Items

• Actors performing The First Man, photograph by Alison Carrick.
• A Moon for the Misbegotten play script with holograph notes by O’Neill

  O’Neill’s last produced play during his lifetime was moved to open in Columbus, OH due to the playwright’s dissatisfaction with the actors. It was booked for a short run through the Midwest but ran into problems with local censors, and it closed in St. Louis.
• “Yale Receives Rights in Unpublished Play"

  Despite O’Neill’s signed agreement (see “Long Day’s Journey Into Night agreement” in this exhibition), Carlotta Monterey O'Neill gave publication rights for Long Day's Journey Into Night to Yale University fewer than two years after his death.
• “Thirst” and Other One Act Plays

  O’Neill’s first book was published by Richard G. Badger who agreed to publish it on the condition that the author defray all expenses. O'Neill's father did not appreciate his son's writing, but was relieved to see him trying to make something of himself, so he financed the publication.
• “The Ordeal of Eugene O'Neill” in Time

  The Time reviewer of The Iceman Cometh deems it, as a drama, not much deeper than a puddle. The cover article is mainly about O'Neill’s whole career, finding him not a great dramatist but our greatest dramatic craftsman.
• “Is Academia Killing O'Neill?, A Lecture by Harley Hammerman”

  Poster for a talk given by Hammerman on his view of the state of O’Neill studies
• “Eugene O’Neill: A Centenary Celebration”

  Harley Hammerman and Washington University professor Henry Schvey co-planned the O’Neill centennial celebration, which included academic discussions, film screenings, a student production of Desire Under the Elms, and an exhibition tour led by Harley.
• "Tomorrow" in The Seven Arts

  This was O’Neill’s only published fiction, a semi-autobiographical story of a suicide in a saloon where the author once lived. The Seven Arts also paid to publish his one-act play “In the Zone” but ceased publication before it could appear.
• "The Bridegroom Weeps!" Poem Manuscript

  Unpublished poem by Eugene O'Neill most likely written late 1910 or early 1911 in Buenos Aires as he lamented the low state of his life. This is the earliest existing O'Neill manuscript.
• "O'Neill Collection Part of Centennial Celebration"

  Harley and his O’Neill collection were featured in the Washington University Magazine, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and elsewhere during the centennial year.
• "Happy Ending (?)" Typescript

  Although Anna Christie received uniformly favorable reviews when it opened in November 1921, the critics perceived the play's final act -- its "happy ending" -- as contrived. O'Neill composed this defense of both his play and his integrity as a playwright. On December 18, 1921, the New York Times ran O'Neill's defense.
• "Free" in Pliedes Club Year Book with accompanying note

  The Pleiades Club was composed of actors, artists, and writers who met in Greenwich Village. G. Warren Landon, a member of the club, arranged to have O'Neill's poem "Free" published in the club's yearbook
• "Bound East for Cardiff" in The Provincetown Plays First Series

  The first series of The Provincetown Plays contains the plays presented as the first bills of the Provincetown Players 1916-1917 season. In addition to “Bound East for Cardiff,” First Series contains “The Game,” by activist and international journalist Louise Bryant who had a love affair with O’Neill.
• "Before Breakfast" with inscription to Bob Sis

  O'Neill appeared in three of the Provincetown Players productions of his own works. In "Before Breakfast", he was the off-stage husband, an invisible character whose arm is seen reaching through an open door for a bowl of shaving water.