奥尼尔的悲剧人物观:个体英雄主义的困惑

奥尼尔戏剧是关于奉行个体主义的人的悲剧。古希腊悲剧中,悲剧英雄与人以外的力量进行抗争,而由此引发的失败和痛苦使悲剧英雄和观众意识到人自身的不足。恰是这一对人类不足的认识构成古希腊悲剧的高贵,即悲剧感。奥尼尔悲剧中,神与社会的力量被弱化至虚无,他专注于描述悲剧人物的失败和痛苦本身,使其因自恋而自怜。剧作家和悲剧人物所秉持的个体主义至上思想抑制了古希腊戏剧意义上的悲剧感的产生。在个体主义赋予的自由意志下,奥尼尔悲剧人物却依然为人的自我身份而困惑,并表现出与宗教、社会或他人的隔离与疏远。

O'Neill's Tragic Sense: The Qualms of Individualist Heroes

O' Neill' s plays represent tragic heroes who believe in individualism. In ancient Greek tragedies, tragic heroes struggle with forces beyond man,and the concurrent failures and sufferings provoke both the heroes and audiences to ponder the inadequacy of man, which contribute to the formation the tragic sense or nobility of characters in ancient Greek tragedies. O' Neill greatly admires, yet hardly approaches this nobility, precisely because of the individualism he upholds. He slides over the struggle human characters engage in against external forces, the cosmos or society, while instead singlehandedly focuses on failures and sufferings per se. Consequently, O' Neill characters have no recognition of the limit of man, but suffer narcissism and resultant self-pity. Even with free will promised by individilism, O' Neill' characters still perplex over self-identities, alienating from religion, society or other individuals.