The Ride Down Mount Morgan (Penguin Plays) [Paperback]

Arthur Miller (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1992

When Lyman Felt--a poet-turned-insurance-tycoon--crashes his car in upstate New York, his excessive lifestyle begins to catch up with him as his two wives show up to take care of him in the hospital, in a full-length play by one of America's great playwrights.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

To double his pleasure, Lyman Felt has procured two wives, but when they find out about each other, he incurs double the wrath. Miller's play about the feelings of a lying man delve into the harder questions about human relationships, pitching love and truth to one's self at the expense of love and truth to another. As Felt comes to terms with the two families he has ruined, he must find redemption while being true to his larger-than-life self-perception. L.A. Theatre Works performs this amusing and even endearing play in front of a live audience with acclaimed actor Brian Cox lambasting his way through scenes as Felt repudiating and embracing his two angered lovers. Cox's voice, like Felt's personality, dominates nearly every scene, which benefits the production since he is the epicenter of humor, thought and enlightenment. The acoustics of the performance hall provides crisp and resonating voices of the cast while moderately capturing the audience. The ambience of it all harkens to the old days of radio shows like Orson Welles's Mercury Theatre on the Air, but with sound quality far superior than any antenna could provide. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

From Library Journal

In reading Miller's most recent work, one cannot escape the echoes of the author's Pulitzer Prize-winning Death of a Salesman (1949). Both plays present time and space as free-flowing entities, leading the audience/reader through the action with the disjointed logic of memories and hallucinations spliced onto reality. Similarly, at the heart of each play is a man in midlife crisis, a man who has betrayed women, a man whose children are devastated by the revelation of their father's true character. While Willy Loman was a failure, however, Lyman Felt is a successful businessman. And so, while Willy was haunted by Ben and lost opportunity, Lyman is stalked by the specter of death and guilt in the form of his father. Ironically, Miller's latest hero is in trouble because he is too opportunistic. His crime is that he refuses to say "no" to himself, regardless of whom he destroys along the way. That, according to Miller, appears to be the tragedy of the 1990s. Or was that the 1980s? For most drama collections.
- Dianne Greene Mahony, Harvey Sch., Katonah, N.Y.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (September 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140482369
• ISBN-13: 978-0140482362
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,676,477 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Arthur Miller (1915-2005) was born in New York City in 1915 and studied at the University of Michigan. He was awarded the Avery Hopwood Award for Playwrighting at University of Michigan in 1936. He twice won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, received two Emmy awards and three Tony Awards for his plays, as well as a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement. He also won an Obie award, a BBC Best Play Award, the George Foster Peabody Award, a Gold Medal for Drama from the National Institute of Arts and Letters, the Literary Lion Award from the New York Public Library, the John F. Kennedy Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Algur Meadows Award. He received honorary degrees from Oxford University and Harvard University and was awarded the Prix Moliere of the French theatre, the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Lifetime Achievement Award and the Pulitzer Prize, as well as numerous other awards. He was named the Jefferson Lecturer for the National Endowment for the Humanities in 2001. He was awarded the 2002 Prince of Asturias Award for Letters and the 2003 Jerusalem Prize.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A splendid ride indeed, June 21, 2000

By 

Janet Hinkle - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (Plays, Penguin) (Paperback)

In Arthur Miller's splendid play, the main character Lyman Felt concludes that if you try to live according to your real desires, you have to end up looking like a s---. That's his explanation for never divorcing his first wife before marrying another. It's when his car crashes traveling down a snow covered Mt. Morgan that his double life is exposed. His two wives meet and the issues of fidelity, true love, deception and honesty are explored. Can a person remain true to himself and still always true to another? Arthur Miller poses wonderful food for thought in this witty, poignant masterpiece.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I know Willy Loman, and Lyman Felt . . ., December 27, 2000

By 

Robert Stribley (NY, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (Plays, Penguin) (Paperback)

The Ride Down Mt. Morgan is an engaging play, one that provides the reader (or viewer) with as much food for thought, as amusement. Is it a masterpiece? No. Not by any stretch. Death of a Salesman is a masterpiece.

Lyman Felt is certainly a colorful character from whom we can learn much, not just about bigamists, but also about ourselves. He is not, however, a Willy Loman, a character so strongly defined that he's entrenched in the American (if not the world's) psyche. Felt effectively represents and helps us to understand (if not forgive) a specific type of man; Loman effectively represents the sometimes overwhelming frustrations any of us endures in pursuit of the elusive American dream.

Miller does succeed in The Ride Down Mt. Morgan by prompting us to consider what might motivate a man who constructs an elaborate network of lies in an attempt to keep two wives. In his own mind, Felt is justifiably keeping both women happy and (again, in his own mind) he loves them both so much, he couldn't stand to let either one go. For some time, he is quite successful in living these two lives.

After surviving an accident (or was it an accident?), however, both women arrive at the hospital to take care of him. Now that the deception is uncovered, the real damage unfurls; both wives know they can't trust him; both feel they were never truly loved; both are forced to make swift decisions, none of which are surprising or irrational given the circumstances. Although Felt is charming enough to win our affection, we still come away believing he pretty much gets what he deserves. I might be wrong. Maybe Felt does represent us all. Sure, few of us are bigamists; but maybe Felt really represents the very damaging, but human desire we all have to have your cake and eat it, too.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Happiness and Loneliness, August 26, 2005

By 

JMack (Chicago) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

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This review is from: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (Plays, Penguin) (Paperback)

In a number of ways, "The Ride Down Mt. Morgan" parallels "Death of a Salesman". Both plays include a man searching for something in the present with flashblacks spliced into the scenes. The greatest difference between the plays is that many people can identify with Willy Loman from "Death of a Salesman. It is harder to identify with Lyman Felt and his bigamy.

Lyman wants to find happiness and discover himself. After one successful marriage, he begins an affair that leads to a pregnancy. Rather than taking a more logical route, Lyman chooses to marry a second wife. He leads the second wife to believe that he divorced the first wife. Nine years later, a car accident on Mt. Morgan leads the two wives to meet at the hospital. It is there that Lyman explores his motivation for bigamy and the guilt for the pain he has caused. Ultimately, Lyman discovers his true self in loneliness. He is left to himself and the mess he created.

"The Ride Down Mt. Morgan" seems a bizarre premise for Miller to explore. The reader must wonder if bigamy is a more narrow divorce for Miller to explore extra-marrital affairs. While this aspect of the storyline seems distant, it is hard not to feel the emotion in this tale of love lost.