Arthur Miller as a Critic of Contemporary Social Evils

1. Pawan Kumar Sharma (Research Scholar, American Literature) 2. Dr A. S. Rao Assistant Professor and Head, Faculty of Arts, FASC (MITS) Deemed University Lakshmangarh (Sikar) Rajasthan E-mail : asrao1975@rediffmail.com Arthur Miller (1915- 2005), is one of the greatest American dramatists and social critics of twentieth century. His main focus is on the contemporary values and theme. His plays reflect his concern for the common man. Millers first play All My Sons (1947) investigates some of the assumptions of a capitalist society. The Man Who Had All the Luck (1997) depicts a character who anticipates his doom. His masterpiece play Death of a Salesman (1949) is as a struggle by a common man against a society. Crucible (1953) was written when anticommunist hysteria was at its peak in America. His another play A View Form the Bridge set on the Brooklyn water front, which formed a common moral focus of the lust of a man. As soon as when Miller was through his desk drawer plays he began to feel interested in ideas and rational thinking. In Millers opinion, the serious Playwright must write social drama. The major dramas of Miller are tragedies and they represent a socio-political criticism of contemporary culture. He uses concrete symbols for the social realities of his time. Millers protagonists and their surroundings are in close interaction with each other. Miller has shown society in his plays which becomes vehicles for argumentation. His style is penetrative, each paragraph, each sentence gives his thought clarity. Miller, in his On Social Plays has also argued that the complex nature of man and drama cannot be

sacrificed to depict a man only as a psychological entity or a social entity on the stage but as a balanced concept between the two.

INTRODUCTION: Born in New York city in 1915 and studied at the University of Michigan, Arthur Miller worked in a variety of jobs. An account of the early years of his life was written by him under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooking" which, however, is not very informative so far as the writer himself is concerned. All his plays reflect his concern for the common man. Miller learnt about life of the common man in America which mirrors in his plays and other writings. His first play All My Sons (1947) investigated some of the assumptions of a capitalist society. His next masterpiece play Death of a Salesman (1949) could be read as a struggle by a common man against a society, which drains him of his energies and then drops him like a sack of potatoes. Miller has placed the common man at the centre of the drama which led many to believe that he had communist sympathies and for which he was investigated against by the House of Un-American Activities in 1947. The charges against him were dropped but the fact remains that Miller stood up for the underprivileged man in American society. Miller's play, The Man who had all the Luck (1997) depicted a character who anticipates his doom simply because he has come to accept the value which the community has put on his success. In the Crucible (1953) written when anti-communist hysteria was at its peak in the country. Miller set his action in witch-hunting salem and once again, though perhaps less resonantly, displayed the clash between private and collective guilt, hinting that man must in the end define himself beyond both. The same may be said of Miller's most forceful play, A View from the Bridge set on the Brooklyn water front, which formed a common moral focus of the lust of a man, both incestuous and homosexual and the lust of a society which denies men the hope of self betterment.

MILLER'S THEMATIC CONCERN: AS A SOCIAL CRITIC: - It was not until Miller had turned thirty and produced about a dozen plays that he realised that it was no use picking themes at random and constructing a story. Far and away the more important business of the dramatist, so he came to believe, was to work on an intellectual plan and explore the meanings and implications of what he wanted to put on the stage. Naturally enough, as soon as he was through with what he calls his 'desk drawer plays' he began to feel interested in ideas and rational thinking. Miller thought all great and serious plays are ultimately involved with the basic problems, how a man may make of the outside world a home. Obviously he finds the existing world deficient in some significant respects when he compares it with home, it does not for instance, have "the safety, the surroundings of love the care of soul, the sense of identity and honour" which the very idea of family so spontaneously evokes. To remove this polarity between home and the world, he suggested that individuals change themselves as well as the world they are living in. It is noticed that Miller believes that the serious Playwright must write social drama. For him however, social drama is not simply an arraignment of the evils of society. The true social drama which he calls the 'Whole Drama' must recognize that a man has both a subjective and an objective existence that he belongs not only to himself and his family but to the world beyond. Miller presents his critique of society by presenting a dichotomy between the individual and society. It was borne in him during the great depression that the one is inextricably intertwined with the other. Eugene O'Neill's God may have been irreverently banished, but a chastened and subdued Miller realized, there are gods like forces which imperiously rule over man's life.

