Quote 1
Keller: She thinks he's coming back, Chris. You marry that girl and you're pronouncing him dead. Now what's going to happen to Mother. Do you know? I don't. (1.208)
Joe needs Kate's support. In his effort to sustain a delicate situation, Joe tries to guilt Chris into protecting his mother.
Quote 2
Keller: It's crazy, but it comes to my mind. She don't hold nothin' against me, does she? (1.573)
With George calling from the prison where his father is held, Joe gets paranoid. Perhaps Ann has come to trap him too? A guilty conscience starts to dampen his good mood.
Quote 3
Keller: That's the way they do, George. A little man makes a mistake and they hang him by the thumbs; the big ones become ambassadors. (2.411)
Joe tries to deflect George's anger and blame by sympathizing with Steve.
Quote 4
Keller: I can afford another bag of potatoes. (1.238)
Keller threw the potatoes away because he thought they were garbage. This wastefulness provides an interesting contrast to his crime of saving machine parts (which actually were garbage) and selling them to the military.
Quote 5
Keller: Kid, walkin' down the street that day I was guilty as hell. Except I wasn't, and there was a court paper in my pocket to prove I wasn't, I and I walked… past… the porches. Result? Fourteen months later I had one of the best shops in the state again, a respected man again; bigger than ever. (1.446)
What matters to Keller is that he eventually restored his business to prosperity. Material success is the ultimate goal.
Quote 6
Keller: I don't know what you mean! You wanted money, so I made money. What must I be forgive? You wanted money, didn't you? (3.61)
Joe feels betrayed by Kate turning on him now. Like her neighbor Sue, she must have at some point encouraged him to make the family comfortable. Both Joe and Kate hide from their own responsibility in this matter.
Quote 7
Keller: Who worked for nothin' in that war?… It's dollars and cents, nickels and dimes; war and peace, it's nickels and dimes, what's clean? Half the Goddam country is gotta go if I go! (3.150)
Joe uses the dominant American ideology, capitalism, to excuse his actions.
Quote 8
Keller: How can I pay?
Mother: Tell him… you're willing to go to prison. (3.56)
Kate doesn't really suggest this because she believes Keller deserves it. Offering to go to prison is more like a gesture to Chris. She wants to hold on to at least one son.
Quote 9
Joe: So he takes out his tools and he… covers over the cracks. All right… that's bad, it's wrong, but that's what a little man does. If I could have gone in that day I'd a told him – junk 'em, Steve, we can afford it. (1.481)
This is the opposite of what really happened. When asked for advice, Joe directed Steve to cover the cracks. Now he lies to Ann and Chris with ease. Perhaps he's been telling this story for so long he's begun to believe it himself.
Quote 10
Keller: I want a clean start for you, Chris. I want a new sign over the plant – Christopher Keller, Incorporated.
Chris: [a little uneasily] J.O. Keller is good enough. (1.583-4)
Chris's deceit lies in his refusal to investigate his own suspicions. He won't accuse his father of wrongdoing, yet he doesn't want his name dragged into the business.
Quote 11
Keller: There are certain men in the world who rather see everybody hung before they'll take blame. You understand me, George? (2.430)
We want to scream: you're talking about yourself! You're talking about yourself!
Quote 12
Keller: I want him to know, Annie… while he's sitting there I want him to know that when he gets out he's got a place waitin' for him. It'll take his bitterness away. To know you got a place… it sweetens you. (2.158)
So what do you think: How much of this is Joe truly reaching out to his old colleague? How much of it is Joe covering his tracks?
Quote 13
Keller: You lay forty years into a business and they knock you out in five minutes, what could I do, let them take forty years, let them take my life away? (2.542)
Joe explains his position at length. He's really hoping Chris will come around, see things his way, say: "Yes, you did the right thing, Dad. Thanks for saving the business for me."
Quote 14
Keller: She's dreaming about him again. She's walking around at night. (1.162)
Keller is frustrated by his wife's stubborn refusal to accept the death of their son Larry.
Quote 15
Keller: Goddam, if Larry was alive he wouldn't act like this. He understood the way the world was made. He listened to me. To him the world had a forty-foot front, it ended at the building line. (3.77)
Joe's image of his dead son's worldview is about to be refuted, in a big way, by the reading of his suicide note.
Quote 16
Keller: I want you to spread out, Chris, I want you to use what I made for you… I mean, with joy, Chris, without shame… with joy. (1.585)
To be sympathetic to Joe's situation, we really have to get behind the idea that he did it all for his family.
Quote 17
Keller: You're in love now, Annie, but believe me, I'm older than you and I know – a daughter is a daughter, and a father is a father. (2.156)
Ann tries to reassure Joe that hate could never come between her and Chris. For Joe, family comes first. He's concerned that Ann will come to see things that way, too, under the influence of her father and brother.
Quote 18
Keller: And I don't understand why she has to crucify the man… A father is a father! (2.162-166)
Ann's ruthless judgment of her father strikes fears into Joe. What if, when they're married, Chris begins to feel the same way about him?
Quote 19
Keller: Chris… Chris, I did it for you, it was a chance and I took it for you. (2.546)
Joe's rationalization of this crime eventually makes it harder for Chris to condemn him. But in this moment, all Chris feels is shocked – and tainted by his father's deed.
Quote 20
Keller: I'm askin' you. What am I, a stranger? I thought I had a family here. What happened to my family? (3.45)
When the truth finally comes to light, Kate retreats from her usual busy mastery of the situation. Joe's left feeling alone, wondering why he made the sacrifices he did.