Dreams in Death of a Salesman. In this essay I’m going to consider Arthur Miller’s perception of dreams, particularly the American Dream. Arthur Miller's play "Death of a Salesman" is a detailed review on the capitalist American society of the 1940s and also on human psychology and how much materialistic success means to us. He uses the misfortunes of a salesman named Willy Loman to illustrate this. Miller introduces the Loman family in a depressing mood (dim lighting is used and shows a house that has "towering, angular shapes" surrounding it and with little furniture). This immediately gives the audience a glum feeling about the play. The Loman family is a very stereotypical American family, with the father, Willy, working all day, a loving mother, Linda, and two children, Biff and Happy. As the play develops however, we learn more and more about the real tragedy of the family. Willy believes in the American dream. It was very influential in the American society of the 1940s and still is to some people, today. But only a few people have benefited from it. The American dream is based on the idea that as long as someone works hard, they will achieve great success no matter what their sex, age, nationality is. As the audience learn about the Loman family's poor financial situation, it becomes clear that Willy is a victim of the American dream. Willy's failure in leading a rich or even just a comfortable life is very apparent. He complains about his work and struggles to pay his bills. He is also frequently shown in a state of depression, he cannot concentrate when driving; he is still working at his old age and is struggling to bring in a steady income. His unstable mind makes him contradict himself in th... ... middle of paper ... ...fridge fails. Arthur Miller seems to see her, not Ben, as the real hero of the play. This is reflected in the gentle respect he gives to her in his writing. This play is a strong message against the principle of the "American Dream". Willy Loman is constantly striving to achieve the dream, but drives himself crazy. Biff seems to be the only character in the Loman family that is able to set himself aside from this dream, wanting only to be happy - his own man. Although I believe dreams to be an important, if not essential part of life, I also believe that contentment is far more important. If you cannot be happy with what you have, you cannot possibly hope to be happy with what you wish for. Willy Loman dreams of becoming a great man, dreams of the great man he was and dreams of the great man Biff can be, he just fails to realise that they are great men.
“BIFF [crying, broken]: Will you let me go for Christ’s sake? Will you take that phony dream and burn it before something happens?” By saying this Biff tries to address his family on the giant rift between Willy’s dreams for him and reality. He tries to explain that all he wants is for Willy to let go of those dreams and high standards he has set for him so he can create his own reality rather than fulfill his father's dream. Willy's dreams for Biff were very unrealistic for the reality of his situation,which caused him to fill unsuccessful and push himself away from his father. The reason Willy wanted his children to do so well and had such big dreams for them was because he wasn't able to achieve the dream and had a fear he had failed and so he wanted to force his dream to be fulfilled by his children. Therefore, due to Willy’s wildly unrealistic amount of pride, causing him to make poor decisions, betray his family by having a mistress and finally his unrealistic dreams for his sons, he paved his way towards his failure and his deep fear of isolation and
support is a pathetic effort to protect his identity. Linda will never admit to herself,
As time grows, a spouse becomes a soul mate, best friend, and lover all in one. No one will ever show their dedication and love for you like your significant other and that’s what Arthur Miller addresses in the play Death of a Salesman. Linda Loman is the wife of Willy Loman, a man that treats her wrong but she still stands by his side. Linda is a vital character because she never has a low personality, she chooses her husband over her children she’s strong when her husband passes away and she the voice of the playwright.
Biff never kept a steady job during his young adult life, and did not possess a healthy relationship with anyone that was in his life. As the play progresses the reader sees how much Biff becomes more self- aware. An online source states, “Unlike the other members of his family, Biff grows to recognize that he and his family members consistently deceive themselves, and he fights to escape the vicious cycles of lies.” When Biff returns home it becomes a struggle to keep a healthy relationship with his parents. Once Willy and Biff decide together that Biff will go and ask Bill Oliver for a loan is when the differences between the two characters are truly seen. Biff accepts reality for the first time in his life, and realizes how ridiculous it is to ask Bill Oliver for a loan, when he barely knows the man and worked for him about ten years ago. When Biff meets up with Willy after the ‘meeting’ Biff is talking to his Father and says, “Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!” This quote reveals that Biff recently has just experienced an epiphany, and realizes that what he was doing was making no sense. Biff is escaping the self- deception he was caught in with the rest of his
BANG! Your father is dead. Within a few seconds, although he attempted many times, your father dies. He gave up. All the fights, all the disrespect, and all the struggles are behind you. However, all the hope, all the passion, and all the love is still there. In Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, the main conflict is between Willy Lowman and his son Biff. Most of their struggles are based on disrespect; however, much of the tension throughout the play is also caused by the act of giving up.
