O'Neill, Eugene Gladstone (1888–1953)

US playwright. He is widely regarded as the greatest US dramatist. His plays, although tragic, are characterized by a down‐to‐earth quality and are often experimental in form, influenced by German expressionism, Strindberg, and Freud. They were a radical departure from the romantic and melodramatic American theatre entertainments. They include Beyond the Horizon (1920) and Anna Christie (1921), both of which won a Pulitzer Prize, as well as The Emperor Jones (1920), The Hairy Ape (1922), Desire Under the Elms (1924), The Iceman Cometh (1946), and the posthumously produced autobiographical drama A Long Day's Journey into Night (1956; written 1941), also a Pulitzer prizewinner. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1936.

O'Neill was born in New York City, the son of stage actors James O'Neill and Ella Quinlan. His tumultuous family relationships would later provide much material for his plays. He had varied experience as gold prospector, sailor, and actor. Other plays include The Great God Brown (1925), Strange Interlude (1928; which lasts five hours), Mourning Becomes Electra (1931; a trilogy on the theme of Orestes from Greek mythology), and A Moon for the Misbegotten (1947; written 1943).