Eugene Gladstone O'Neill Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was a very talented man and was very fortunate in having the writing skill he did. Eugene was a man of the theater, he was born in it, lived in it, worked in it and wrote in it. (Henry, “Eugene O'Neill”, p.157.) O'Neill is referred to as the most important twentieth century writer, not because he was the first american playwright but because of the influence of his work on the development of the american theater and on other writers. O'Neill said “The theater to me is life- the substance and Interpretation of life............. [And] life is struggle, often