Arthur Miller dies

Yes, a great writer and a great man...a rare combination.

Yeah, a great shame, but what he left behind was worth the ride. I played the part of Willy Loman in 'Death Of A Salesman' when I was studying drama and I also had a part in 'The Crucible'. They are two very powerful plays.

Death of a salesman is a cracker. 89 is not a bad age to get to...

A great man. (Not many passed the test of the un-American activities trials.) "A View from the Bridge", "The Crucible", and "The Archbishop's Ceiling" are awesome in performance. "All My Sons" moved me on the radio. I feel a great loss; for me, he represented, above all, conscience in writing. ". . . to seek cause and effect, hard actions, facts, the geometry of relationships, and to hold back any tendency to express an idea in itself unless it was literally forced out of a character's mouth; in other words, to let wonder rise up like a mist, a gas, a vapour from the gradual and remorseless crush of factual and psychological conflict." (Timebends.)

I was astounded to learn that he was only 89. He has always been this 'elder statesman' figure who struck me as being in his 70s during the Kennedy administration. We read his plays in high school, which had mixed results. At the time, I thought they were boring; however, he was somewhat out of fashion in the late sixties and plays are meant to be seen not read. Nowadays I can appreciate his writing much better than I could so many years ago.