Lakhasly

Scene 1

The firefighters gather at the forefront of the ship, taking a break from shoveling coal. The narrow crew quarters are at the ship's bow. The ocean liner has sailed for an hour outside New York. The men sit on their bunks, drink beer, continue bantering, and sing loudly. Yank, "broader, fiercer, more powerful, and more confident than the rest," diverts his attention to the revelers and asks for a beer. When Yank speaks, the men immediately fall silent, eagerly offering him drinks. Yank, satisfied, steps back, convincing the rowdy men to let the older firefighter, Paddy, sing the "Whiskey Song." Paddy, in a drunken state, sways and clings to his bed, crooning "Whiskey! Oh, Johnny!" Others quickly join in, chanting along. Yank refocuses their attention, ordering them to be quiet while he tries to "think." The men mockingly echo, "Think!"

Above the men's noise, a voice sings about a "girl waiting proudly/making me a home -." Yank silences the tenor, sternly stating that the ship is his home, nowhere else. Long, drunk, jumps on the table to support Yank's statement but adds that the ship is both home and hell, blaming the first-class passengers as responsible. Yank threatens to throw Long and labels his thoughts as the "army of salvation - the socialist bull." He boldly declares that firefighters are superior to first-class passengers, physically stronger, and "belong" to the ship. Paddy awakens and shouts, questioning their loyalty to what Yank is saying. Yank challenges Paddy to give a lengthy and emotional speech, explaining his past life at sea. Paddy describes the pride of working on sail-powered ships, contrasting them with the coal-dragging steamships. He argues that the men can belong to clipper ships but not to steamships. Paddy concludes that men on steamships, dragging coal, are trapped like "monkeys in a zoo!"

Firefighters' speech patterns illustrate their animalistic nature. O'Neill carefully depicts broken words and vocal patterns to create a barrier between the firefighters and upper-class characters. Except for Paddy and Long, the men speak in short, simple phrases with broken English. Paddy and Long also have thick accents, conveying complexity through their dialogue. In this scene, the firefighters' dialogue comes in waves of exclamation:

"Give me me 'at, you! Hi! Jasonite! Squalor! Drunk as a lord, God save you! And here's the way! Luck!"

The firefighters' lines resemble animal sounds, lacking structure or coherence. This doesn't ignore the fact that firefighters, outside the play, might convey complete sentences and thoughts. Inside the text, firefighters are described as a group of dogs. They are reactive, easily provoked, defensive, and always ready for a fight. Yank, the group leader, earns respect not for being the smartest but for being the strongest physically.

Paddy needs to calm down because he is crazy and old, unable to comprehend. With enthusiasm, Yank suddenly shouts that he belongs to the ship while Paddy doesn't; Paddy died while still alive. Yank declares himself part of the engines, moving, breathing coal dust, and consuming it. Without Yank, without the engines, everything will stop. Like Long, Yank describes the ship's bottom as hell, but "working in hell requires a man." Yank equates himself with steel, "muscles," and the punch he leaves behind.

Analysis

Through the ordeal of a firefighter on the ocean liner, Eugene O'Neill reveals the regression of civilized humans to an animalistic state. Firefighters are transformed into working animals, confined and mistreated. The ocean liner serves as a metaphor for larger imprisonment and oppression of blue-collar workers in a tight status at the bottom of society. The bulletin, similar to a cage, represents the narrow world in which men live, devoid of opportunities. O'Neill suggests that men should "resemble those pictures where the appearance of Neanderthal man is guessed." The tight quarters of the bulletin and low ceilings force men to stoop low, preventing them from assuming a natural upright posture. Men are valued only for their physical strength, their ability to shovel coal in the ship's furnace, and they have abandoned the need for modern or complex thinking, reverting to a Neanderthal-like state.

O'Neill reinforces the Neanderthal-like state of firefighters in their speech patterns. He carefully illustrates broken words and vocal patterns to ensure that the actor uses dialogue effectively as another barrier, dividing between firefighters and upper-class characters. Except for Paddy and Long, the men speak in short, simple phrases with broken English. Paddy and Long also have thick accents, expressing complexity through their dialogue. In this scene, the dialogue between firefighters comes in waves of exclamation:

"Give me me 'at, you! Hi! Jasonite! Squalor! Drunk as a lord, God save you! And here's the way! Luck!"

Firefighters' lines resemble animal sounds, devoid of structure or coherence. This doesn't dismiss the fact that firefighters, in real life outside the play, may convey complete sentences and thoughts. Inside the text, firefighters are described as a pack of dogs. The men are reactive and easily provoked, defensive and always ready for a fight. Yank, the group leader, gains respect not for being the smartest but for being the strongest physically. Men don't respect Yank for his mental strength. When Yank asks the men to "stop the loud noise" because he's trying to "manipulate" them to repeat in unison "Think!" the men deliberately mock Yank, who can barely form the word, and attempts to think. In a wave of loud exclamation, the men warn Yank not to break his head while thinking, "You feel the headache, Bai Yungo! One thing about him - he harmonizes with the drink!" The men equate thinking with physical labor and alcohol, the two factors that dominate and move their lives. The chorus that erupted reinforces this saying, "Drink, don't think," repeated three times.

Whether physical labor and alcohol are necessary or comforting, they allow men to exist within their societal status and ship boundaries. Yank's reaction to the tenor singing for his home and Lassie is extremely humiliating for Yank because it implies a life and thought beyond the worker's life. Yank feels equally insulted by Paddy, who recalls life aboard a clipper ship. Yank desperately tries to assert his presence, reversing the societal structure based on "belonging," a theme extensively developed in the play.