Long Day’s Journey Into Night

         The Characters in Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night are deeply affected psychologically. The three men in the family are affected in a similar way. They are all alcoholics and most of the reason is because of Mary, who is terribly addicted to morphine, and when she finds out Edmund has consumption, gets high to the point where she can’t even think for herself. Mary is affected psychologically because she can’t break her addiction anymore and it is now getting worse as Edmund’s physical condition gets worse. At the beginning of the day, the psychological state of the family was tolerable, but it got worse and worse throughout the day, and by nighttime none of them could think they were so messed up.

          First, the three men of the house. Jamie and Edmund, the two brothers were affected a little differently by their mothers morphine addiction. Jamie isn’t afraid to admit the truth, he is brutally honest in the play. “Where’s the hophead? Gone to sleep?” he says referring to his mother. Edmund was always backing up his mother, hoping to God that this was all a dream and that she didn’t shoot up morphine, hoping it was all a lie. “You dirty bastard!” was Edmund’s reply as he punched Jamie square in the face. This happened numerous times throughout the play. Tyrone was in between the two. He hated Jamie for being so honest, and thought Edmund was a fool for not believing. He knew she was on morphine, wasn’t going to not believe, but wasn’t going to make crude comments about it either, he wanted to not think about it unless he knew she was about to take more, then he’d try and prevent her. “Up to take more of that God-damned poison, is that it? You’ll be like a mad ghost before the night’s over!” yelled Tyrone in agony at Mary, trying to prevent her from shooting up again. And all 3 of them turned to alcohol to help ease tensions in the house.

          Mary was mentally affected much differently than the other characters in the story. Mary was a headcase, she was incapable of solving problems without resorting to drugs. Mary always lives in the past, isn’t capable of accepting reality, and worsens her problems with morphine. She always lives in the past;

“Oh, I’m so sick and tired of pretending this is a home! You won’t help me! You won’t put yourself out the least bit! You don’t know how to act in a home! You don’t really want one! You never have wanted one-never since the day we were married! You should have remained a bachelor and lived in second-rate hotels and entertained your friends in barrooms!”

          Mary is incapable of accepting reality. She refuses to believe that Edmund has consumption, she thinks he is faking the whole thing and that he just as a small cold. “Oh I’m sure you don’t feel half as badly as you make out. You’re such a baby. You like to get us worried so we’ll make a fuss over you.” said Mary to Edmund after he explained to her how sick he felt. And the only thing Mary could do to solve her problems is buy more morphine.

          This entire play, characters were affected psychologically. From the 3 men’s alcohol abuse or Mary’s morphine addiction, the one thing they all have in common is they turn to a dangerous substance to cope with their problems, but in this case, those substances are making all of their psychological situations worse in the end.