American Research Journal of English and Literature

This paper draws on the story of Eben Cabot’s love and revenge from a well-known American play, Desire under the Elms with a critique from the Freudian psychological interpretation of love and of revenge drive. The essay brings out the traumatic manifestation of vengeance and horror when Eben’s love for his mother turns him into an avenger for taking a revenge on his father, Ephraim Cabot. As Eben thinks his mother is killed by his father, he gives his father a severe penalty by removing him with disowning his two elder brothers. In addition, he succeeds wooing her newly married step-mother, Abbie Putnam; and manages to sleep with her. After she gives birth to a baby, she herself smothers it only for Eben. When Abbie leaves the Cabot House and rushes with Eben, Eben’s father feels utterly disgraced while Eben feels he avenges finally.