Desire Under the Elms: Analysis of Setting
"Desire Under the Elms" is a play set on an isolated New England farm, originally owned by Eben Cabot's mother and now inherited by her widower, Ephraim Cabot. The harsh realities of farm life in the mid-nineteenth century create a backdrop for the personal and psychological conflicts that unfold among the characters. The farmhouse, described in stark terms, reflects the oppressive atmosphere of the family dynamics, with various settings including the kitchen, parlor, and bedrooms contributing to the mood of confinement and despair.
Central to the outdoor setting are two imposing elm trees that loom over the farmhouse, symbolizing the lingering influence of Eben's deceased mother and serving as a haunting presence in the narrative. The play’s action contrasts between the grim interiors of the house and the more open, yet equally fraught, exterior spaces like the barn and gate, where characters confront their desires and dreams. California, mentioned but never depicted, represents a distant hope for escape and opportunity, highlighting the contrast between the characters’ bleak reality and their yearning for a better life. Overall, the setting plays a crucial role in emphasizing the themes of desire, conflict, and the inescapable ties to family and place.
Desire Under the Elms: Analysis of Setting
First published: 1925
First produced: 1924
Type of work: Drama
Type of plot: Tragedy
Time of work: 1850
Asterisk denotes entries on real places.
Places Discussed
Cabot farmhouse
Cabot farmhouse. Isolated New England farm, originally belonging to Eben Cabot’s mother, that becomes the property of her widower Ephraim Cabot and his two sons after Ephraim works her to her grave, as Eben claims. Life on the farm, as on so many farms in New England in the mid-nineteenth century, is a challenging existence, which is one reason why Eben is able to bribe his half brothers to leave. After Ephraim arrives home with his new wife Abbie Putnam, who will inherit the farm if she produces a son, Peter and Simeon leave for California, and the passionate psychological struggle among the remaining three characters begins.
The action takes place in various rooms of the green and “sickly grayish” Cabot farmhouse: the kitchen, the porch, the bedrooms, and the parlor, described in stage directions as a “grim, repressed room like a tomb.” This room has been preserved as Eben’s mother left it and is where Abbie’s seduction of Eben takes place. At the end of the play, Abbie kills their love child to prove her love to Eben. The sheriff who comes to arrest them admires the farm and concludes, ironically given the tragedies the farm represents, that he wished he owned it.
Much of the action of the play takes place outside: by the gate, where characters stand at sunrise and sunset, and in the barn, where Ephraim sometimes sleeps with his cows. The most important features outdoors, however, are the “two enormous elms” which bend over the roof of the farmhouse and whose “sinister maternity” represents the spirit of Eben’s dead mother.
*California
*California. Home of the gold strikes of 1849. Although never seen in the play, California represents escape for the inhabitants of the Cabot farmhouse. “They’s gold in the West,” Peter Cabot says to his brother Simeon at the play’s opening, and the dreams of “fields o’ gold” soon draw these two characters away from this farm strewn only with stones.
Bibliography
Alexander, Doris. Eugene O’Neill’s Creative Struggle: The Decisive Decade, 1924-1933. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1992. Attempts to trace the plays to probable sources. Sees O’Neill’s writing of plays as opportunities “to confront and solve” problems in his own life. Analyzes the composition and final text of Desire Under the Elms in relationship to O’Neill’s death wish after his mother died.
Bogard, Travis. Contour in Time: The Plays of Eugene O’Neill. Rev. ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. Recognizes O’Neill’s plays as efforts at self-understanding. Attempts to analyze the plays in relationship to events in O’Neill’s life. Especially effective at developing the psychological and mythic elements in Desire Under the Elms.
Carpenter, Frederic I. Eugene O’Neill. Rev. ed. Boston: Twayne, 1979. An effective, short introduction to O’Neill’s life and plays, emphasizing the tragic dimensions of the dramas. Sees “the spirit of nature” as the “final hero” of Desire Under the Elms, since the play emphasizes that human attempts at ownership and possession result in pain and inevitable loss.
Gannon, Paul W. Eugene O’Neill’s “Desire Under the Elms.” New York: Monarch Press, 1965. Provides a clear, if oversimplified, summary of the plot and commentary on the characterization, staging, and major themes and problems in the drama.
Sheaffer, Louis. O’Neill: Son and Artist. Boston: Little, Brown, 1973. The most authoritative biography of O’Neill. Includes helpful details about the incidents in O’Neill’s life related to Desire Under the Elms, as well as about the play’s composition and immediate reception.