Arthur Miller

“Lahr’s cogent analyses [in Arthur Miller] are revelatory but not surgical, and his sympathy never cloys. He does what a good literary biographer must do: He does not reduce the work to the life, but shows how it explains the life from which it emerges. He is an investigative reporter, a profiler of personality, mind and character, and a critic who understands drama on the page and in the house.”—Willard Spiegelman, Wall Street Journal

“His plays, although rooted in the personal as John Lahr establishes, can still disclose truths about the political world that might otherwise be denied.”—John Stokes, Times Literary Supplement

Named by the New Yorker as a Best Book of 2022

“It is a tapestry rich with personal as well as public detail, but it also makes irrefutable the argument (sometimes opposed) that Miller’s Jewishness was foundational to his writing.”—John Nathan, Jewish Chronicle

“New Yorker critic Lahr shines in this searching account of the life of playwright Arthur Miller. . . . It’s a great introduction to a giant of American letters.”—Publishers Weekly

“An engaging summary of a celebrated and checkered career.”—Kirkus Reviews

“In this succinct and gorgeously written portrait, the former New Yorker drama critic and award-winning biographer of Tennessee Williams offers a keen psychological appraisal of Miller’s works, and of Miller himself.”—Julia Klein, Boston Globe

“John Lahr’s slender, sharp biography offers an engaging account of the playwright’s life, beginning with his New York childhood. Lahr also provides a penetrating interpretation of Arthur Miller’s canonical works.”—Christian Science Monitor, “November’s 10 Best Books”

“Beautifully written. . . . Lahr’s latest book is the achievement of a fine and mature scholar, and the volume has the interpretive sensitivity, scholarly scruple, narrative energy, and cultural depth to make it one of the major coordinates in Miller studies.”—Matthew Roudané, Tennessee Williams Annual Review

“In this instructive, well-wrought interpretative biography, Lahr illuminates the enduring contributions Miller made to cultural affairs, at home and abroad. This insightful, accessible presentation will captivate Miller scholars and novices alike.”—H. I. Einsohn, Choice

“With this admirably brief book, Mr. Lahr, a prominent theater critic, delivers a no-filler biography that still leaves room for his keen critical insights.”—Kurt Wenzel, East Hampton Star



“No one writes about playwrights and the theater the way John Lahr does. In this probing, brilliantly insightful, and also deeply readable and entertaining book, he offers unique insight into how Miller’s mind works, and how the details of his biography impacted his body of work.”—Sarah Ruhl, MacArthur Prize–winning playwright

“Lahr lets us see the great American playwright with new eyes. After his highly acclaimed Tennessee Williams biography, Lahr scores a second smash hit with Arthur Miller. No one writes more perceptively about the twentieth-century theater than John Lahr.”—John Guare, playwright, Six Degrees of Separation

“A superbly written, impeccably researched biography from the great John Lahr. The close relationship between Miller and his plays is detailed and sympathetic. A classic book about a classic American playwright.”—André Bishop, artistic director, Lincoln Center Theater

“In Arthur Miller, the great critic and biographer John Lahr has found a perfect subject: complex, gifted, a man of his times. This is biography-as-collaboration, and utterly captivating.”—Hilton Als, Pulitzer Prize–winning essayist and author