Death of a Salesman

By Arthur Miller

The Pulitzer Prize-winning tragedy of a salesman’s deferred American dream
 
Ever since it was first performed in 1949, Death of a Salesman has been recognized as a milestone of the American theater. In the person of Willy Loman, the aging, failing salesman who makes his living riding on a smile and a shoeshine, Arthur Miller redefined the tragic hero as a man whose dreams are at once insupportably vast and dangerously insubstantial. He has given us a figure whose name has become a symbol for a kind of majestic grandiosity—and a play that compresses epic extremes of humor and anguish, promise and loss, between the four walls of an American living room.

"By common consent, this is one of the finest dramas in the whole range of the American theater." —Brooks Atkinson, The New York Times

"So simple, central, and terrible that the run of playwrights would neither care nor dare to attempt it." —Time

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Release date: Oct 28, 1976
• ISBN: 9781101665022

Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller was born in New York City in 1915. After graduating from the University of Michigan, he began work with the Federal Theatre Project. His first Broadway hit was All My Sons, closely followed by Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and A View from the Bridge. His other writing includes Focus, a novel; The Misfits, first published as a short story, then as a cinema novel; In Russia, In the Country, Chinese Encounters (all in collaboration with his wife, photographer Inge Morath) and 'Salesman' in Beijing, non-fiction; and his autobiography, Timebends, published in 1987. Among his other plays are: Incident At Vichy, The Creation of the World and Other Business, The American Clock, The Last Yankee, and Resurrection Blues. His novella, Plain Girl, was published in 1995 and his second collection of short stories, Presence, in 2007. He died in February 2005 aged eighty-nine.

Book preview

PENGUIN PLAYS

DEATH OF A SALESMAN

ARTHUR MILLER (1915–2005) was born in New York City and studied at the University of Michigan. His plays include All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), A View from the Bridge and A Memory of Two Mondays (1955), After the Fall and Incident at Vichy (1964), The Price (1968), The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972), and The American Clock (1980). His other works include Focus, a novel (1945); The Misfits, a cinema novel (1961); and the texts for In Russia (1969), In the Country (1977), and Chinese Encounters (1979), three books in collaboration with his wife, photographer Inge Morath. His memoirs include Salesman in Beijing (1984) and Timebends, an autobiography (1987). His short fiction includes the collection I Don’t Need You Anymore (1967), the novella Homely Girl, A Life (1995), and Presence: Stories (2007). His later work includes the plays The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1993), Broken Glass (1994), and Mr. Peters’ Connections (1999); Echoes Down the Corridor: Collected Essays, 1944–2000; and On Politics and the Art of Acting (2001). Among numerous honors, he received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the John F. Kennedy Lifetime Achievement Award.

BY ARTHUR MILLER

PLAYS

The Golden Years

The Man Who Had All the Luck

All My Sons

Death of a Salesman

An Enemy of the People

The Crucible

A View from the Bridge

After the Fall

Incident at Vichy

The Price

The Creation of the World and Other Business

The Archbishop’s Ceiling

The American Clock

Playing for Time

The Ride Down Mt. Morgan

Broken Glass

Mr. Peters’ Connections

Resurrection Blues

Finishing the Picture

ONE-ACT PLAYS

A View from the Bridge (one-act version)

A Memory of Two Mondays

Fame

The Reason Why

Elegy for a Lady (in Two-Way Mirror)

Some Kind of Love Story (in Two-Way Mirror)

I Can’t Remember Anything (in Danger: Memory!)

Clara (in Danger: Memory!)

The Last Yankee

SCREENPLAYS

Playing for Time

Everybody Wins

The Crucible

The Misfits

MUSICAL

Up from Paradise

AUTOBIOGRAPHY

Timebends

REPORTAGE

Situation Normal

In Russia (with Inge Morath)

In the Country (with Inge Morath)

Chinese Encounters (with Inge Morath)

Salesman in Beijing

FICTION

Focus (a novel)

Jane’s Blanket (a children’s story)

The Misfits (a cinema novel)

I Don’t Need You Any More (stories)

Homely Girl, A Life (a novella and stories)

Presence: Stories

COLLECTIONS

Arthur Miller’s Collected Plays, Volumes I and II

The Portable Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller: Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Tony Kushner, editor)

Arthur Miller: Collected Plays 1964–1982 (Tony Kushner, editor)

Arthur Miller: Collected Plays 1987–2004 with Stage and Radio Plays of the 1930s and 40s (Tony Kushner, editor)

ESSAYS

The Theater Essays of Arthur Miller (Robert A. Martin, editor)

Echoes Down the Corridor: Collected Essays, 1944–2000 (Steven R. Centola, editor)

On Politics and the Art of Acting

VIKING CRITICAL LIBRARY EDITIONS

Death of a Salesman (Gerald Weales, editor)

The Crucible (Gerald Weales, editor)

PENGUIN BOOKS

An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

375 Hudson Street

New York, New York 10014

penguinrandomhouse.com

First published by Viking Penguin, Inc., 1949

Viking Compass Edition published 1958

Reprinted 1958 (twice), 1959 (three times), 1960 (four times), 1961 (three times), 1962 (three times), 1963 (three times), 1964 (three times), 1965 (twice), 1966 (four times), 1967 (four times), 1968 (four times), 1969 (five times), 1970 (five times), 1971 (three times), 1972 (three times), 1973 (twice), 1975 (three times)

