Last week, Arthur Miller, the dramatist who wrote plays that dealt with big moral and political questions in America, died. The legendary playwright, who continued his commitment to art and politics until the end of his life, was 89.
There are many indicators that show that Venezuela is in the vanguard of the class struggle internationally, one of them is the phenomenon of occupied factories run under workers' control. Throughout history it has always been the case that workers' control has been raised as a demand during periods of intense class struggle, but workers' control under capitalism can either move forward towards the complete expropriation of the capitalists or it slips back and can be reabsorbed into less threatening forms of workers' “participation” and so on.
Phil Mitchinson reviews a new book Remembering Arthur Miller and interviews one of the contributors, the well known director David Thacker who worked with the American playwright on numerous occasions and was the artistic director of the famous Young Vic theatre in London. Miller's courageous stand against McCarthyism is well known but perhaps less generally recognised is how important an influence politics in general played in his life and writings.
