The loss of identity and purpose is perfectly captured with the character Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s play “The Death of a Salesman”. Arthur Miller was known for his literary works revolving around sad topics such as regrets,desperation, and death. All themes are present in “The Death of a Salesman” as it is laced with the somber topic of suicide and madness. The main character Willy has been a salesman for his whole life, but he is losing his mind to Alzheimer's all while his sons are visiting and thus bring past events into light. His madness weighs heavily on his whole family and his perspective and misguided values in life is imprinted on his sons. Willy is suicidal whether it is due to his shortcomings or madness one thing remains fact …show more content…
Willy recounts the events vividly, due to his madness, that question his morality and worth. His two sons, Biff and Happy, both in their 30’s, mirror their father’s split persona. Biff is filled with regrets and low self esteem, while Happy is overloaded with idealistic beliefs which causes him to exaggerate and lie. Biff is the most close to the downfall of Willy than anyone else. Although Willy believes he has taught Biff “the way to be successful,... he did nothing but rationalize and condone harmful activities.”(Feinberg) Willy does not fully realize the harm he has done to his family. However, through his confusion between reality and illusion, he revisits his mistakes, Biff had a chance to rebuild a future, but after he caught his father having an affair Biff rejected the opportunities out of spite. Because of this Willy subconsciously blames himself for his son’s failed career and life overall. It weighs down on Willy and causes him to be defensive on the littlest of doubts presented on his and his son’s character. Willy is proven to be desperate to be “well liked”, prideful, yet disappointed in himself. Ultimately, this affects his family’s philosophy and output in society. Linda becomes defensive when it comes to judgement against Willy, Happy tries to compensate of living in his brother’s shadow with women and extravagant lies, and Biff becomes a kleptomaniac “bum”. Willy knows he has lead a both an unsuccessful personal and professional life and thus leading him to be sucked in his madness and suicidal
One problem Willy has is that he does not take responsibility for his actions; this problem only gets worse because of his lies. Biff looks up to Willy, so when he finds out that Willy has an affair in Boston, Biff is petrified. Biff realizes his hero, dad, the one he wants to impress, is a phony and a liar. Willy destroys Biff's dream of playing football by saying he does not have to study for the math regents, he also Willy telling Bernard to give Biff the answers. When Biff fails the regents, he does not want to retake the test because he is so disgusted with his hero and does not want to succeed. Not only did Willy destroy Biff's dream, he also broke his vows and refused to admit it. Biff is a failure, in Willy's eye, in most part due to Willy and what happened in Boston. Willy refuses to take responsibility for what he did, so he lies about Biff. Willy tells Bernard that Biff has been doing great things out west, but decided to come back home to work on a "big deal". Willy knows that Biff is a bum who has not amounted to anything, but he refuses to take responsibility for what happened in Boston, so he changes the story of Biff's success. Throughout Willy's life he continued to lie. It might have stopped if Linda did not act the way as she did. Linda is afraid to confront Willy, so she goes along with his outlandish lies.
In the book Death of A Salesman, author Arthur Miller shows how cruel life can be through the life of Willy Loman, the main character. His feelings of guilt, failure, and sadness result in his demise.
The play, “Death of a Salesman” written by Arthur Miller, presents Willy Loman, as a salesman, who fails to earn a living and slowly loses his mind. Willy continuously seeks the past to find out where he went wrong. During his years in life, Willy wanted his two sons, Biff and Happy to become someone they’re not; Willy wanted them to become a salesman like him. However, because of his obsession in the American Dream of easy success and wealth, he created a life full of lies for himself and his sons. In the end because of “his misconception of himself as someone capable of greatness” leads to his downfall and the end of his life (Death of a Salesman).”
Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman”, primarily focuses on the flaws and failures of Willy Loman, Millers’ main character in this story. Willy’s distorted and backward views of the American Dream, paired with his inability to let go of the past lead him down a road of regret and in the end his biggest failure which was his wasted life.
Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman follows protagonist Willy Loman in his search to better his and his family’s lives. Throughout Willy Loman’s career, his mind starts to wear down, causing predicaments between his wife, two sons and close friends. Willy’s descent into insanity is slowly but surely is taking its toll on him, his job and his family. They cannot understand why the man they have trusted for support all these years is suddenly losing his mind. Along with his slope into insanity, Willy’s actions become more aggressive and odd as the play goes on. Despite Willy and Biff’s “family feud”, his two sons Happy and Biff truly worry about their father’s transformation, Happy saying: “He just wants you to make good, that’s all. I wanted to talk to you about dad for a long time, Biff. Something’s – happening to him. He – talks to himself” (Miller 21). Willy, as a father, cares about his children but he wishes they would do better. He believes Biff should have been an athlete. According to Harrington, “Even figuratively, Willy is haunted, and particularly in Biff’s failure to achieve success as a sports figure” (108). This haunting is part of what led to Willy’s slow plunge into madness. As Willy’s career in sales fails, he also fails, even failing his family. Heyen adds: “He didn’t have anything of real value to give to his family, or if he did, he didn’t know what it was” (48). His debilitating flashbacks and delusional hallucinations with Uncle Ben cement his horrifying realizations that he has let down his family. Willy Loman blames the economy for his downfall in his career. In one of his more extreme outbursts he exclaims, “There’s more people! That’s what’s ruining this country! Population is getting out of control. ...
