The Price
Tags
Summary
Editor's review
Who it's for
A good fit for
- Serious literary readers interested in family ethics, human complexity, and intergenerational trauma
- Theater enthusiasts, especially professionals or students who wish to study Arthur Miller's mid-career representative work
- Readers who prefer profound social issues presented through taut dialogue and dramatic conflict
- Reflective readers at a crossroads in life, contemplating choice, responsibility, and cost
Not a good fit for
- Readers seeking light entertainment or fast-paced popular fiction
- Readers unfamiliar with or uncomfortable with play scripts who prefer traditional narrative fiction
Reading tips
- Begin by reading the play quickly from start to finish to absorb the dramatic conflict and character relationships, then reread key dialogue closely to savor the subtext and psychological motivation behind the lines.
- Read in conjunction with Arthur Miller's life and other works (such as Death of a Salesman) to understand his enduring creative themes.
- After reading, consider: what exactly are the characters trying to hold on to by paying the "price" in the play? And what have they lost?
About the publisher
Shanghai Translation Publishing House is a Chinese publisher oriented mainly toward translation and publishing. Its publications cover foreign literature, world classics and classic works, as well as social culture, folk literature and classical poetry. The database contains 2,618 titles, including Never Let Me Go, Les Misérables (2 volumes), Don Quixote (illustrated collector's edition), The Complete Comedies of Molière (4 volumes), The Complete Novels of Kafka (3 volumes), The Collected Works of Dostoevsky (9-volume set), Reason and Persons, and Oedipus Rex (Translation Classics). Its author resources include foreign writers such as Kazuo Ishiguro, Victor Hugo, Cervantes and Molière, as well as translators such as Zheng Kelu, Sun Jiameng, Li Jianwu and Zhang Kun. The publisher has brands such as "Translation Classics Selections" and "Translation Documentary," and emphasizes translated works in foreign literature and the humanities and social sciences, while also publishing bilingual dictionaries and foreign-language educational books. Public information is limited; the above is based on the book information in the database.
Contents
- 版权信息
- 导言 美国戏剧的良心：阿瑟·米勒
- 两幕剧
- 第一幕
- 第二幕
- 作者的演出说明
- 演员表
FAQ
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About the author
Arthur Miller (1915–2005) was an American playwright and one of the leading figures of twentieth-century American theater. His work combined social concern with a profound exploration of his characters' inner lives. His masterpiece Death of a Salesman won the Pulitzer Prize and the Tony Award, and plays such as The Crucible, All My Sons, and A View from the Bridge are also widely known. In 1956 he became famous for refusing to cooperate with the House Un-American Activities Committee; his second wife was Marilyn Monroe. The collection includes 16 of his works, spanning drama, autobiography, and essays, commonly categorized under foreign literature, folk literature, biography, and film.
Mai Xiwen is an author about whom limited public information is available. Two of her works are currently held in the collection: The Cost and Reading the Self and Others. Judging from their common categories, her writing spans foreign literature and prose miscellany, combining literary narrative with essayistic reflection. The titles of these two works suggest a concern with the付出 and cost involved in human relationships, and with the connection between the act of reading and self-understanding; her prose tends toward introspection and speculation. Because basic details such as dates of birth and death and nationality are not clearly recorded, her biographical background cannot yet be described in detail, and this introduction can only sketch a limited picture based on the works themselves and their classification. Readers who wish to learn more about her writing may begin with these two works and consider the ways of expression and the focal concerns they reveal in the fields of prose and foreign literature.
