Arthur Miller: His Life and Work

Rating:
Summary: A definitive work on an important but not Promethean figure
Review: Arthur Asher Miller is famous, as this book's back cover sums up, for three things: his own body of work, his defiance of the House Un-American Activities Committee in the mid-1950s, and his marriage to "the most famous of movie stars" (Gottfried's quote), namely Marilyn Monroe.

In his own country, Miller is, also as Gottfried says, unappreciated to the point of scorn. My only disappointment with this work-and it is a fine book-is that he does not explore this aspect of Miller's relationship to the "vox populi", whom his work, like that of Rockwell and Springsteen, is supposed to relate to. My own observation is that one's attitude to Miller-as playwright, as 'Mr.Marilyn Monroe', as human being-often is, like an artificial horizon indicator of one's own sociopolitical attitudes. Those listing to port will invariably uphold Miller as the great conscience of his generation whilst those heading starboard will dismiss him pretty perfunctorily as merely another "Intellectual", in the vein of those figures of derision Paul Johnson deftly skewers in his volume of that title.

Actors, or those considering themselves as such, place Miller's work on a great pedestal, and the technical merits of his work are considerable and generally undisputed. However,Miller's sense of life, so to speak, is not essentially noble, but essentially fatalist and indifferent.

Miller, personally, despite his wealth, critical success, and longevity-he's still working at 88-is not a figure one wants to view sympathetically, and I certainly do not. He left his first wife and ran off with a very public movie star whom he had ample reason to know would be very high maintenance, and, like an intricately built exotic car in the hands of a teenager, didn't maintain her well at all. While it's certain he had no direct involvement in her death, he was something of a negligent husband who failed to effectively deal with her dependencies on barbituates and psychoanalysis, and tormented her for her indiscretions with Yves Montand despite the fact that he'd done the same thing whilst she was married to Joe DiMaggio. To rub salt into the wounds, as percieved by the American public, he failed to attend her funeral and then proceeded to write a play (After the Fall)in which an unmistakably Monroe-alter-ego character is dealt with cruelly. Make no mistake, there are many theatre-goers who flatly hate Arthur Miller.

Many of those will snort with indignation when they read, in this volume for perhaps the first time, that Miller's son (with third wife Inge Morath) was born with Down''s syndrome and perfunctorily institutionalized, or Miller's unprovoked attack on a journalist in 1995-inasmuch as he was 80 at the time, however, many may more disdain the journalist (a healthy male in his early thirties) for "not besting the old Bolshevist", as one conservative commentator said.

Ultimately, it's his work that will either uphold Miller as the great playwright-of his nation, of his century, even,as one actor avers in this book, along with Shakespeare,of his species-or merely an important but not overarching writer, and such grand judgments are only plausible many years,even decades, after one's death. While it's clear Gottfried believes the former to be the case, and I believe the latter, one virtue of his book is that I still can concede its excellence without endorsing the notion of Miller as the ultimate in any aspect, save that which appears on the back cover: as a concomitantly commercially successful, politically controversial, and romantically conspicuous celebrity at a noteworthy time and place.

Arthur Miller, once the ultimate celebrity.

Rating:
Summary: A definitive work on an important but not Promethean figure
Review: Arthur Miller is famous, as this book's back cover sums up, for three things: his own body of work, his defiance of the House Un-American Activities Committee in the mid-1950s, and his marriage to "the most famous of movie stars" (Gottfried's quote), namely Marilyn Monroe.

In his own country, Miller is, also as Gottfried says, unappreciated to the point of scorn. My only disappointment with this work-and it is a fine book-is that he does not explore this aspect of Miller's relationship to the "vox populi", whom his work, like that of Rockwell and Springsteen, is supposed to relate to. My own observation is that one's attitude to Miller-as playwright, as 'Mr.Marilyn Monroe', as human being-often is, like an artificial horizon indicator of one's own sociopolitical attitudes. Those listing to port will invariably uphold Miller as the great conscience of his generation whilst those heading starboard will dismiss him pretty perfunctorily as merely another "Intellectual", in the vein of those figures of derision Paul Johnson deftly skewers in his volume of that title.

