Death of a Salesman: Certain Private Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem ~ Paperback ~ Arthur Miller

Willy Loman, the protagonist of "Death of a Salesman," has spent his life following the American way, living out his belief in salesmanship as a way to reinvent himself. But somehow the riches and respect he covets have eluded him. At age 63, he searches for the moment his life took a wrong turn, the moment of betrayal that undermined his relationship with his wife and destroyed his relationship with Biff, the son in whom he invested his faith. Willy lives in a fragile world of elaborate excuses and daydreams, conflating past and present in a desperate attempt to make sense of himself and of a world that once promised so much.Author BiographyArthur 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"(1963), "Incident at Vichy"(1964), "The Price"(1968), "The Creation of the World and Other Business"(1972) and"The American Clock"(1980). He also wrote two novels, "Focus"(1945), and"The Misfits," which was filmed in 1960, and the text for"In Russia"(1969), "Chinese Encounters"(1979), and"In the Country"(1977), three books of photographs by his wife, Inge Morath. His later work included a memoir, "Timebends"(1987); the plays"The Ride Down Mt. Morgan"(1991), "The Last Yankee"(1993), "Broken Glass"(1994), and"Mr. Peter's Connections"(1999);"Echoes Down the Corridor: Collected Essays, 1944 2000"; and"On Politics and the Art of Acting"(2001). He twice won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, and in 1949 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Miller was the recipient of the National Book Foundation s 2001 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, the Prince of Asturias Award for Letters in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003. Christopher Bigsbyis a professor of American Studies at the University of East Anglia. He edited the Penguin Classics editions of Miller's"The Crucible," "Death of a Salesman," and"All My Sons.""