Student: José Martínez Hernández e-mail: jomarhe5@alumni.uv.es
English Philology. First cicle, first course.
English
Theatre XIX & XX Centuries Group B ( evenings ).
Play: Where
the cross is made.
Eugene
O'Neill Complete plays
Editor:
Travis Bogard.
Publisher: Library of
The main
characters are:
Captain
Isaiah Bartlett, a former whaling captain.
For half
the play, is a character that does not show up, more like a reference, although
later is crucial for the plays outcome. In the play, his son talking about him
says as an old man, formerly the man in charge of a fishing boat, being now no
more than a crazy old guy, that spends the whole day
looking at the sea, hoping for a legend to come true.
Nat
Bartlett
The captain's son. Very tall, gaunt and loose-framed, with an arm
amputated at the shoulder. Portrayed first as someone who knows what he
talks about, with straight thinking. And that is doing the best for his father,
when he convinces the doctor that has to be taken away for his own good.
Sue
Bartlett
The captain's daughter. She is the caring good girl that feels pain for the idea of having his
father taken away. Most of it all when she learns that would not be for the
right reason. She confronts bravely her brother over it.
Doctor
Higgins
He just
plays the role of the trusting, and the same time a bit sceptical doctor that
comes called by the son to arrange for the captain being taken
to the
asylum.
Silas Horne
( mate ), Cates ( bosun ), and
Jimmy Kanaka ( harpooner ), are three characters that are only referential,
since only the two people that believe in the legend can see them. They are
only living ghosts of their mind.
The plot is
that seven years ago, I.Bartlett was ( as his father was, too ) a whaling captain, and he and his
crew departed for a two-years-long trip that took in fact four. The ship was
wrecked in the
The son
wants the doctor to take his father to the asylum as mentally impaired, as he
is insane. Or so he says, since the real reason is that it is in his personal
interest. The mortgage can be foreclosed by someone that thinks ( as everyone else ), that the captain is out of his mind,
and that could set fire to the house. The person able to foreclose the mortgage
wants to protect his property, and therefore tells Nat that he would be better
put away. When the doctor is in the house, the captain comes down, confronts
his son calling him evil, and saying that he can see the Mary Allen in the
harbour, with its crew. Nat ( that although his
denials has always been a believer ), looks into the sea, and agrees happily.
Nobody else sees anything, obviously. Then the captain has a heart attack and
dies. And Nat remains shouting madly that he still has the map, and still has a
chance to get the treasure.
Although
the play finishes there, the obvious is that Nat will be taken to a mental
sanatorium, thus having the same sort he wanted his father to have.
Among the
remarkable things in this play, Nat lost his arm because the captain took him
to sea, and therefore he is bitter and blames his father for that. Blaming is
often a companion in O'Neill's plays.
Another of
Nat's features is that he wants money to put it into a book of his, which he
thinks will be his opportunity of freedom in life.
The
settings are a house that is made to be the more similar possible to a boat.
Boats and sea and sailors are also usual features of the author.
The sounds
are present, being them the sounds of the wind and sea.
The time is
" an early hour of a clear windy night in the
fall of the year 1900". There is a bright moonlight.
A play of
O' Neills in which the dreams are portrayed as having a really big
strength.