Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Anna Christie was a drama by the American playwright Eugene O’Neill that won him his second Pulitzer Prize for Drama in the year 1922. It is a four-act play that was first performed in 1920. Unlike his previous play (Beyond The Horizon) which had a tragic ending, Anna Christie ends on a promising happy note. Yet, the titular character and the protagonist of the play represent the marginalized weak section of society.
Characters:
Anna Christopherson (Anna Christie) is a young girl who was abandoned by her father at the age of five. She decides to meet her father who is a sea Captain. Chris C. Christopherson (Old Chris) is her father. Mat is a young man who is among the rescued people from a shipwreck. He comes close to Anna. Johnny the Priest is the barkeeper in whose bar, Anna reunites with her estranged father after many years. Marthy is a grown-up woman, the current girlfriend of Chris. She shares a barge with Chris.
Summary of Anna Christie
The play begins as Anna Christie, a young girl knocks on the door of a bar. Chris is a barge captain who is having some drinks in the same bar. He is well known to the barkeeper Johnny the Priest and shows him a letter that he recently got. He says that this letter is from his estranged daughter whom he hadn’t seen since she was five years old. He says that since he used to be on the sea most of the time, his wife decided to live on a farm in Minnesota with her family members, and Chris never visited them there. He discusses the matter of the letter with Johnny the Priest. His daughter Anna is coming to New York City to meet him. Chris is a bit nervous about it as he hadn’t seen his daughter for years and he doesn’t know how to react. He is also worried that he isn’t leading a settled life. As Chris leaves the bar, Anna enters in. She is a confident girl who reveals herself as a tough cynical prostitute. She meets Mathy at the bar and soon the two become friendly with each other. Marthy is the girlfriend of Old Chris but Anna doesn’t know that. She reveals her reason to visit New York City to Marthy. She informs that the brothel she was working for in Saint Paul was arrested. She was given a choice of freedom if she leaves the town. She was feeling a bit ill so she decided to take a leave and visited New York City where her father lives. She is planning to stay and rest with her father for a while. She further reveals her past to Marthy and says that she doesn’t expect much from her father because she hasn't seen him since she was five. She informs her how her mother took her to a farm to live with her family where one of Christie’s cousins raped her. To save herself from further exploitation, she chose to run away to Saint Paul. She got some help in the new town and got a job as a nanny. However, she did not like caring for children and became a prostitute instead.
As Old Chris returns to the bar, he meets his daughter. Both cautiously greet each other and are optimistic about each other. Anna decides to hide her past life from her father and agrees to live with him and Marthy on his barge.
At sea, Anna feels a new sense of freshness. She tells her father that she is liking life at his barge as it makes her feel clean and healthy. Chris isn’t happy about it. He worries that Anna may decide to marry some sea captain like him because he doesn’t want his daughter to feel the same loneliness that his wife and Anna’s mother suffered.
Later that night, Chris sees some people trapped in the sea. He rescues four shipwrecked sailors. One of them is Mat who is young, good-looking, and flirtatious. When he sees Anna at the barge he tries to flirt with her. As Mat attempts to seduce Anna, she resolutely resists him. Mat gets impressed by her tough and determined nature. He feels she is the girl he should marry and settle with. However, he is a sailor and Chris doesn’t want her daughter to be with a sailor. Thus, Chris tries everything to keep them apart. This develops tension between Chris and Mat and ultimately they argue about Anna. Their argument soon gets the heat and they get involved in a fistfight. Mat is younger and stronger while Chris is getting old. Mat easily beats and defeats Chris. When Anna comes to know this, she gets very upset. She doesn’t like the fact that two such people who barely know her are fighting to decide her fate. She straightforwardly approaches Mat and says that though she likes him, she cannot marry him. Mat is adamant and he insists that Anna should accept his proposal. To this, Anna angrily reveals her past to him in presence of her father. She tells him that back in Saint Paul, she used to be a prostitute. As Chris and Mat listen to this, both get upset at Anna and criticize her. However, Anna isn’t ashamed of her past. She says that it is her father’s fault who abandoned her at such an early age. She informs how she was raped at the farm by her cousin and what forced her to become a prostitute. Anna further says that she decided to keep it a secret from her father but Mat has forced her to reveal her past. Mat gets furious and stomps out of the barge and starts drinking alcohol. On the other hand, Chris realizes that Anna became a prostitute only because of her situation while she has strong feelings for Mat. He decides to go behind Mat to convince him about Anna.
Chris continues to search for Mat for two days but fails to find him. He returns to his barge and finds that Anna is packing her belongings as she is preparing to return to Saint Paul. He informs her that he has signed on a ship project heading to South Africa. He says that he will make good money from it and will send it to Anna. Anna soothes him and says that she knows that he left her and his mother only to provide money for his family.
At the same time, Mat visits the barge through a steamer. He asks Anna to tell him that she lied about her past. But Anna isn’t ready to tell any lie and deny her reality. She says that she did work as a prostitute but now she has changed and swears that she will never go the same way she was in past. Mat realizes her toughness and believes in her. He forgives her and asks her to marry him the very next morning as he is also going to the same ship project headed to South Africa. He tells her that Anna won’t have to live alone for long as soon she will have his kids with her.
Chris tries to warn Anna again about the consequences of marrying a sailor. However, Anna convinces her that everything will be fine between her and Mat. Both Chris and Mat leave Anna as the play ends promising they will return soon to fill her life with all happiness she deserves. The play ends on a bittersweet note as it is suggested that Anna is making the same mistake that her mother did, years ago.
So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!
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