Published in Penguin Books 1976

Copyright © Arthur Miller, 1949

Copyright renewed Arthur Miller, 1977

Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

eISBN 978-1-101-66502-2

CAUTION: Professionals and amateurs are hereby warned that performance of this drama is subject to a royalty. It is fully protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America, Canada, United Kingdom and the rest of the British Commonwealth, and of all countries covered by the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artist Works, the Pan-American Copyright Conventions, the Universal Copyright Convention, and of all countries with which the United States has reciprocal copyright relations. All rights, including but not limited to professional and amateur stage rights, motion picture, recitation, lecturing, public reading, television and radio broadcasting, video and sound recording, and the rights of translation into foreign languages are strictly reserved. Particular emphasis is placed upon the matter of readings, permission for which must be secured in writing. Inquiries should be addressed to ICM Partners, 730 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10019.

Cover design by Jim Tierney

Version_2

Contents

Cover

About the Author

Also by Arthur Miller

Title Page

Copyright

A Note on the Text

DEATH OF A SALESMAN

Characters

Act One

Act Two

Requeim

A Note on the Text

The text in this volume is the version preferred by Arthur Miller and should be considered the authoritative text.

Characters

WILLY LOMAN

LINDA

BIFF

HAPPY

BERNARD

THE WOMAN

CHARLEY

UNCLE BEN

HOWARD WAGNER

JENNY

STANLEY

MISS FORSYTHE

LETTA

The action takes place in Willy Loman’s house and yard and in various places he visits in the New York and Boston of today.

ACT ONE

A melody is heard, played upon a flute. It is small and fine, telling of grass and trees and the horizon. The curtain rises.

Before us is the Salesman’s house. We are aware of towering, angular shapes behind it, surrounding it on all sides. Only the blue light of the sky falls upon the house and forestage; the surrounding area shows an angry glow of orange. As more light appears, we see a solid vault of apartment houses around the small, fragile-seeming home. An air of the dream clings to the place, a dream rising out of reality. The kitchen at center seems actual enough, for there is a kitchen table with three chairs, and a refrigerator. But no other fixtures are seen. At the back of the kitchen there is a draped entrance, which leads to the living-room. To the right of the kitchen, on a level raised two feet, is a bedroom furnished only with a brass bedstead and a straight chair. On a shelf over the bed a silver athletic trophy stands. A window opens on to the apartment house at the side.

Behind the kitchen, on a level raised six and a half feet, is the boys’ bedroom, at present barely visible. Two beds are dimly seen, and at the back of the room a dormer window. (This bedroom is above the unseen living-room.) At the left a stairway curves up to it from the kitchen.

The entire setting is wholly or, in some places, partially transparent. The roof-line of the house is one-dimensional; under and over it we see the apartment buildings. Before the house lies an apron, curving beyond the forestage into the orchestra. This forward area serves as the back yard as well as the locale of all Willy’s imaginings and of his city scenes. Whenever the action is in the present the actors observe the imaginary wall-lines, entering the house only through its door at the left. But in the scenes of the past these boundaries are broken, and characters enter or leave a room by stepping through a wall on to the forestage.

From the right, Willy Loman, the Salesman, enters, carrying two large sample cases. The flute plays on. He hears but is not aware of it. He is past sixty years of age, dressed quietly. Even as he crosses the stage to the doorway of the house, his exhaustion is apparent. He unlocks the door, comes into the kitchen, and thankfully lets his burden down, feeling the soreness of his palms. A word-sigh escapes his lips—it might be Oh, boy, oh, boy. He closes the door, then carries his cases out into the living-room, through the draped kitchen doorway. Linda, his wife, has stirred in her bed at the right. She gets out and puts on a robe, listening. Most often jovial, she has developed an iron repression of her exceptions to Willy’s behavior—she more than loves him, she admires him, as though his mercurial nature, his temper, his massive dreams and little cruelties, served her only as sharp reminders of the turbulent longings within him, longings which she shares but lacks the temperament to utter and follow to their end.

LINDA, hearing Willy outside the bedroom, calls with some trepidation: Willy!

WILLY: It’s all right. I came back.

LINDA: Why? What happened? Slight pause. Did something happen, Willy?

WILLY: No, nothing happened.

LINDA: You didn’t smash the car, did you?

WILLY, with casual irritation: I said nothing happened. Didn’t you hear me?

LINDA: Don’t you feel well?

WILLY: I’m tired to the death. The flute has faded away. He sits on the bed beside her, a little numb. I couldn’t make it. I just couldn’t make it, Linda.

LINDA, very carefully, delicately: Where were you all day? You look terrible.

WILLY: I got as far as a little above Yonkers. I stopped for a cup of coffee. Maybe it was the coffee.

LINDA: What?

WILLY, after a pause: I suddenly couldn’t drive any more. The car kept going off on to

Reviews for Death of a Salesman

[Mirana la Reina Blanca · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It has a classic narrative.
It is a smooth read, with intrepid characters and a traveler who will undoubtedly leave you speechless.
It has a very good plot twist.
And it can be read in one sitting.
Very good and recommended. (Translated from Spanish)