Study Guide by Arpita Karwa

The Emperor Jones by Eugene O'Neill

tionaries have entered the forest to find Jones. Smithers

meets Lem. Lem tells Smithers that Jones has been
killed. He also tells him that he and the revolutionaries
melted silver coins to make silver bullets that could kill
Jones.

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co
The Emperor Jones written by American dramatist Eugene
O'Neill in 1920 revolves around Brutus Jones - a man
who is self-assured and extremely resourceful.

Brutus Jones, an American fugitive, is the emperor of an

unknown island in the West Indies. All the servants in the
palace have left except an old woman -- who updates a
Cockney trader named Smithers that the natives are
a.
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planning a revolution against Jones.

Smithers updates Jones about the same and tells him that
escaping through the dark forest of the island could be
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dangerous. Jones says that he knew this revolution would

happen as he had been stealing wealth from the island and
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depositing it in a foreign bank account.

Jones is trying to escape through the dark forest with his

gun loaded with five lead bullets and one silver bullet. He
is overconfident partly because, in the past, he has made
ta

the islanders believe that he possesses magical powers and

also that he could only be killed by silver bullets, which is
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actually a myth.
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Jones is starting to lose his mental strength in the darkness

of the forest. He is seeing hallucinations of what he dreads.
With every hallucination, he is firing a bullet from his
gun, thereby inadvertently alerting the natives.
ar

Jones is seeing hallucinations of the two men he killed in

order to reach the island. One of them was a man who he
killed over a game of craps and the other one was a prison
guard who he killed in order to escape from the prison.
The next hallucination is about a slave ship and a
Witch-Doctor who are trying to kill him with a crocodile.
Jones fires the silver bullet - the last bullet he had.

The next scene introduces Lem - the leader of the insur-

rection. He attempted to shoot Jones earlier. The revolu-

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 Study Guide by Arpita Karwa

Mind Map

Desirable and foolish

young man

Brutus Jones Friend Smithers

Escaped America, became the emperor of
an unidentified West Indies island A white Cockney trader

Killer Helped by

Lem Old Native Woman

The leader before Jones, the leader of Helpful, tells Smithers
the insurrection who finally kills Jones about natives’s plan

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