Character Analysis (AQA A-Level English Literature A): Revision Notes
Character analysis
Understanding the characters in All My Sons is essential for analysing Arthur Miller's exploration of guilt, responsibility and the American Dream. Each character represents different moral positions and responses to wartime profiteering and its consequences. This note examines the major and supporting characters, highlighting their key traits, motivations and relationships.
Character analysis is crucial for understanding how Miller uses individual characters to represent broader themes about post-war American society, moral responsibility, and the consequences of prioritising profit over ethics.
Major characters
Joe Keller
Joe Keller embodies the figure of the ruthless American businessman whose priorities centre solely on financial success and family security. Lacking formal education and refinement, he represents a type of entrepreneur who prioritises profit above ethical considerations. His business ambitions for his son have driven him to accumulate substantial wealth, but this success comes at a devastating moral cost.
Joe's character is defined by his moral blindness. He permitted the shipment of faulty cylinder heads for military aircraft during the war, a decision that resulted in the deaths of 21 pilots. Rather than accepting responsibility, he allowed his business partner Steve Deever to take sole blame and imprisonment for their joint crime. This choice enabled Joe to maintain his profitable business whilst avoiding punishment.
Although a jury acquitted Joe at trial, accepting his version of events, doubt persists within his community. Neighbours continue to question his innocence, and gossip follows him. The play reveals Joe's fundamental weakness: when confronted with the truth of his actions, he must finally face the reality of his guilt and its consequences. Miller presents Joe as someone who compartmentalises morality, believing he acted to support his family whilst refusing to acknowledge the broader human cost.
Key characteristics:
- Focuses exclusively on money and business success
- Lacks ethical conscience and moral reasoning
- Shifts responsibility to others for his actions
- Prioritises family loyalty over wider social responsibility
- Lives with unacknowledged guilt
Kate Keller
Referred to as 'Mother' throughout the play, Kate functions as a controlling, maternal presence whose influence extends throughout the household. She demonstrates cleverness and observational skills, quickly assessing situations and adapting her responses to maintain control. Miller describes her as possessing 'a woman of uncontrolled inspirations, and an overwhelming capacity for love', suggesting both her emotional intensity and her manipulative tendencies.
Kate's defining characteristic is her refusal to accept reality, particularly regarding her son Larry's death. Three years after his disappearance during the war, she clings to the hope that he remains alive, despite the absence of any evidence. This denial serves a dual purpose: it protects her from grief whilst also preventing the truth about her husband's guilt from emerging fully.
Her avoidance of reality connects directly to her husband's crime. If she were to acknowledge Larry's death, she would have to confront the possibility that Joe's actions contributed to it. This would also clear the way for Chris and Ann to marry, which Kate opposes. She can be harsh, particularly toward Ann, showing a different face depending on whether she addresses someone directly or speaks about them behind their back.
Key characteristics:
- Exercises control over people and situations
- Refuses to face uncomfortable truths
- Demonstrates both love and manipulative behaviour
- Lives in denial about her son's death and husband's guilt
- Shows different personas publicly and privately
Chris Keller
Chris represents idealism and moral consciousness in the play. Returning from the war, he faces the burden of being the surviving son and the reluctant heir to his father's business. Unlike Joe, Chris possesses little interest in the manufacturing company but feels obligated to assume his expected role. The weight of family expectations conflicts with his own values and desires.
His wartime experiences have shaped his moral outlook profoundly. He wishes to marry Ann Deever, his late brother's former girlfriend, and build a life based on different principles than those his father followed. However, Chris faces uncertainty about the future, knowing that many in the community still blame Joe for the wartime crime.
Chris experiences deep internal conflict. He loves his father but suspects the truth about Joe's guilt. He wants to move forward with Ann but feels trapped by family loyalty and his mother's denial about Larry. Miller presents Chris as someone caught between generations and value systems, struggling to reconcile his conscience with his family obligations.
Key characteristics:
- Possesses strong moral convictions and idealism
- Feels troubled by his father's business ethics
- Bears the responsibility for the family's future
- Struggles between family loyalty and personal morality
- Desires to marry Ann and create an independent life
Ann Deever
Ann represents clarity and moral certainty in contrast to the Kellers' denial and compromise. Having witnessed her father's conviction for the wartime crime, she has refused to forgive him or maintain contact, even ceasing prison visits. Her position is unambiguous: her father committed a terrible crime and must face the consequences.
Before Larry's disappearance, Ann was his girlfriend, but she harbours no illusions about his survival. She has moved forward with her life, leaving the Midwest to work in New York, where she has acquired sophistication and self-assurance. Her appearance reflects this transformation: she dresses well and carries herself with confidence.
