Books: Tale of Two Masks

PART OF A LONG STORY (331 pp.)—Agnes Boulton—Doubleday ($4.50).

"There was never a great genius," said Aristotle, "without a tincture of madness." Part of Eugene O'Neill's genius lay in the fact that he could weave the near madness of his life into his plays. Long Day's Journey into Night showed how closely the life and the plays overlapped, and yet how brilliantly he was able to impose art on mere reminiscence. This book of recollections by his second wife is less than a work of art, but it adds some fascinating scenes to the growing script of Eugene O'Neill's offstage drama.

Author Agnes...