The Web

Summary of The Web: A prostitute argues with her pimp about her serious illness and her baby in their New York apartment. A neighbor storms in and comes to the woman’s rescue. He turns out to be a criminal in hiding. He is shot in the hallway, and the prostitute ends up with the blame.

 

"It’s easy to say: “Why don’t I beat it?” I can’t. I never have enough coin to make a good break and git out of town. He takes it all away from me. And if I went to some other part of this burg he’d find me and kill me. Even if he didn’t kill me he’d have me pinched and where’ud the kid be then? [grimly] Oh, he’s got me where he wants me all right. He squares it with the cops so they don’t hold me up for walkin’ the streets. Yuh ought to be wise enough to know all of his kind stand in. But if he tipped them off to do it they’d pinch me before I’d gone a block. Then it’ud be the Island fur mine. [scornfully] D’yuh suppose they’d keep me any place if they knew what I was? And d’yuh suppose he wouldn’t tell them or have someone else tell them? Yuh don’t know the game I’m up against."

- The Web, Eugene O'Niell

 

This dramatic monologue, written by Eugene O’Neill, is spoken from the point of view of Rose Thomas, a prostitute, and because of this it has been written in the first person. To emphasize the speaker's sociolect, O’Neill uses colloquial language, high-frequency lexis (‘good’, ‘takes’, ‘place’) and slang words and phrases such as 'beat it', 'burg' and 'have me pinched'. These techniques convey her low social standing within the community she lives. The use of non-standard spellings like 'git' rather than get, ‘yuh’ rather than you, and 'where'ud' rather than where'd also help in crafting a regional dialect which suggests she is living in a more deprived area. These language techniques are very important for a spoken piece such as this, as they direct the speaker as to how it should be performed and they can inform the audience of the persona's place in society, where the scene is set (or indeed where the speaker is supposed to be from), and how comfortable the character is.

   Rose seems hopeless in this text, and we see this with O'Neill's use of the rhetorical question 'where'ud the kid be then?' She believes that even if she attempted leaving her dreadful life, there would be dire consequences for either her or her baby.

   None of the sentences within the monologue are complex, and this is used both to get across her frustration – she is at breaking point – and to imply a lack of intellectuality. O’Neill wants us to empathize with the persona, and not judge Rose because of her profession – a profession that she may well have been forced into.

   The writer never uses the pimps name, instead he uses the pronoun ‘he’ several times throughout the text. This lack of identity is intimidating and also shows the hatred she harbours towards him. She loathes and fears him so much she cannot even say his name aloud. O'Neill uses another personal pronoun 'you' to make the auience feel guilty for the way they may have previously thought of prostitutes. The synethic personalisation created makes them feel as though perhaps they could have helped her free herself, and they chose to ignore her. The persona says herself 'It’s easy to say: “Why don’t I beat it?”', but if she is not helped by 'you' the audience, she 'can't'. 

  O’Neill uses the noun ‘game’ in order to create a metaphor about Rose’s situation, showing her belief that her life can end in only one of two ways: she will win, or she will lose. And with the tone created by the final sentence ‘Yuh don’t know the game I’m up against,’ it seems clear that currently losing seems inevitable.  We can also see this in the stage directions ‘[grimly]’ and ‘[scornfully]’ – these adjectives are extremely negative, and that is no surprise considering her lot in life.