www.100xuexi.com 圣才电子书 十万种考研考证电子书、题库视频学习平台
第23单元 阿瑟?米勒
23.1 复习笔记
I. Introduction to author（作者简介） 1. Life（生平）
Arthur Miller (1915—2005) was a great dramatist to come out of the 1940s. He was born in New York. He grew up in the Depression and witnessed his father’s business failure. In the mid-1930s he studies journalism at Michigan University and began to write plays and radio scripts. His first play, The Man Who Had All the Luck, was produced in 1944, and his first important work, All My Sons, did a good deal in fostering his reputation as an Ibsenian playwright. The staging of Death of a Salesman, won him the Tony Award and the Pulitzer Prize, and established him
once and for all as a writer of no small talent. In 1965 he was elected the first American president of the international P. E. N. Arthur Miller has some connection with China. He visited China in 1978 and again in 1983 to help stage his masterpiece in the country. The play enjoyed a good deal of popularity.
阿瑟·米勒(1915—2005)是40年代出现的伟大剧作家。他出生于纽约市，成长于经济大萧条时期。他目睹了父亲生意上的失败。30年代中期他就读于密西根大学，并开始写剧本和广播剧脚本。第一个剧作《鸿运高照的人》创作于1944年。他的第一个意义重大的剧
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www.100xuexi.com 圣才电子书 十万种考研考证电子书、题库视频学习平台 作，《全是我的儿子》为其赢得“易卜生式剧作家”的美名。《推销员之死》公演后，为其赢得了托尼奖和普利策奖，并坚定了其戏剧界天才作家的地位。1965年他当选为国际笔会的首任美国主席。阿瑟·米勒是中国人民的朋友。他曾在1978年访问中国，1983年他又亲自到中国指导话剧《推销员之死》，该剧在中国大获成功。
2. Major Themes（主要主题）
A typical theme of Arthur Miller concerns the dilemma of modern man in relation to his family and work. What occurs often in a Miller play is that the hero finds himself under a pressure from his society and its ethics, tries in vain to extricate himself from the physical and spiritual quandary into which he has fallen and finds release only in death, often in the form of actual or virtual suicide. The world is harsh. There is little or no choice for the hero. Either he submits to the impossible demands of society, or he rejects them. He dies in either case. Miller is, however, not completely pessimistic. Reading his plays, one feels a faith in man and in life, however vague it may be, though very often gloom overweighs hope.
阿瑟·米勒作品典型的主题是现代人在家庭与工作方面的困境。在他的剧作中，主人公经常处于社会及其道德规范的压力之下。他陷入了精神及物质上的困境，他竭力摆脱却发现一切只是徒劳，真实或精神上的自杀，才能使之解脱。主人公别无选择，对于社会的需求，他要么服从要么拒绝，两种情况下都是死亡。然而，米勒并不完全是悲观的。虽然他的剧本中阴郁多过希冀，但是我们能感受到一种对人类、对生活的信念，尽管这种信念可能不太明确。
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www.100xuexi.com 3. Major Works（主要作品）
圣才电子书 十万种考研考证电子书、题库视频学习平台 The Man Who Had All the Luck (1940) 《鸿运高照的人》 All My Sons (1947) 《全是我的儿子》 Death of a Salesman (1949) 《推销员之死》 The Crucible (1953) 《炼狱》
A View from the Bridge (1955) 《桥头眺望》 After the Fall (1964) 《堕落之后》 Incident at Vicky (1964) 《创世纪及其他》 The Price (1968) 《代价》
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972) 《维希事件》 The Archbishop’s Ceiling (1977) 《大主教的天花板》 The Last Yankee (1991) 《最后一个美国佬》 Broken Glass (1994) 《破碎的镜子》
Ⅱ. Selected works（选读作品） ◆Death of a Salesman《推销员之死》
It is a story about a 63-year-old salesman, Willy Loman, who suddenly realizes that he is an incompetent husband and father after many-year traveling around doing business. He himself has very great dreams and he pins great hope on his two sons. However, he is getting old and has no chance to realize his own dreams anymore and his sons also let him see no bright future at all. He gets desperate and commits suicide in the end, which indicates that Willy’s American Dream is
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www.100xuexi.com shattered.
圣才电子书 十万种考研考证电子书、题库视频学习平台 这是一个关于一位63岁的推销员威利的故事。在四处奔波了许多年后，他忽然认识到自己是一个不称职的丈夫和父亲。他有自己的梦想，并对两个儿子寄予厚望。然而，他日益衰老，没有了实现梦想的机会，而在两个儿子身上也无法看到美好的未来。他绝望了，最后自杀，宣告了其美国梦的破灭。
23.2 课后习题详解
1. Is Willy Loman tragic or pathetic? Is this play a tragedy in the classical sense of the word? Does it make any difference if this play is not a tragedy? Key: In my opinion, Willy Loman is pathetic, but he is a tragic hero.
This play is not a tragedy in the sense of the word.
If this play is not a tragedy, it will not convey so much meaningful reflections of the then society. And we cannot read out the shattered American Dream from it, which has been a general cause of people’s tragedy in America.
2. What is the function of the intermingling of present and past, and of illusion and reality in the play?
Key: We can get a better understanding of the story and the characters’ mental states through the intermingling of present and past, and of illusion and reality. It makes the play more complete and more real.
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www.100xuexi.com 圣才电子书 十万种考研考证电子书、题库视频学习平台 3. We do not know what Willy sells in the play and we do not know if the insurance money will be paid to his family. Why does the playwright leave these uncertainties for us?
Key: It gives us space to think about it. Through the whole play, we easily get the sense of upset and depression, so, the writer makes an open ending, we can make our own choice of the ending as we like. If we feel depressed by it, we can make our own relatively positive ending, that is, the family gets their insurance. We will feel much better then.
23.3 考研真题与典型题详解
I. Fill in the blanks.
1. First produced in 1949, Arthur Miller’s _____ struck an immediate, emotional chord with audiences. Much of its success is attributed to Miller’s facility in portraying the universal hopes and fears of middle-class America. Through his main character, _____, Miller examines the myth of the American Dream and the shallow promise of happiness through material wealth. (天津外国语2011研) 【答案】Death of a Salesman；Willy
【解析】《推销员之死》是米勒的代表作。作品通过一位美国梦的典型追求者推销员威利，展示了美国社会中的各种矛盾，宣告了美国中产阶级郊区牧歌的完结。
2. Death of a Salesman is written by _____.
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陶洁《美国文学选读》笔记和课后习题(含考研真题)详解(阿瑟 米勒)【圣才出品】
