In the later part of the 19th century a new movement swept over the American literature. Naturalism was a theory that believed that composition should be based on objective human beings. Naturalists concentrated on the harsh aspects of life, believing that life rarely works out, as people want it to. Authors viewed life and human behavior as an experiment controlled by instinct, emotions, and social conditions. In "Long Day's Journey into Night", Eugene O'Neill describes a journey that a person takes in life in order to find his or her self. This piece describes a family consisting of James Tyrone, Mary his wife, and their two sons James and Edmund. As the play unfolds, the relationship between the characters becomes pellucid and their disunities are shown. By describing the struggle that each character goes through, O'Neill illustrates that as each person loses control of their life, they lose their identity.
Tyrone fought his entire life to overcome his difficult youth. His father abandoned him when he was young and he had to work hard to support his family. Tyrone was an incredible actor with potential to get even better. Once he
discovered his talent, he realized that he did not have to work hard to become a success. Tyrone had a chance at easy money, and he took it. By doing so he ensured the security for himself and his family, but also he lost control of the direction of his life. "I'd lost the great talent I once had through years of easy repetition...never really working hard... Yet before I bought [into temptation] I was considered one of three or four young actors with the greatest artistic promise (2025-2026). Tyrone had given up his love of the theater for a large sum of money. In losing this love he lost himself.
Mary was a dreamer with high goals and was willing to work hard to achieve them. She gave up her life partly when she married Tyrone. Mary went form a self-sufficient individual to a housewife whose primary goal was to take care of her husband, but she continued her struggle to create the life she thought she deserved. However when her second born baby died, the spirit inside her died too. Mary was so consumed by guilt and grief that she lost control, fell apart, and turned to drugs to avoid reality. She blames Tyrone: "Above all, I shouldn't have let you insist I have
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