Death of a Playwright

Last night Arthur Miller died. He wrote some amazing stuff that's been seared in my memory. For all that people moan about school curriculum, whoever put his plays in mine should be commended. The two Miller plays that stay with me to this day are The Crucible and Death of a Salesman.

In 9th grade, The Crucible was my second lesson on politcal allegory, following Animal Farm from the year before. The Crucible used the Salem witchtrials to mock the House Committee on Un-American Activities and the McCarthyism that had gripped the country, and which ultimately came after Miller for his views. The timing of its release (1953, while the country was fully in the grip of McCarthyism) foretold of its lack of success. But in truth, it's not Miller's best stuff, as he went about his allegory in a rather heavy-handed manner (In a note to the play, Miller wrote, "A political policy is equated with moral right, and opposition to it with diabolical malevolence."). Nevertheless, the heavy-handedness was a perfect way to educate 9th graders on political allegory, and at the time, I thought it brilliant to draw such parallels. To this day, I make the connection between the two events whenever either of them come up.

Miller was at his best when he explored the human condition, something he did repeatedly. All My Sons and On the Waterfront are two magnificent plays in this regard, but his tour de force on the subject was certainly Death of a Salesman.

I might have read Death of a Salesman in 12th grade, and I've been fortunate to see it performed since. Willy is the the modern common man as a Greek tragic figure, who cannot face losing his job, and imparts the wrong lessons to his sons, Biff and Happy. Willy may be the title character, but I've usually thought about the play more in terms of Willy's sons, perhaps because I'm not a father. Biff and Happy want to live the American Dream, but with Willy's misguidance, they don't know how to reach it, not even when the answer is right in front of them (in the form of the boys' childhood neighbor, the boy that did succeed through hard work). Miller's attention to the boys and their relationship with their father is a brilliant look at misplaced American values, every bit as significant today as when it was opened (1949), perhaps moreso. With all the "lessons" one can find in modern society, I wonder whether there are millions of Biffs and Happys out there.

So tonight I raise a glass, and toast the memory of Arthur Miller. And maybe in the not-too-distant future, I'll get his autobiography, Timebends, a book that's been on my "to read" list since it came out in 1987, and finally examine the man behind the plays.