How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Act.Line). Every time a character talks counts as one line, even if what they say turns into a long monologue.
Quote #1
Jim: I would love to help humanity on a Warner Brothers salary. (1.57)
Jim and Sue reflect, in their subplot, the same conflict between money and ideals that affects the Kellers.
Quote #2
Chris: Everything was being destroyed, se but it seemed to me that one new thing was made. A kind of… responsibility. Man for man. You understand me? – To show that, to bring that on to the earth again like some kind of monument and everyone would feel it standing there, behind him, and it would make a difference to him. (1.541)
Before Chris can give himself fully to Ann, he needs her to understand the conflict he feels between the idealism of the war and the practicality of daily life back home.
Quote #3
Sue: Chris makes people want to be better than it's possible to be. (2.67)
Sue is a resolute pragmatist. Chris inspires her husband to want to do research, when she just wants him to keep them comfortable at home by doing ore profitable work. She's hoping she can influence Ann to get Chris out of the picture so Jim will feel less conflicted.
Quote #4
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 #5
Mother: While you were getting mad about Fascism Frank was getting into her bed.
George: He won the war, Frank. (2.372-3)
Like Chris, George comes back disillusioned from the war. Faced with the banal reality of late '40s America, they can't understand what they were fighting for in the first place.
Quote #6
George: [to Ann] He simply told your father to kill pilots, and covered himself in bed! (2.485)
George seems to react more strongly to the betrayal of his father than to the original crime of shipping bad parts.
Quote #7
Chris: You killed them, you murdered them
Keller: How could I kill anybody? (2.533-4)
Joe can't identify himself as a murderer, and truly doesn't understand why Chris sees it this way.
Quote #8
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 #9
Chris: For me! I was dying every day and you were killing my boys and you did it for me? What the hell do you think I was thinking of, the Goddam business? Is that as far as your mind can see, the business? (2.557)
Chris's wider vision of humanity is informed by the war. In his earlier monologue with Ann, he confesses that he feels it draining out of him. In some ways, All My Sons is a sad coming-of-age story for Chris.