Top 100 Arthur Miller Quotes From His Work, Life, And Friends

Being an American playwright, Arthur Miller has been famously known for his popular plays, 'The Crucible,' 'All My Sons,' 'Death Of A Salesman,' and 'View From The Bridge.'

Other than this, he also has worked on many screenplays. The most noted work for screenplays by Miller is 'The Misfits.'

Born on October 17, 1915, Miller started his writing in 1935. Although the Miller family was rich, the Wall Street Crash of 1929 made them lose everything and they had to move to Brooklyn from Manhattan.

It is fascinating that the reason behind writing 'The Crucible' was Miller's fascination for the witch trials. He took the Red Scare of the 1950s and the Salem witch trials of the 1690s and perceived parallels between the two.

His writing style blends movements and dramatic style giving the right balance to both a single personality as well as the whole society.

If you like these quotes, you can also check out Gertrude Stein quotes and Tennessee Williams quotes

Best Quotes By Arthur Miller

Dive in to read these amazing insightful quotes about Arthur Miller.

1. "It is rare for people to be asked the question which puts them squarely in front of themselves."

- Arthur Miller.

2. "I cannot write anything that I understand too well."

- Arthur Miller.

3. "The jungle is dark but full of diamonds."

- Arthur Miller.

4. "I saw clearly only when I saw with love."

- Arthur Miller.

5. "Tragedy enlightens — and it must, in that it points the heroic finger at the enemy of man's freedom."

- Arthur Miller.

6. "Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets."

- Arthur Miller.

7. "Until an hour before the Devil fell, God thought him beautiful in Heaven."

- Arthur Miller.

8. "The best work that anybody ever writes is the work that is on the verge of embarrassing him, always."

- Arthur Miller.

9. "After all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive."

- Arthur Miller.

10. "The two most common elements in the world are hydrogen and stupidity."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller 'The Crucible' Quotes

Read the best American play 'The Crucible' quotes in this section.

11. "I may think of you softly from time to time. But I'll cut off my hand before I ever reach for you again."

- Arthur Miller.

12. "Take it to heart. There are many others who stay away from church these days because you hardly ever mention God anymore."

- Arthur Miller.

13. "I'll plead no more! I see now your spirit twists around the single error of my life, and I will never tear it free!"

- Arthur Miller.

14. "Now hell and heaven grapple on our backs and all our old pretense is ripped away. Aye, and God's icy wind will blow."

- Arthur Miller.

15. "A fire, a fire is burning! I hear the boot of Lucifer, I see his filthy face! And it is my face, and yours, Danforth!"

- Arthur Miller.

16. "There are wheels within wheels in this village, and fires within fires!"

- Arthur Miller.

17. "A  child's spirit is like a child, you cannot catch it by running after it; you must stand still, and, for love, it will soon itself come back."

- Arthur Miller.

18. "An everlasting funeral marches round your heart."

- Arthur Miller.

19. "A person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road between."

- Arthur Miller.

20. "You're pulling heaven down, and raising up a whore!"

- Arthur Miller.

21. "Who weeps for these, weeps for corruption!"

- Arthur Miller.

22. "I counted myself so plain, so poorly made, no honest love could come to me! Suspicion kissed you when I did; I never knew how I should say my love. It were a cold house I kept!"

- Arthur Miller.

23. "We burn a hot fire here; it melts down all concealment."

- Arthur Miller.

24. "Theology, sir, is a fortress; no crack in a fortress may be accounted small."

- Arthur Miller.

25. "We cannot look to superstition in this. The Devil is precise; the marks of his presence are definite as stone."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller 'Death Of A Salesman' Quotes

Read the quotes from the best play 'Death of A Salesman' here.

26. "Why must everybody like you?"

- Arthur Miller.

27. "Personality always wins the day."

- Arthur Miller.

28. "I simply asked him if he was making any money. Is that a criticism?"

- Arthur Miller.

29. "You cut your life down for spite!"

- Arthur Miller.

30. "Be loving to him. Because he’s only a little boat looking for a harbor."

- Arthur Miller.

31. "Nothing's planted, I don't have a thing in the ground."

- Arthur Miller.

32. "You can't eat the orange and throw the peel away — a man is not a piece of fruit."

- Arthur Miller.

33. "A small man can be just as exhausted as a great man."

- Arthur Miller.

34. "I've always made a point of not wasting my life, and every time I come back here I know that all I've done is to waste my life."

- Arthur Miller.

35. "Everybody likes a kidder, but nobody lends him money."

- Arthur Miller.

36. "He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine."

- Arthur Miller.

37. "Never fight fair with a stranger, boy. You'll never get out of the jungle that way."

- Arthur Miller.

38. "A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory."

- Arthur Miller.

39. "He's not the finest character that ever lived. But he's a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller 'All My Sons' Quotes

Read amazing quotes from the play 'All My Sons' here.

40. "I don't read the news part anymore. It's more interesting in the want ads."

- Arthur Miller.

41. "They knew he was a liar the first time, but in the appeal, they believed that rotten lie."

- Arthur Miller.

42. "I think to him they were all my sons. And I guess they were."

- Arthur Miller.

43. "Money-money-money-money. You say it long enough it doesn't mean anything."

- Arthur Miller.

44. "What could I do... let them take my life away?"

- Arthur Miller.

45. "If November 25th was his favorable day, then it's completely possible he's alive."

- Arthur Miller.

46. "Little of everything. Pressure cookers, an assembly for washing machines."

- Arthur Miller.

47. "He hasn't been laid up in fifteen years."

- Arthur Miller.

48. "Don't you have a country? Don't you live in the world?"

