Arthur Miller

Arthur H. Miller

THE STORY: As Howard Taubman outlines the play: At the outset Quentin emerges, moves forward and seats himself on the edge of the stage and begins to talk, like a man confiding in a friend. In the background are key figures in his life, and they m

A Play

After the Fall

This Student Edition of After the Fall is perfect for students of literature and drama and offers an unrivalled and comprehensive guide to Miller's play. It features an extensive introduction by Brenda Murphy which includes a chronology of Miller's life and times, a summary of the plot and commentary on the characters, themes, language, context and production history of the play. Together with over twenty questions for further study and detailed notes on words and phrases from the text, this is the definitive edition of the play. After the Fall (1964) is embedded in historical events that were bound up with Arthur Miller's personal life. It is an intensely personal psychological study of its protagonist Quentin and a moral and philosophical commentary on the Holocaust, McCarthyism, and the career and death of Marilyn Monroe. The play marks the full realisation of Miller's modernist experimentation in trying to create a form that dramatises both human consciousness or subjectivity and its interrelationship with social and familial dynamics. A drama that takes place in the mind and thoughts of its protagonist, where memories are overshadowed by the Holocaust, the play is a moving study of human consciousness, morality and how we should live our lives once we have come to the realisation that we exist 'after the Fall'.

chloe rae

"The word 'now' is like a bomb through the window, and it ticks."

I started out completely LOVING this play. I was invested, I was intrigued, I had no idea what was going on and I didn't care. But then it just kind of all...fell apart. And I get that this statement is essentially a pun but I don't think that's quite what Arthur Miller was intending to happen when naming this play. 

From what I grasped, this whole play was just about our main character Quentin's failed marriage(s?) and ultimately, a self-reflection of his life. After some research, there's a lot of talk that this is a some-what autobiographical work of his marriage to Marilyn Monroe which is just INSANE. The character named Maggie was obviously supposed to be based on her and that was by far the worst relationship/part of the play. But also, once every character got more fleshed out, I realized I didn't like anyone? I liked the character Holga maybe a little and that's about it. And so much went right over my head, I feel like I'd have to read this again to completely understand everything. There was so much going on and being discussed: issues with his parents, communism, WW2, multiple poorly written women. Just an overall strange play that felt like it didn't have a purpose. I don't know what we're supposed to take away from Quentin's story. 

I will say, though, that some of his lines were down right stunning. The next time I read this I will have a pen at the ready.

Quentin is a successful lawyer in New York, but inside his head he is struggling with his own sense of guilt and the shadows of his past relationships. One of these an ill-fated marriage to the charming and beautiful Maggie, who went from operating a switchboard to become a self-destructive star - a singer everyone wanted a piece of. After the Fall is often seen as the most explicitly autobiographical of Arthur Miller's plays, and Maggie as an unflinching portrait of Miller's ex-wife Marilyn Monroe, only two years after her suicide. But in its psychological acuity and depth, and its brilliant, dreamlike structure, it is a literary, and not just biographical, masterpiece.

After the Fall A Play

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