Based on the general literature review on Eugene O’Neill above, I have found that even though Eugene O’Neill’s reputation in Chinese context is rising in recent years with abundant relevant studies and papers emerging, the overall development does not obviously get any further than the American and European literature circle did in the twentieth century。 

The aspect that I will focus on in my thesis is the modernity in Eugene O’Neill’s works。 “He is internationally recognized as the quintessential American dramatist of the twentieth-century world stage。” (Michael Manheim, 2000: 55) The reputation does not come for no reasons。 His works, mostly, are tragedies。 Tragedies always reach to the pathos of human beings, yet they appear in different ages in quite different forms and content。 Will the story of Oedipus strike so much significance if it is written today? In fact, the nature of tragedy keeps on changing all the time。 From my perspective, the modernity in O’Neill’s works is largely the reason he succeeded。 

Astradur Eysteinsson, who did a comprehensive reexamination of the idea of modernism, deliberately expounded the intonation of the very key word “modernism” in his book The Concept of Modernism, in which nontraditional and unconventional creation is highly emphasized。 

Modernity, as a literary label, contains far more connotations and thus cannot be exhausted within a few sentences。 Yet understanding towards it is essential to the discussion of Eugene O’Neill’ works。 According to the definition given by A Glossary of Literary Terms, “the specific features signified by ‘modernism’ vary with the user, but many critics agree that it involves a deliberate and radical break with some of the traditional bases not only of Western art, but of Western culture in general。 Important intellectual precursors of modernism, in this sense, are thinkers who had questioned the certainties that had supported traditional ways of conceiving the human self。 ” (M。H。 Abrams, 2008: 170)

Tong Ming stated in A History of American Literature that there is a habitualized practice of linking American modernism so automatically with The Waste Land, yet we should be aware that this kind of habitualized practice has its particular historical circumstance at that time。 The Waste Land is the paradigm of literary modernity, however, it should not be the only one。

  In Tong Ming’s American Literature, he pointed that “it is not possible to be thorough here about the wide range of stylistic features” yet he has given a limited list of the most discussed featured, each with a brief commentary。  (Tong Ming, 2007: 185)文献综述

    “In modern literature, the question ‘what is the story?’ is intricately connected with another question ‘How is the story told?’

 ·Uses of narrative points of view have become very sophisticated in modern literature。

 ·Perspectivism is the belief that a truth is something relative to a perspective and therefore reality is interpretable from many perspectives。

 ·Fragmentation and open-endedness become new structuring principles。

 ·Literary explorations of the psychological depths now gain some new principles and methods from Freudian psychoanalysis。

·Irony and ambiguity are favored rhetorical modes in modern literature, which reflects a general disillusionment in the social, economic and spiritual values of western world。

·There is a broad dependence on the image in modern poetry。

·Traditions in the recent past and existing systems of belief are resisted, but traditions in antiquity becomes sources of inspiration。

·There is a renewed interest in non-western cultures。 ”