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman tells the story of a man trying and failing to obtain success for him and his family. Willy Loman, a traveling salesman, has been trying to ‘make it big’ for the majority of his life. Miller’s play explores the themes of abandonment and betrayal and their effects on life’s success. Willy sees himself as being abandoned by his older brother, Ben, and constantly views his sibling’s betrayal as one that changed his prospects forever. Willy, in turn, is guilty of a different type of abandonment and betrayal of his sons, especially Biff.
Like countless characters in a play, Willy struggles to find who he is. Willy’s expectations for his sons and The Woman become too high for him to handle. Under the pressure to succeed in business, the appearance of things is always more important than the reality, including Willy’s death. The internal and external conflicts aid in developing the character Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman.
“Death of a Salesman” written by Arthur Miller in 1948 attempts to give the audience an unusual glimpse into the mind of Willy Loman, a mercurial 60-year-old salesman, who through his endeavor to be “worth something”, finds himself struggling to endure the competitive capitalist world in which he is engulfed. Arthur Miller uses various theatrical techniques to gradually strip the protagonist down one layer at a time, each layer revealing another truth about his distorted past. By doing this, Miller succeeds in finally exposing a reasonable justification for Willy’s current state of mind. These techniques are essential to the play, as it is only through this development that Willy can realistically be driven to motives of suicide. The very first section of the first scene, already defines the basis of Willy’s character for the rest of the play.
In the play, The Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller,Willy Loman, an unsuccessful business man struggling to support his family is completely out of touch with reality throughout the plot line. Many characters throughout this play and their interactions with Willy have showed the audience his true colors and what he thinks is important in life. His constant lying and overwhelming ego certainly does not portray his life in factual terms, but rather in the false reality that he has convinced himself he lives in.
As a teenager Biff idolized his father, but their relationship changed after Biff discovered that Willy was cheating on Linda. Biff realizes that Willy is not the man he presented himself to be, and as a result Biff is left without a role model. Because of this realization, Biff gives up on his dreams and drifts from one job to the next, never progressing in any aspect of his life. This causes conflict between Biff and Willy. Biff has failed in the business world and has accepted his failure as his own fault. However Willy fears that Biff blames him for his failure. Willy’s adulterous ways left Biff without a role model, so he feels responsible for his son’s failure. Willy’s guilt is apparent when he tells Biff, “when you’re rotting somewhere beside the railroad tracks, remember, and don’t blame me!”(130). Willy denies his guilt, because he sees himself as the cause of Biff’s failure, meaning that he himself failed as a father. By denying his guilt Willy hopes that Biff will not realize Willy’s fault and hate him for it. And that is Willy’s greatest fear: Willy’s ultimate desire in life is to be well loved, he already knows Biff dislikes him for being unfaithful, and he lives in fear that his son’s dislike will grow into
Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman is the story of a man much like Miller's father, a salesman, "whose misguided notions of success result in disillusionment" (Draper 2360). The suppression of the main character, Willy Loman's, true nature is a result of his pursuit of a completely misguided dream. The fraudulent and miserable existence this generates is accentuated by the father-son relationship he shares with his son Biff.
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller concerns itself with the fall of a simple man perpetually in a steadfast state regarding his own failure in a success-driven society. The protagonist of the play, Willy Loman, will follow a tragic trajectory that will eventually lead to his suicide. Arthur Miller's tragic play is an accurate portrayal of the typical American myth that sustains an extreme craving for success and a belief in the illusion of the American dream, a dream attainable only by a handful of people. Having chosen a career in sales Willy Loman constantly aspires to become 'great'. Nevertheless, Willy is a poor aging salesman that considers himself to be a failure when comparing himself to his successful father and brother, but he is incapable of consciously admitting it. Consequently, Willy will measure his level of success with the level of success attained by his offspring, particularly his eldest son Biff. Their difficult relationship contribute to the play's main plot. Willy unfolds his deluded perception and recollection of the events as the audience gradually witnesses the tragic downfall of a man shadowed by a mental illness that has already began to take it's toll on his mind and personality.
Arthur Miller's, "Death of a Salesman," shows the development and structure that leads up to the suicide of a tragic hero, Willy Loman. The author describes how an American dreamer can lose his self-worth by many negative situations that occur throughout his life. The structure and complications are essential because it describes how a man can lose his way when depression takes over.
His distorted perceptions of the American Dream ultimately ruined his life and the lives of his family. Sadly, Willy definitely failed as a father. He obviously favored his eldest son Biff over his youngest son Happy, and this constant neglect drove Happy to become more like his older brother as an adult in order to win his father’s approval. We can see this through his philandering behavior, something Biff was known for in high school, the golden years. Biff, on the other hand, had it worse because his father sold him lies about his importance in the business industry, which forced Biff to admire Willy and strive to be like him one day. Willy’s consistent stroking of Biff’s ego misled Biff into thinking that he could get away with anything simply because he was “popular” and “well-liked”. However, when Biff accidentally stumbles upon his father’s adultery, his world crashes in on itself as he loses his sense of identity. He quotes, “I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been” (Act II). Willy wasn’t much better with his “friends”. He hated Charley for being more affluent than him and expressed this anger when he bullies Charley over a game of cards. Charley only tolerates Willy because he pities his fate. And attempting to use his “personality” to get a job from his boss’s son Howard only gets Willy
Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman is a story about the dark side of the "American Dream". Willy Loman's obsession with the dream directly causes his failure in life, which, in turn, leads to his eventual suicide. The pursuit of the dream also destroys the lives of Willy's family, as well. Through the Lomans, Arthur Miller attempts to create a typical American family of the time, and, in doing so, the reader can relate to the crises that the family is faced with and realize that everyone has problems.