Bigamy in Miller's the Ride Down Mt. Morgan  Article excerpt  In
Plato's Symposium Aristophanes explains Love by supposing that
"the primeval man was round, his back and sides forming a
circle; and he had four hands and four feet, one head with two
faces"--and was subsequently cleaved in two by the jealous gods
(Plato, The Symposium, trans. Benjamin Jowett, The Portable
Plato, ed. Scott Buchanan,[N.Y.: Viking, 1948,]: 144). After the
division, the two parts of this being, each desiring the other
half, came together, and threw their arms about one another,
eager to grow into one. Plato's idea is appealing because it
explains the phenomenon of sexual attraction. The myth suggests
that love is the union of two people, and only two. The Ride
Down Mt. Morgan runs counter to this dominant idea in Western
thought.  Miller's play is a moral fable--part comedy, part
tragedy--with some sensual elements. Lyman is in the insurance
business, and bigamy for him is a kind of insurance. As the main
beneficiary of the arrange