| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立成功大學 === 外國語文學系碩博士班 === 93 === Abstract
Eugene O’Neill, the Nobel Prize laureate for Literature in 1936, has throughout his dramatic career experimented with various dramatic techniques and philosophical ideas and produced works that are diversified in form and content. His active involvement in the Art Theatre Movement caused American theatre to be taken seriously; therefore, commercialism in the American theater was gradually challenged by the experimentalism of the Art Theatre Movement. In a way, O’Neill brought modern drama into American theatre and bridged the gap between American drama and European drama. In addition, he exerted a profound influence on the Chinese spoken drama by attracting a number of Chinese playwrights.
In Chapter One, I would like to illustrate the background against which the American playwright is introduced to China. Above all, O’Neill exhibits an affinity with the Chinese Taoist philosophy in several of his plays, particularly in Marco Millions. In addition to O’Neill’s interest in the Taoist philosophy, China also takes an interest in his plays. Consequently, translations and performances of his plays flourished in China, making O’Neill one of the favorite foreign dramatists among Chinese readers and theatergoers.
In Chapter Two, I will focus on O’Neill’s influence on the Chinese playwright Hong Shen. Hong Shen has modeled his play, The Yama Chao, or Chao – The King of Hell, on O’Neill’s expressionist play, The Emperor Jones. Both plays will be compared in terms of the expressionistic technical devices and realistic social dimension to illustrate their analogy.
In Chapters Three and Four, I will discuss O’Neill’s impact upon Cao Yu, another prominent Chinese playwright of the spoken drama. O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones and Desire Under the Elms have considerably influenced Cao Yu’s two plays – The Wilderness and Thunderstorm, respectively. Though reluctant to acknowledge his indebtedness to the American playwright, Cao Yu has unquestionably assimilated many O’Neillian elements into his own dramatic creation. I will then attempt to explore how Cao Yu incorporates the expressionistic skills into his realist play in Chapter Three. Chapter Four will deal with Cao Yu’s handling of the incest theme in Thunderstorm, which is heavily indebted to the American prototype – Desire Under the Elms in order to reveal their parallels.
Finally, I will demonstrate how the great American playwright plays a significant role in the cultural communication between China and the United States through O’Neill’s connection with the Chinese Taoist philosophy and the Chinese playwrights’ emulation of this American dramatist.
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