The Iceman Cometh: Analysis of Setting
"The Iceman Cometh" is a play by Eugene O'Neill that explores the lives of social outcasts in a squalid barroom setting, specifically Harry Hope's saloon in lower New York City. The saloon, reminiscent of actual locations O'Neill frequented, serves as a sanctuary for derelicts and failures who seek refuge from their bleak realities, indulging in cheap whiskey and clinging to their dreams. The backroom is notably cramped and dirty, symbolizing a womb-like environment where the characters can temporarily forget their struggles. The arrival of Hickey, a salesman with an unusual determination to inspire action among the residents, disrupts this comfortable stagnation. As the play progresses, the setting transitions from a dark, cozy saloon to a more celebratory atmosphere, paralleling Hickey's attempts to motivate the characters to confront their aspirations. However, as they grapple with the reality outside, the oppressive nature of their illusions becomes evident, culminating in a return to their original despair. The play highlights the essential human need for dreams and illusions as a means of survival amidst harsh truths.
The Iceman Cometh: Analysis of Setting
First published: 1946
First produced: 1946, at the Martin Beck Theatre, New York City
Type of work: Drama
Type of plot: Tragedy
Time of work: 1912
Places Discussed
Harry Hope’s saloon
Harry Hope’s saloon. Squalid barroom in lower New York City. Although a fictional creation, it is modeled on three actual spots familiar to Eugene O’Neill: Jimmy the Priest’s, a flophouse where O’Neill landed after a stint at sea; the Hell Hole, a Greenwich Village establishment; and the taproom of the Garden Hotel near the old Madison Square Garden.
O’Neill’s stage directions describe a “dirty black curtain” that separates the backroom from the bar. The backroom, the location of the primary action of the play, is so crammed with tables that it is difficult for anyone to pass through. There is a toilet built out into the room and a nickel-a-slot phonograph. The windows, which look out on a backyard, are filthy, and the walls and ceiling are “splotched, peeled, stained and dusty.” Larry Slade, the “old Foolosopher,” calls it the “No Chance Saloon” and “The Bottom of the Sea Rathskeller.”
Walled from the street outside, Harry Hope’s saloon provides a place of escape for its occupants, who are social outcasts, derelicts, and failures, existing with their five-cent whiskey, free lunch, and pipe dreams of tomorrow. It is a setting in which one can forget, repress, deny. Symbolically, Harry Hope’s is like a womb: It is warm, cozy, dark, and filled with fluid.
At the end of the first act, the comfortable booziness of the backroom is disturbed by the entrance of Hickey, the salesman, arriving ostensibly to help celebrate Harry’s birthday, as is his annual custom. However, he differs somewhat from usual: first, because he refuses to drink, and second, because he is determined to persuade the residents to act upon their dreams.
In the second act the backroom has been prepared for a party. It is midnight, signifying the beginning of a new day. The bar is closed off, the floor has been swept, tables have been pushed together to make one long table, and a space has been cleared for dancing. There is a birthday cake, red ribbons on the light fixtures, and presents and bottles of whiskey on the table. The setting has been transformed into something that grotesquely approximates the celebrations of the outside world. Similarly, Hickey seeks to transform his friends into participants in society by convincing them to confront their dreams.
The effort to alter the setting and its inhabitants continues through act 3 and into the next morning. Now more of the bar is seen, including its swinging doors to the street. Significantly, the doors will introduce the characters to the reality beyond Harry Hope’s, and, one by one, seduced by Hickey’s arguments relating to their peace of mind, they make abortive attempts to bring their illusions of tomorrow into reality.
In the last act the setting reverts to the original scene but with an “atmosphere of oppressive stagnation.” Even the booze has no life to it. The patrons were unsuccessful in facing reality, and only when Hickey blurts out that he hated his wife and must be insane can they reinstate their pipe dreams and therefore their stasis. They, as all humankind, need their illusions to survive.
Jimmy the Priest’s was a Raines Law hotel of the early twentieth century. It could allow service of liquor after hours and on Sundays if a meal was served with the liquor. Generally this meant a moldy sandwich festered in the middle of each table. The building was a narrow, five-story structure, with the proprietor occupying the second floor, while the upper floors were rented to the regulars. When O’Neill lived there for a while in 1912, he met many of the characters who appear in this play; and it was here that he probably attempted suicide and was saved by his friend, James Byth, the model for Jimmy Tomorrow.
Bibliography
Bogard, Travis. Contour in Time: The Plays of Eugene O’Neill. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972. Unites theatrical understanding with textual insights. Emphasizes the resemblance of The Iceman Cometh, in its use of the chorus, to Greek tragedy.
Cargill, Oscar, N. Bryllion Fagin, and W. J. Fisher, eds. O’Neill and His Plays. New York: New York University Press, 1961. A collection of reviews and articles, including Helen Muchnic’s important essay comparing The Iceman Cometh to Maxim Gorky’s The Lower Depths.
Falk, Doris V. Eugene O’Neill and the Tragic Tension. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1958. Brilliant and short interpretive study, astute in analyzing Larry Slade.
Floyd, Virginia. The Plays of Eugene O’Neill: A New Assessment. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1987. Reviews the plot of the play in detail.
Raleigh, John Henry. The Plays of Eugene O’Neill. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1965. Stresses the autobiographical and sociological elements in The Iceman Cometh. Argues that the characters form a hierarchy, not a democracy.