O’Neill presents women as victims of male’s greed and cruelty and at the same time it is women who are driven by a desire for property. They are shown as lustful too. To bring out this image of women O’Neill resorts to myth, symbol and the technique of naturalism. Women are sufferers and objects to be enjoyed and used for the benefits of men.

    Ephraim Cabot had married Eben’s mother mainly because of farm. He didn’t care for her in other ways. She worked hard but her husband didn’t treat her as an equal partner. She suffered a lot because of him. Her death can be blamed on him. It shows that the old Cabot married her and used her only as a means to get the farm. Eben’s hatred towards his father brings this to light. When the play opens we find old Cabot coming back home with the third wife. Though he was already married twice he brings Abbie home as his third wife. He doesnot stick to one woman but goes for many wives for his greed selfishness and pleasure. Though he was suffering from loneliness he shouldn’t have married for the third time. He could have overcome his loneliness in the company of his sons but he didn’t do that. Abbie comes to the farm as a woman who has a great lust for property. Eben thinks that she has come there to take his mother’s place. Her lust for farm inspires her to give birth to a son no matter how. Though she married old Cabot she began to hate him after marriage and began to make advances to her step son Eben. It is a picture of a woman who is incestuous. It is an act of demonizing woman. Her main purpose for doing it is to have a son through which she could gain access to the property of the old man. She thought the old man was incapable of giving her a son so she began to get closer to her step son. It shows her lust both for property and sex. It is this act that was the source of many problems.

    O’ Neill uses the land itself as a symbol. The land stands for wealth. Many characters are tied to the land and it is their lust for that land which had made their life problematic. Cabot married Eben’s mother for land and Abbie came to the farm because of her lust for it. Her sexual contact with Eben can also be explained on the similar grounds.
     The other major symbol is the elm tree itself. The elm tree with its branches spreads out, stands for the environment where the drama of the characters with different desires like jealousy, incest, love, hatred, greed and murderous instincts gets played out. The elms stand for the suffering of women as will. Eben’s mother lived under the shadow of the elms and suffered a lot in the hand of her husband old Cabot. Abbie’s suffering and desires also take place in the same environment.
    The use of myth is also a part of O’Neill’s technique. Though the playwright uses Greek myth of Phaedra, who in the Euripides’s play Hippolytus and in Racine’s seventeenth century play, Phaedra finds herself uncontrollably desiring her husband’s son. As part of his technique O’Neill uses naturalism to show characters who are not free because they are controlled by different biological and economic forces. The tragedy in their life is primarily due to their overwhelming desires. Hence, O’ Neill uses land and Elms as symbols and creates a naturalistic setting where he paints a picture of women who are suffering and are also victims of their passions and emotions. Use of myth is also equally remarkable in this play.

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