Reality In Arthur Miller's Death Of A Salesman

Our reality is often influenced and persuaded by the lives of the individuals around us. Ultimately though, one’s sense of reality is personal and particular, shaped through the individual’s personal circumstances, emotions, values, and morals. However, this can potentially be altered through the perspectives and opinions of those around us. An individual’s past may contribute and determine the perception of their reality that they may have, further developed by friends and family who may cause certain perceptions to be adapted. The media also performs certain misrepresentations, showing how our realities are often integrated by fantasy and false dreams can be manipulated substantially. Everyday examples from our society also contribute to

Subconsciously or not, we are never completely in control of the activities that take place, and this can cause our reality to be easily persuaded. In Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, Willy Lowman constructed his own version of reality around his perception of the ‘American dream.’ His reality is extremely unstable as he is a victim of his own delusions, and when faced with the truth, even Willy’s family have contradictory perceptions on his suicide. When making the decision to take his own life, he creates the idea of it being a sacrifice in an attempt to put his family ahead of the game “after all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive.” This shows the influences and consequences

Certain representations are preferred over others in a community, and as individuals commonly fear a lack of acceptance the chances of conforming to other people’s opinions is extremely prominent. Our individual experiences of reality gives us the opportunity to learn and grow from incidents, enabling us to have the capacity to take full responsibility for the conditions we undergo. Willy sells himself a particular version of reality, which is filled with delusion and leads to him further shaping his entire life around a world of lies “someday I’ll have my own business, and I’ll never have to leave home anymore.” The social pressure to conform to the values of a materialist society along with the economic pressures to be somewhat wealthy and make a living, lead to Willy’s breakdown and the loss of his frail, unsuccessful reality and its continuous downward spiral. In The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Daisy’s love for Gatsby is by far one of the grandest illusions to be mistaken. Expecting to be with Daisy forever, he creates an illusion for himself which ultimately leads to his downfall, as his illusion is later shattered “I want to wait here till Daisy goes to bed… So I walked away and left him standing there in the moonlight- watching over nothing.” This provides clear links between the