A Review on the Textplay "Before Breakfast” written by Eugene O’Neill

The text “Before Breakfast” is a one act play written by Eugene O’Neill. What makes this short drama special is the fact that the drama consists mainly of the female lead, Mrs. Rowland, talking to and berating her husband for over twenty minutes. And throughout it all, not once does her husband ever appears on the stage (other than a avery brief glimpse the audience get of his hand). We might as well call this drama “a one character play”. And yet despite it is mainly played by one character only, the drama manages to convey all the necessary element of the usual drama, such as the setting, the plot, and the conflicts—even if we only see it from the way Mrs. Rowland sees.



Even from the first few minutes, it is rather clear that Mrs. Rowland is clearly dissatisfied with the life that she leads right now, and wishes everything would change—or at least, wishes her husband would change. She blames all of their misfortune on her husband, and in her rants she seems to think of herself as a martyr—because despite all of her husband’s flaws, she still sticks by him, still finds it in herself to provide him breakfast, instead of just leaving him to fend for himself and going back to her father’s house.

Why, then, if she really feels dissatisfied with him, she still lives with him? Could it be that she loves him that much? In dialogue 16-17 we know that her husband is a graduate of Harvard, and used to be rich, and most of all, used to act as if she forced him to marry her. Even from this fact alone, we could gather that women must have been after him—at least when he is still rich. It is entirely possible that she marries him only for his wealth, since she is only a grocer’s daughter. But then also in dialogue 17, she tells the audience how he used to make her poetry, how he used to say lovely things to her. If we are going by this, then it seems her husband is actually quite an actor and a fine hypocrite at that. Even in the middle of the hard lives they are both living, he still manages to find the time to cheat on her wife and even goes so far as to impregnate another woman—who obviously wants him to take a responsibility, if the letter his wife found is any indication.

The most surprising of all is perhaps the ending, where it seems to be implied that her husband has committed suicide, if the grunts of pain he emanates from the room and Mrs. Rowland’s own hysteric scream at the end is any indication. Why he does that, none knows. But the fact remains that he ends his own (miserable) life, leaving everthing behind—including all of his problems. If we see it from this angle alone, it seems he could not take anymore of what the life has in store for him, and takes the easy way out. And what a cowardly way it is.



*You could also read the textplay here.