The Last Yankee by Arthur Miller
This is an excerpt from the paper...
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 hi
. . .
ay and possible recovery. They are bedrock, aspiring not to greatness but to other gratifications--successful parenthood, decent children and a decent house and a decent car and an occasional nice evening with family or friends, and above all, of course, some financial security (Miller 92).
This description applies to both couples, though in different ways. Leroy Hamilton does swing a hammer each day, and his wife is waiting for her ship to come in. Mr. Frick does not swing a hammer but is an entrepreneur who works at that every day, and his wife feels that she has been denied her own ship as he pursues his.
Frick is the sort of businessman who admires money but has no respect for all the little people whose work makes it possible. He is always ready to criticize the ambitions of others while elevating his own to the position of something inevitable, as if he deserved all he could get. This is apparent when he says he admires Leroy's attitude and differentiates it from what he sees all around him:
Everybody's got the gimmes, it's destroying the country. Had a man in a few weeks ago to put in a new showerhead. Nothing to it. Screw off the old one and screw on the new one. Seventeen dollars an hour! (Miller 17).
Frick
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
Arthur Miller, Alexander Hamilton, Leroy Hamilton, Instead Leroy, Karen Patricia, Dream Frick, American Dream, Indeed Frick, Leroy Yankee, leroy hamilton, american dream, Frick Leroy, arthur miller, understand wife, day wife, frick leroy, women treated, alexander hamilton, swing hammer, world karen,
Approximate Word count = 1320
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)
More Essays on The Last Yankee by Arthur Miller
|
Customer Service
to Over
32,000 Professionally Written Papers!!!