Happy Loman has grown up to be a well-adjusted man of society. He has developed from a follower to a potentially successful businessman. Throughout his childhood, Happy always had to settle for second fiddle. Willy, his father, always seems to focus all his attention on Happy's older brother Biff. The household conversation would constantly be about how Biff is going to be a phenomenal football star, how Biff will be attending the University of Virginia and be the big man on campus, how Biff is so adulated among his friends and peers, and so on. Young Happy was always in Biff's shadow, always competing for his father's attention but failing each time. Happy would resort to such antics as laying on his back and pedaling his feet backwards to capture his father's attention but to no avail. Willy would continue to not take notice of his younger son and maintain his attention on other matters that he thought were of greater importance. Growing up under these conditions is what motivated Happy to be the man he is today.
fake later in life, Biff tries over and over again to reach his father and to
To have a fulfilling life, one must have a dream. However, with the wrong dream, even a fulfilling life is not a happy one. For example in the play, Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller, the protagonist, Willy Loman, dreams of becoming a respected and successful salesman. However, Willy Loman dreams the wrong dream and as a result its leads to his tragic demise. This is evident through Willy’s dream being unrealistic, Biff's troubles due to Willy instilling his dream into him, Willy's pride resulting from his dream, and the illusion that Willy’s dream creates. As a result, the fabricated life that Willy thought was perfect, ultimately falls apart as it turns into reality.
Through a series of events, Biff gradually comes to a realization of what is necessary for success. First, we are shown a part of his childhood where Biff is told that "the man who makes an appearance in the business world, the man who creates personal interest, is the man who gets ahead." This idea appears in direct contrast to Bernard, one of Biff's childhood friends, who works and studies hard. Biff decides that Bernard will not succeed because he is "only liked, not well-liked," and being well-liked is the cornerstone of success. Nonetheless, later in the play we see that Bernard has become very successful, underscoring one of the messages in the play, that success is not just a result of popularity. Second, we are shown a scene in Boston soon after Biff has just failed math for the year. He discovers his "heroic" father having an affair. Biff comes to the painful realization that his father's values, his views, and everything that Biff had made the foundation of his life, are all completely "fake" and "phony." Unfortunately, he has nothing with which to replace it. Lastly, Biff decides to leave to try and find himself, but an argument develops between Biff and Willy. Biff begins to see himself as like his father, "nothing," just an average man trying to make a living, and quite possibly failing. Biff's earlier image of his father's greatness has crumbled entirely, leaving a lost young man trying to find his way. Biff realized that he now needs to find his own values in life. He has finally tasted reality and now must dive head first into the pot, without any real preparation.
“Death of a Salesman” written by Arthur Miller in 1948 attempts to give the audience an unusual glimpse into the mind of a 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.
“He had all the wrong dreams. All, all, wrong.” Why were these dreams ‘Wrong’; analyse what the ‘right’ dreams would have been. Base your answer entirely on the text.
Within the play Death of a Salesman, the “American Dream” is prevalent throughout its entirety. The american dream has stood as the symbol of happiness and success for multiple generations in the United States. The main character, Willy Loman, has become obsessed with the idea of achieving this sought after goal. While of course everyone would love to be able to live a life well lived, Willy takes it too far. The ideal that everyone should be able to achieve success no matter their background intrigues the titular character to the point of obsession. I believe that his fixation on “making it” in life; is what led to the psychological breakdown and eventual suicide of Willy Loman.
The pursuit of the American dream can inspire ambition. It can transform a person and cause him to become motivated and hard-working, with high standards and morals. Or, it can tear a person down, to the point of near insanity that results from the wild, hopeless chase after the dream. This is what occurs to Biff, Happy, and Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's book Death of a Salesman. In the play, Willy Loman is a traveling salesman whose main ambition in life is wealth and success, neither of which he achieves. Corrupted by their father, Biff and Happy also can not attain success. Biff fails to find a steady, high-paying job even though he's 30, and he hates the business world, preferring instead to live on a farm in California. Happy, on the other hand, has a fairly well-paying, steady job, but still suffers from emptiness and a sense of being lost, a void which he fills by sleeping around with many women, some of whom are even married or engaged. Thus, Miller uses motifs, such as deception, theft, and hallucination, to show the pathology that all three of these characters experience in the wake of the American dream.
Biff grew to forgive his father and confessed that he loved him despite their past. He experienced growth through the events of the story, making him another candidate for the protagonist.
The American dream today is based on the fact that anyone living in America can achieve a perfect life if they work hard. Willy Loman, the father in the play Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, tries his hardest to reach the American dream as he grows up. The Loman’s life from beginning to end is a troubling story based on trying to become successful, or at least happy. Throughout their lives they encounter many problems causing Willy to have a tragic death due to the desire of succession. Willy wants to provide his wife Linda, and two sons Biff and Happy, the perfect life. Willy strives for the American dream throughout the entire play, yet never achieves what he hopes because there are too many problems standing in his way.