander Brietzke through Suffolk University or
directly via e-mail:
<zbrietzke@verizon.net>. Copyright © 2004 by The Eugene O’Neill Review & Suffolk University ISSN: 1040-9483 |
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