The major drama of Miller are tragedies and they represent a socio-political criticism of American culture. A play cannot be both tragic and social, for the two forms conflict in purpose. Social drama treats the little man as victim and arouses pity but no terror, for man is two little and passive to be a tragic figure. But Miller tries to reconcile these kinds of contraries in his plays. He tries to find the appropriate concrete symbols for the social realities of his time and place. He achieves through a series of emotional confrontations among the members of a single family and emotionally valid psychological statement about the particular conflicts of the American family, as well as the universal psychological family struggle as his heroes become victims of the 'American Dream'. Man's freedom of will, however, Miller affirms, makes him "More than the sum of his Stimuli and impedictable beyond a certain point." Consequently, if it is true that a man is what he is because of social forces such as class structure, politico-economic pressure, moral imperatives and family patterns, it is by no means less true that he can challenge them and try hopefully to fashion them anew. This dual relationship is metaphorically summed up thus"... a fish is partly made of the sea and the sea is partly made of fish and each flow through the other". Miller's protagonists and their surroundings are in close interaction with each other; both share the blame for the way things are. We believe that Arthur Miller deserves the title of 'social dramatist', apparently the only question is whether to call him a marxist or a humanist. The first label has had a certain currency. Some critics believe his work presents a socialist commentary on the economic structure of the United States. Joe Killer in All My Sons is such a creature of his circumstances that his business conduct does not strike him as in any sense reprehensible or wholly unethical. Willly Loman in Death of a Salesman expresses his disgust with the boxed in kind of existence to which he is condemned but his yearning for a different kind of world

is all too vague as is indicated by the fact of his hearing a melody and his consciousness conjuring up visions of 'grass and tree and the horizon'. Not many among those who suffer call in question the legal machinery in 'The Crucible'. Concludingly we can say that Arthur Miller's basic assumption is that the world is improvable. Despite his preoccupation with criticism of society in the plays of 1947 to 1955 period, he never allows his faith in common people to be shaken Miller blames those organs of society in which power resides. For him they are the society, they are the world. When, therefore, he directs his animus against society, or the system or the world, he is urging us to give a shake-up to be institutionalized authority, to the establishment, that is perhaps no more dramatist has experienced the immense change in dramatic situations Miller has, and no modern playwright or critic has been so concerned with the process of this change in the theatre experience. Miller has shown society in his plays which becomes vehicles for argumentation. Put in nonMarxian terms, their argument might be summarized as follows: to achieve dignity, to develop their talent and to avoid self-defeat, Miller tries to preach that individuals must acknowledge and adjust to their limitations rather than obsessively pursue egoistic ambitions. In Miller's critical writings, his style is marked by firmness, coherency and satiety. His style is penetrative, each para, each sentence gives his thoughts clarity, so that the very feelings become expressive, without ambiguity, so that a clear social message can be propagated. Miller, through his essays 'On Social Plays' has also argued that the complex nature of man and drama cannot be sacrificed to depict a man only as a psychological entity or a social entity on the stage but as a balanced concept between the two. It is this openness, frankness, and flexible argument that makes reading of Miller's criticism a liberating experience. REFERENCES: 1. Miller, Arthur, The Crucible, New York.: The Penguin Group, 1995.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Miller, Arthur , Death of a Salesman, Certain Private Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem, New York : Penguin Books. Corrigan, Robert W , A Collection of Critical Essays (Edited by Arthur Miller, Prentice Hall, New York, 1960). Lewis, Allen , American Plays and Playwrights of the Contemporary Theatre (New York Crown, 1995). Evans Richard I , Psychology and Arthur Miller (New York, 1969). Gascoigne, Bamber , Twentieth Century Drama (London 1962).