Significance Of The Title
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The significance of a title is not always easy to discover and the full significance of the title becomes apparent to the reader only gradually. In A Long Days Journey into Night by Eugene ONeill, the significance of the title is developed through the titles importance to each of ONeills characters. Tyrone, Mary, Jaime, and Edmund carry different meanings of the title. The words long and night play a major role in the importance of the title to each character. Both words can have multiple meanings. In addition to the long horrible journey each character suffers until days end, each character also longs and desires to have their addictions fulfilled. The word night not only descries the character journey from dusk until dawn, but night also denotes the reality of the past and the present for each character. To Tyrone, the title represents his journey from a young Irish boy living in perpetual poverty to a rich, cheap, worn-out actor living a life of routine and monotony. The title represents Tyrones longing to return to the days when he still had talent as an actor and the only way Tyrone can return to the past is by succumbing to his alcohol addiction. For Mary, the title stands for her longing to return to the time when she had choices in front of her and aspired to be things such as a nun or concert pianist. However, like her husband, Mary can only return to this time by giving in to her addiction to morphine. Mary must experience the reality that she cannot constantly live in the past and that her son, Edmund, is not three years old anymore and has consumption. The title also had a different meaning for Jamie. James longs to be an only child again and to be the writer that he had aspired to be. The night reveals that Jamie, like his father and brother, is an alcoholic. Jamies addiction to alcohol prevents him from achieving his original goals in life. Lastly, the title also has a different meaning to Edmund. The title represents Edmunds longing to become something better than his family. Night for Edmund would be not only death from consumption, but also the fact that he may waste his life, just like his family. The significance of the title A Long Days Journey into Knight is developed gradually through each of the characters in the play.
The significance of the title to Tyrone represents both what he longs for and the night reality that night brings. Tyrones journey from Ireland to America and his overcoming of poverty and eventually become a successful actor are described by the title of the play. Tyrone became a well-known actor but valued money more than anything else in his life did because of his great fear of living in poverty once again. However, although Tyrone was once of the greatest actors in America, he gave all of this up when he bought the rights to the play The Count of Monte Cristo; the one role that Tyrone would play for the rest of his life. “That God-damned play I bought for a song and made such a great success in- a great money success- it ruined me with its promise of an easy fortune. I didnt want to do anything else, and by the time I woke up to the fact Id become a slave to the damned thing and did try other plays, it was too late.” (149) Tyrone chose money over doing something he loved because of his great fear of living in poverty again. Tyrone longs to return to when he was still a fine actor and could play any role he wanted to. Tyrone remembers the time when he had the greatest potential of any actor, “In 1874 when Edwin Booth came to the theater in Chicago, where I was leading man, I played Cassius to his Brutus one night, Brutus to his Cassius the next, Othello to his Iago, and so on. The night I played Othello, he said to our manager, That young man is playing Othello better than I ever did!” (150) Tyrones journey into night represents the reality that “night” brings to him. Tyrone always feared poverty and as a result, gave away his acting ability and passion. “What the ell was it I wanted to buy, I wonder, that was worth” (150). Tyrone realizes that nothing was worth losing his passion and dream. The reality of the night is that Tyrone cannot even remember what he wanted to buy with the money he would earn as the Count of Monte Cristo. Night also represents the dark side of Tyrone, his addiction to alcohol. The only way in which Tyrone can return to the moment when he was happy and had such promise is an actor is by drinking alcohol. The title A Long Days Journey into Night, for Tyrone, represents his longing to become a great actor but the reality of the situation, brought by night, is that Tyrone is an alcoholic who ruined his career for the dollar. ONeill, by representing his father in this fashion, is attempting to show his reader that one must not dwell upon ones regrets in life; one must live with what one has and live in the present with passion.
The significance of the title is also developed through the character of Mary. To Mary, A Long Days Journey into Night represents her longing to be back in the past, a time when she was happy and still had other opportunities in her life. Night to Mary represents the time when marry fully becomes part of the past due to her morphine addiction. Mary longs to return to her youth when she had a real home. She longs to return to the convent, where she was a great pianist and still had her faith. “I used to love the piano. I worked so hard at my music in the Convent…My father paid for special lessons. He would have sent me to Europe to stuffy after I graduated from the Convent. I might have gone- if I hadnt fallen in love with Mr. Tyrone. Or I might have become a nun. I had two dreams. To be a nun, that was the more beautiful one. To become a concert pianist, that was the other.” (104) Mary wants to return to her life before she decided to marry Tyrone. At this point in her life, Mary still had choices and having opportunities and a real home is what made her happy. Marys journey through her addiction was caused by the death of her son, Eugene. After Eugene passed away, Mary needed to have another child to replace Eugene; however, the birth of her second son, Edmund, was extremely painful and required morphine to ease the pain. “I was so healthy before Edmund was born. You remember James. There wasnt a nerve in my body…But bearing Edmund was the last straw. I was so sick afterwards, and that ignorant quack of a cheap hotel doctor- All he knew was I was in pain. It was easy for him to stop the pain.” (87) As night approaches, reality begins to set in. Mary escapes life and returns to the past through her addiction to morphine. For Mary, A Long Days Journey into Night represents Mary becoming completely removed from reality and becoming totally immersed in the past due to her addiction. Little