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Situational Irony
Key Examples in The Hairy Ape
Style
Explanation and Analysis:
The Hairy Ape is abnormally subdivided for a drama, separated into eight distinct standalone scenes. In keeping with stylistic practices during the modernist period and immediately after, O'Neill breaks from traditional, centuries-old drama structure, refraining from using acts that are split into multiple scenes. This stylistic choice is one commonly made by modernist writers and their predecessors. During this period, it was common to break from traditional formal structures within an artistic genre—a choice that was symbolic of the political, cultural, and technological changes occurring in the world at the time.
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