Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller 1915 and grew up in New York City.  Miller' father, owned a shop of women's coat; however, he lost everything in the stock market crash of 1929.  Miller was forced to work several jobs to support himself, including being a farm hand.  Miller began writing his plays in the 1930s.  He was a student at the University of Michigan but returned back to New York to write plays for the stage shortly after graduation.  Miller's plays were mainly focused around social and political issues.  

Miller wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman, within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play.  Death of a Salesman then appeared on Broadway in 1949 at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Kazan.  Miller's play Death of a Salesman won three Tony awards and the Pulitzer Prize which made Miller famous.  He wrote novels, essays and short stories and was one of the most recognizable playwrights in America.  Miller's works are known for their strong commitment to social justice, and their concern for the ordinary person, and the inner lives of their characters.  

Miller was married three times.  He married Mary Grace Slattery in 1940.  They had two children, Robert and Jane, before they got divorced in 1955.  Miller then married Marilyn Monroe in 1956.  They got a divorce in 1961, and in 1962 he married the photographer Inge Morath.  They have one cild, Rebecca Miller, who is an actress.  

In 2005, Miller died of congestive heart failure at his home in Connecticut at the age of 89.  The date of his death happened to be the 56th anniversary of the Broadway opening of "Death of a Salesman".

"As a dramatist, Miller had a lot in common with Ibsen, Shaw, Chekov, and Brecht.  What they share in common is the philosophy that the fate of a person is social and that the stage should be considered as a medium more important for ideas than for just entertainment.  Miller, however, is more of a moralist, and his plays have a serious intellectual purpose.  Miller focused on the expression of free ideas in the theatre, and also decided to write plays of social protest.  In the Death of a Salesman, Miller criticizes the falsity of the American Dream and the emphasis placed on financial success in the United States."

(http://thebestnotes.com/booknotes/Death_Of_A_Salesman_Summary/Death_Of_A_Salesman_Miller04.html