Arthur Miller

- Blurb -

A great theater critic brings twentieth-century playwright Arthur Miller' s dramatic story to life with bold and revealing new insights Distinguished theater critic John Lahr brings unique perspective to the life of Arthur Miller (1915-2005), the playwright who almost single-handedly propelled twentieth-century American theater into a new level of cultural sophistication. Organized around the fault lines of Miller' s life-his family, the Great Depression, the rise of fascism, Elia Kazan and the House Committee on Un-American Activities, Marilyn Monroe, Vietnam, and the rise and fall of Miller' s role as a public intellectual-this book demonstrates the synergy between Arthur Miller' s psychology and his plays. Concentrating largely on Miller' s most prolific decades of the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, Lahr probes Miller' s early playwriting failures; his work writing radio plays during World War II after being rejected for military service; his only novel, Focus; and his succession of award-winning and canonical plays that include All My Sons, Death of a Salesman, and The Crucible, providing an original interpretation of Miller' s work and his personality.