For the majority of The Emperor Jones, Brutus Jones is the only character who speaks. Jones converses with himself, with an absent God, and with his very own memories—and he does all of this regardless of the fact that he never receives an answer and regardless of the audience watching the play unfold. Thus, Scenes 2 through 7 may be understood as a series of connected soliloquies delivered by a man slowly coming to terms with his unfortunate fate. Take the following example from Scene 5:
Lawd Jesus, heah my prayer! I’se a po’ sinner, a po’ sinner! I knows I done wrong, I knows it! When I cotches Jeff cheatin’ wid loaded dice my anger overcomes me and I kills him dead! Lawd, I done wrong! When dat guard hits me wid de whip, my anger overcomes me, and I kills him dead… Lawd, I done wrong! I knows it! I’se sorry! Forgive me, Lawd! Forgive dis po’ sinner!
In the passage above, Jones laments his past, begging desperately for a forgiveness that never comes. O’Neill’s use of tense is deliberate—although Jones repeatedly states that he knows he has “done wrong” (past tense), when he actually vocalizes these wrongs, he names them in the present tense. For Jones, the sins that haunt him are not over. Rather, his traumas are alive and ongoing. Only by giving voice to them through the act of soliloquizing can he finally begin to overcome the specter of his past.