Actors, or those considering themselves as such, place Miller's work on a great pedestal, and the technical merits of his work are considerable and generally undisputed. However,Miller's sense of life, so to speak, is not essentially noble, but essentially fatalist and indifferent.

Miller, personally, despite his wealth, critical success, and longevity-he's still working at 88-is not a figure one wants to view sympathetically, and I certainly do not. He left his first wife and ran off with a very public movie star whom he had ample reason to know would be very high maintenance, and, like an intricately built exotic car in the hands of a teenager, didn't maintain her well at all. While it's certain he had no direct involvement in her death, he was something of a negligent husband who failed to effectively deal with her dependencies on barbituates and psychoanalysis, and tormented her for her indiscretions with Yves Montand despite the fact that he'd done the same thing whilst she was married to Joe DiMaggio. To rub salt into the wounds, as percieved by the American public, he failed to attend her funeral and then proceeded to write a play (After the Fall)in which an unmistakably Monroe-alter-ego character is dealt with cruelly. Make no mistake, there are many theatre-goers who flatly hate Arthur Miller.

Many of those will snort with indignation when they read, in this volume for perhaps the first time, that Miller's son (with third wife Inge Morath) was born with Down''s syndrome and perfunctorily institutionalized, or Miller's unprovoked attack on a journalist in 1995-inasmuch as he was 80 at the time, however, many may more disdain the journalist (a healthy male in his early thirties) for "not besting the old Bolshevist", as one conservative commentator said.

Ultimately, it's his work that will either uphold Miller as the great playwright-of his nation, of his century, even,as one actor avers in this book, along with Shakespeare,of his species-or merely an important but not overarching writer, and such grand judgments are only plausible many years,even decades, after one's death. While it's clear Gottfried believes the former to be the case, and I believe the latter, one virtue of his book is that I still can concede its excellence without endorsing the notion of Miller as the ultimate in any aspect, save that which appears on the back cover: as a concomitantly commercially successful, politically controversial, and romantically conspicuous celebrity at a noteworthy time and place.

Arthur Miller, once the ultimate celebrity.

Rating:
Summary: Arthur Miller: His Life and Work
Review: Arthur Miller's All My Sons, Death of a Salesman, and View from the Bridge rank as masterpieces of the 20th-century American stage. Veteran drama critic Gottfried (Jed Harris: The Curse of Genius) tells the story of this famed playwright, whom he believes has been more appreciated overseas than in his own country. Skillfully drawing on Miller's correspondence and notebooks, as well as interviews with friends and colleagues, he illuminates the family dynamics of Miller's childhood-and the marked change from privilege to poverty when the Depression struck-and other relationships and experiences. This information, in turn, sheds light on some of the dramatic characters and themes in Miller's work. Details about his three marriages (particularly to Marilyn Monroe), children, friendships, and working relationships with luminaries such as Elia Kazan, and more are presented honestly, intelligently, and without sensationalism. Miller decided not to participate in Gottfried's project, but he did help the author secure access to important documents in research libraries. Gottfried's access to original research makes his book especially in-depth, and with the few biographies of Miller either out of print or emphasizing criticism, this is an important purchase for large theater collections.

Rating:
Summary: A wealth of information and insight into one man's life
Review: Expertly written by award-winning drama critic and biographer Martin Gottfried, Arthur Miller: His Life And Work is the exhaustive and superbly presented biography of the award winning American playwright, and knowledgeably examines his life and his theatrical creations in close detail. A wealth of information and insight into one man's life and his timeless, century-defining plays set Arthur Miller: His Life And Work quite apart among notable and worthy biographies. No academic or community library American Theater History or American Biography collection can be complete without the inclusion of Arthur Miller: His Life And Work.