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Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller Quotes

Playwright

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Famous Arthur Miller Quotes

“When irrational terror takes to itself the fiat of moral goodness somebody has to die. ... No man lives who has not got a panic button, and when it is pressed by the clean white hand of moral duty, a certain murderous train is set in motion.”

MenHandsCertainDiesWhiteMoralDutyGoodnessTrainCleanTerrorPanicButtonsIrrationalMoral DutyMoral Goodness
Book:Collected Essays: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)
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“Pathos truly is the mode for the pessimist. But tragedy requires a nicer balance between what is possible and what is impossible. And it is curious, although edifying, that the plays we revere, century after century, are the tragedies. In them, and in them alone, lies the belief-optimistic, if you will, in the perfectibility of man.”

IfsMenPlayLyingBeliefImpossibleCenturyBalanceTragedyOptimisticCuriousPessimistPathos
Book:The Collected Essays of Arthur Miller
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“The closer a man approaches tragedy the more intense is his concentration of emotion upon the fixed point of his commitment, which is to say the closer he approaches what in life we call fanaticism.”

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Book:Miller Plays: 1: All My Sons; Death of a Salesman; The Crucible; A Memory of Two Mondays; A View from the Bridge
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“I don't say he's a great man. Willie Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He's not the finest character that ever lived. But he's a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. He's not to be allowed to fall in his grave like an old dog. Attention, attention must finally be paid to such a person.”

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Author:Arthur Miller
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“And old Dave, he'd go up to his room, y'understand, put on his green velvet slippers - I'll never forget - and pick up his phone and call the buyers, and without leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want.”

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Book:Miller Plays: 1: All My Sons; Death of a Salesman; The Crucible; A Memory of Two Mondays; A View from the Bridge
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“Those who formally rule take their signals and commands not from the electorate as a body, but from a small group of men. This group will be called the Establishment. It exists even though that existence is stoutly denied. It is one of the secrets of the American social order... A second secret is the fact that the existence of the Establishment - the ruling class - is not supposed to be discussed.”

MenFactsBodyOrderSocialSecretExistenceClassGroupsHistoricalCommandSupposed To BePropagandaDeniedEstablishmentSignalsRulingSmall GroupsSocial OrderElectorateCommand Not
Author:Arthur Miller
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“By whatever means it is accomplished, the prime business of a play is to arouse the passions of its audience so that by the route of passion may be opened up new relationships between a man and men, and between men and Man. Drama is akin to the other inventions of man in that it ought to help us to know more, and not merely to spend our feelings.”

KnowsMenMayMeanPlayHelpingFeelingsPassionBusinessAudienceOughtDramaTheaterTheatreInventionAccomplishedPrimeRoutesPlaywrightNew Relationship
Book:Miller Plays: 1: All My Sons; Death of a Salesman; The Crucible; A Memory of Two Mondays; A View from the Bridge
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“My conception of the audience is of a public each member of which is carrying about with him what he thinks is an anxiety, or a hope, or a preoccupation which is his alone and isolates him from mankind and in this respect at least the function of a play is to reveal him to himself so that he may touch others by virtue of the revelation of his mutuality with them. If only for this reason I regard the theater as a serious business, one that makes or should make man more human, which is to say, less alone.”

IfsThinkingMenShouldHumansMayReasonPlayBusinessAudienceVirtueMankindSeriousMembersAnxietyFunctionTheaterRegardRevelationsConceptionPreoccupationSerious Business
Author:Arthur Miller
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“Nobody dast blame this man. For a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don't put a bolt to a nut, he don't tell you the law or give you medicine. He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back -- that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory.”

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Author:Arthur Miller
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