Ann's character serves a crucial dramatic function. She possesses knowledge about Larry's death that she keeps hidden until the opportune moment. Her relationship with Chris is genuine, and his morality and conscience align with her own values. She waits strategically to reveal what she knows, understanding that timing matters when confronting denial and guilt.
Key characteristics:
- Maintains firm moral principles
- Has completely cut ties with her guilty father
- Possesses self-assurance and sophistication
- Knows the truth about Larry's fate
- Chooses carefully when to reveal crucial information
Supporting characters
George Deever
George is 31 years old and, like his sister Ann, abandoned their father Steve following his conviction and imprisonment. For years, George believed his father deserved punishment for shipping the defective parts. However, after visiting Steve in prison for the first time and hearing his father's account, George becomes convinced that Steve was made a scapegoat whilst Joe Keller escaped justice.
This revelation transforms George's understanding of events. He confronts the Keller family, initially determined to expose the truth and defend his father's reputation. However, the Kellers prove skilled at manipulation and distraction. When definitive proof finally emerges confirming Steve's version of events, George makes the significant decision to leave, abandoning Joe and Kate to face the consequences of their actions alone.
Key characteristics:
- Initially believed his father was guilty
- Changes his view after hearing Steve's testimony
- Confronts the Kellers about the truth
- Ultimately walks away from the situation
Dr Jim Bayliss
Jim Bayliss embodies the tragedy of abandoned dreams and compromised ideals. He aspired to pursue medical research rather than establish a private medical practice, but financial pressures and family obligations forced him down a different path. His wife and children depend on his income, leaving him unable to follow his true calling.
Jim experiences resentment toward his daily work. He dislikes treating patients with minor complaints who expect him to be constantly available. This frustration stems partly from knowing he could be contributing more meaningfully to society through research. He feels guilty on two fronts: first, for benefiting from his wife's support through medical school, and second, for not pursuing work that would benefit humanity more broadly.
Despite his compromises, Jim maintains a sense of social responsibility that extends beyond immediate personal concerns. Miller presents him as someone who understands that obligations exist beyond individual and family needs, though circumstances have prevented him from living according to these values.
Key characteristics:
- Sacrificed his research ambitions for financial security
- Feels trapped by family financial obligations
- Experiences guilt about not contributing to the greater good
- Maintains awareness of broader social responsibilities
- Resents the limitations of his current work
Sue Bayliss
Sue provides a stark contrast to her husband's idealism and social conscience. She constantly pressures Jim to earn more money, driven by materialistic desires and concerns about financial status. She views Chris Keller's idealistic perspectives as depressing influences on Jim, believing they contribute to his dissatisfaction with his lucrative practice.
Sue is forthright and outspoken, never hesitating to express her opinions. She urges Jim to commit fully to his practice and remain available for patient calls, dismissing his belief that patients often seek attention rather than medical treatment. Her pragmatic, materialistic worldview leads her to suggest that Ann Deever should leave town, fearing Chris's influence on Jim will continue if Ann remains nearby.
Key characteristics:
- Prioritises financial gain above other values
- Dismisses idealistic viewpoints as impractical
- Openly expresses her opinions without restraint
- Pressures her husband to focus on earning money
- Takes action to remove influences she perceives as threatening
Character relationships and conflicts
The characters in All My Sons form a web of interconnected relationships marked by loyalty, betrayal, denial and moral conflict. The central tension exists between those who know or suspect the truth about Joe's wartime crime and those who choose denial. Kate and Joe maintain their version of reality through mutual support, whilst Chris struggles with loyalty to his father versus his own conscience. Ann and George represent the Deever family's contrasting response to their father's imprisonment, initially united in condemnation but diverging when George begins to question the official narrative.
Exam tip
When writing about character in All My Sons, always connect character traits and motivations to the play's broader themes of responsibility, guilt and the American Dream. Use specific quotations to support your analysis, and consider how Miller uses characters to represent different moral positions in post-war American society.
Key Points to Remember:
- Joe Keller embodies moral blindness and the corruption of the American Dream through his prioritisation of profit over ethics and his refusal to accept responsibility for his wartime crime.
- Kate Keller lives in denial about both Larry's death and Joe's guilt, using her maternal influence to control the family and maintain a false reality.
- Chris Keller represents idealism and moral conscience, struggling between family loyalty and his own ethical principles whilst bearing the burden of being the surviving son.
- Ann Deever serves as a voice of moral clarity who refuses to forgive her father's crime and strategically reveals the truth about Larry at the crucial moment.
- The supporting characters (George, Jim and Sue Bayliss) represent different responses to moral compromise and social responsibility, enriching the play's exploration of ethics in post-war America.