- Arthur Miller.

49. "We all come back... These private little revolutions always die. The compromise is always made."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller Quotes About Learning

The life of the playwright Miller has been full of learning. Read the quotes below to learn some wisdom.

50. "A man is not a bird, to come and go with the springtime."

- Arthur Miller.

51. "The task of the real intellectual consists of analyzing illusions in order to discover their causes."

- Arthur Miller.

52. "The mission of the theater, after all, is to change, to raise the consciousness of people to their human possibilities."

- Arthur Miller.

53. "If you believe that life is worth living then your belief will create the fact."    

- Arthur Miller.

54. "The theater is so endlessly fascinating because it's so accidental. It's so much like life."

- Arthur Miller.

55. "If I see an ending, I can work backward."

- Arthur Miller.

56. "The apple cannot be stuck back on the Tree of Knowledge; once we begin to see, we are doomed and challenged to seek the strength to see more, not less."

- Arthur Miller.

57. "You specialize in something until one day you find it is specializing in you."

- Arthur Miller.

58. "The job is to ask questions — it always was — and to ask them as inexorably as I can. And to face the absence of precise answers with a certain humility."

- Arthur Miller.

59. "It's the proper morning to fly into Hell."

- Arthur Miller.

60. "A play is made by sensing how the forces in life simulate ignorance — you set free the concealed irony, the deadly joke."

- Arthur Miller.

61. "If only for this reason I regard the theater as a serious business, one that makes or should make man more human, which is to say, less alone."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller Quotes About Corrupt Authority

Read about corrupt authority and more from Arthur Miller here.

62. "I have made more friends for American culture than the State Department. Certainly, I have made fewer enemies, but that isn't very difficult."

- Arthur Miller.

63. "An era can be said to end when its basic illusions are exhausted."

- Arthur Miller.

64. "Without alienation, there can be no politics."

- Arthur Miller.

65. "Officials wept; they were speechless after the play, and everyone knew why. It was because they had to enforce the kind of repression the play was attacking. "

- Arthur Miller.

66. "A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself."

- Arthur Miller.

Arthur Miller Famous Quotes

Read Arthur Miller adversity quotes and more in this section.

67. "The structure of a play is always the story of how the birds came home to roost."

- Arthur Miller.

68. "A play is made by sensing how the forces in life simulate ignorance — you set free the concealed irony, the deadly joke."

- Arthur Miller.

69. "The possibility of victory must be there in tragedy."

- Arthur Miller.

70. "More important, from this total questioning of what has previously been unquestioned, we learn."

- Arthur Miller.

71. "In this age few tragedies are written."

- Arthur Miller.

72. "I am bewildered by the death of love. And my responsibility for it."

- Arthur Miller.

73. "There is a misconception of tragedy - the idea that tragedy is of necessity allied to pessimism."

- Arthur Miller.

74. "I think it's a mistake to ever look for hope outside of one's self."

- Arthur Miller.

75. "Just remember, kid, you can quicker get back a million dollars that was stolen than a word that you gave away."

- Arthur Miller.

76. "If I have to be alone I want to be by myself."

- Arthur Miller.

77. "I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been."

- Arthur Miller.

78. "Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets."

- Arthur Miller.

Some More Quotes From Arthur Miller

You can read some amazing quotes here by Arthur Miller.

79. "It is my art. I am better at it than I ever was. And I will do it as long as I can."

- Arthur Miller.

80. "A playwright is the litmus paper of the arts."

- Arthur Miller.

81. "I'm the end of the line; absurd and appalling as it may seem, serious New York theater has died in my lifetime."

- Arthur Miller.

82. "A suicide kills two people, Maggi. That's what it's for!"

- Arthur Miller.

83. "We are only what we always were."

- Arthur Miller.

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

- Arthur Miller.

85. "The main thing today is—shopping.  You're unhappy?  Can't figure it out?  What is the salvation?  Go shopping."

- Arthur Miller.

86. "Because most people ain't people."

- Arthur Miller.

87. "Can anyone remember love? It's like trying to summon up the smell of roses in a cellar. You might see a rose, but never the perfume."

- Arthur Miller.

88. "Don’t be seduced into thinking that that which does not make a profit is without value."

- Arthur Miller.

89. "Everything we are is at every moment alive in us."

- Arthur Miller.

90. "Sometimes… it’s better for a man just to walk away. But if you can’t walk away? I guess that’s when it’s tough."

- Arthur Miller.

91. "I don’t know why it is, but every time I reach out for something I want, I have to pull back because other people will suffer."

- Arthur Miller.

92. "The political landscape changes, the issues change, but the people are still there. People don’t really change that much."

- Arthur Miller.

93. "You don’t realize how people can hate, they can hate so much they’ll tear the world to pieces."

- Arthur Miller.

94. "The job is to ask questions — it always was — and to ask them as inexorably as I can. And to face the absence of precise answers with a certain humility."

- Arthur Miller.

95. "I cannot sleep for dreaming; I cannot dream but I wake and walk about the house as though I'd find you coming through some door."

- Arthur Miller.

96. "When you reach a certain age you can slough off what is unnecessary and concentrate on what is. And why not?"

- Arthur Miller.

97. "The thrust for freedom is the quality in tragedy which exalts."

- Arthur Miller.

98. "If I know what something means to me, if I have already come to the end of it as an experience, I can't write it because it seems a twice-told tale."

- Arthur Miller.

99. "The revolutionary questioning of the stable environment is what terrifies."

- Arthur Miller.

100. "There are certain men in the world who rather see everybody hung before they’ll take blame."

- Arthur Miller.

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