It’s difficult to imagine the legend Arthur Miller as anything other than an intellectual playwright with biting social commentary. We all have to start somewhere, however, and Miller wasn't always one of the great American writers. He was once a gawky teenager trying to earn money for college.
Miller grew up in a wealthy family, but after the stock market crash of 1929, he found himself thrust into the working class. In order to achieve his career goals, Miller worked several different jobs before and after university. But all of them gave him experience to one day write about the true meaning of success and failure in the life of the everyday man.
First Jobs
Miller's father had shown him how to be a successful businessman with his clothing manufacturing company. But when the Great Depression hit, the Miller family lost almost everything and was never able to rebuild their wealth. Arthur Miller had not taken school seriously until it was time to prepare for college, and he realized that he would need to work to pay for all his expenses.
While still in high school, Miller worked as a delivery boy for a bakery, helped in his father's business, and drove a delivery van for an auto-parts store. After high school, Miller found several other jobs, including a radio singer, truck driver, and worker at a box factory. But the job that he would remain at long enough to earn the $500 needed for college tuition was a clerk for an auto-parts warehouse.
Preliminary Writing Jobs
When Miller started at the University of Michigan, he wanted to study journalism. He got a job as a reporter and editor for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily. While in school, Miller wrote his first play, No Villain, which, after winning an award, had him reconsider his career. He switched from journalism to English.
After graduating in 1938, Miller worked for the Federal Theater Project, writing and reading radio plays. The FTP was shut down one year later due to government fears of Communism, and Miller went to work at the Brooklyn Navy Yard during World War II. He was exempt from fighting in the war because of an injury sustained in high school. While working at the Navy Yard, Miller continued writing radio scripts, some of which were produced by CBS and NBC.
Inspirations for Miller's Plays
The Great Depression and its effects on not just the economy but the psychology of the working man were huge inspirations for several of Miller's plays. His diverse experiences in all of his jobs also played a big role in how he wrote. A Memory of Two Mondays (1955) was based on Miller's co-workers at the auto-parts warehouse and their struggles to make a living during the Depression.
While working with his father to try to open a new clothing factory, Miller witnessed the poor treatment of the salesmen there. This led to his short story In Memoriam, which he would later turn into his most famous play, Death of a Salesman (1949). His many odd jobs opened his eyes to a different world than the well-to-do one he knew growing up, and prepared him to write some of the greatest and most relatable American tragedies to date.