In his play The Last Yankee, Arthur Miller presents two marriages under strain because of differing needs and perceptions by the husbands and wives who once thought they shared everything and who now believe they share less and less all the time. New feelings have emerged to replace the feelings of love that began these marriages, and these new feelings include anger, resentment, anxiety, self-doubt, and disgust. The couples might survive if each member could learn to forgive his or her spouse, but instead, each person is too taken up with a need for self-justification and self-preservation at the expense of his or her spouse.
The story is set in a state-run mental hospital, and three women are being treated there for clinical depression. Patricia is married to Leroy Hamilton, a carpenter, and she believes he is a failure because he does not have the necessary ambition to achieve anything in this competitive world. Karen is married to Mr. Frick, and he is highly successful, quite the opposite of Leroy Hamilton. Indeed, Mr. Frick is a driven man, a type-A personality who owns businesses that dominate the local economy and make him an important man in the business world of the area. Both Karen and Patricia, however, see themselves as failures, in part because of their husbands--Patricia would be a success if she were married to a success, and Karen would be a success if her husband allowed her to be one instead of centering all ambition and all desire in himself and his career. The third woman is hiding from life and is disappointed at everything she has ever tried. It is the two married couples who are central to the play, however.
The two women are treated as their husbands wait outside, one being patient and the other anxious and more interested in being somewhere else to get back to his business. The wives are seeking to understand their own anxieties, while the husbands are part of the cause. Miller connects thes...