Arthur Miller - Definition and Overview

Arthur Asher Miller (born October 17, 1915 in New York) is an American playwright.

Chronology

Monroe and Miller on the set of The Misfits

• Born to Polish Jewish immigrants Isadore, a clothing manufacturer, and Augusta, a housewife. They have two other children, Kermit and Joan. The family lives in a Manhattan penthouse overlooking Central Park until Isadore is ruined in the Great Depression.
• 1936 First play Honors at Dawn produced at the University of Michigan. He wins an Avery Hopwood Award.
• 1938 Graduates from the University of Michigan, majoring in journalism.
• 1940 Marries college sweetheart Mary Slattery. They have two children, Jane and Robert.
• 1949 Death of a Salesman wins the Pulitzer Prize and three Tony Awards.
• January 22, 1953 The Crucible opens on Broadway.
• 1956 Divorces Mary Slattery after a residency period in Reno, Nevada.
• June 1956 Appears before the House Un-American Activities Committee because he was named by Elia Kazan as they had attended communist meetings.
• June 29, 1956 Marries Marilyn Monroe.
• May 31, 1957 Found guilty of contempt of Congress for refusing to reveal the names of members of a literary circle suspected of Communist affiliations.
• August 8, 1958 Conviction reversed by the U.S. Court of Appeals.
• 1958 Publishes Collected Plays.
• January 24, 1961 Divorce filed in Mexico four days earlier by Monroe granted.
• February 17, 1962 Marries Inge Morath. They met when she and other photographers from the Magnum agency documented the making of The Misfits. They have two children, Rebecca and Daniel (see Notes).
• 1985 Visits Turkey and is honoured at the American embassy. After his companion on the trip, Harold Pinter is thrown out of the country for discussing torture, Miller leaves in support.
• January 30, 2002 Inge Morath dies.
• May 1, 2002 Awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama." Previous winners include Doris Lessing, Günter Grass and Carlos Fuentes.
• December, 2004 The 89 year old Miller announces he has been living with 34 year old artist Agnes Barley at his Roxbury, Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they are planning to marry.

Works

Plays

• (1936) Honors at Dawn
• (1944) The Man Who Had All the Luck
• (1947) All My Sons
• (1949) Death of a Salesman
• (1953) The Crucible
• (1955) A Memory of Two Mondays
• (1955) A View from the Bridge
• (1964) After the Fall
• (1965) Incident at Vichy
• (1968) The Price
• (1972) The Creation of the World and Other Business
• (1977) The Archbishop's Ceiling
• (1981) The American Clock
• (1982) Elegy For a Lady
• (1982) Some Kind of Love Story
• (1986) (I Can't Remember Anything and Clara)
• (1991) The Ride Down Mt. Morgan
• (1993) The Last Yankee
• (1994) Broken Glass
• (1998) Mr. Peters' Connections
• (2004) Resurrection Blues
• (2004) Finishing the Picture

Screenplays

• (1961) The Misfits (IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055184/))
• (1966) An Enemy of the People (IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0251072/) -- adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's play)
• (1980) Playing for Time (IMDB (http://imdb.com/title/tt0081344/) -- for TV)
• (1989) Everybody Wins (IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099520/))

Other works

• (1945) Focus
• Situation Hopeless (but Not Serious)
• The Ryan Interview
• The Golden Years
• Fame
• The Reason Why
• Homely Girl, a Life: And Other Stories
• The Theater Essays of Arthur Miller
• Timebends: A Life

Notes

• Death of a Salesman was the first play to win the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, the Tony Award and the Pulitzer Prize.
• Was exempted from military service during World War II because of a football injury.
• According to biographer Martin Gottfried, Miller and Morath had a son, Daniel, born with Down Syndrome. Miller put Daniel in an institution, and never visited him. Miller does not mention Daniel in his autobiography.

See theater, literature, University of Michigan, Hollywood Ten, House Unamerican Activities Committee

External links

• The Arthur Miller Society (http://www.ibiblio.org/miller/)