Info On Death Of A Salesman Summary Willy Loman, an elderly failing salesman whose salary has been taken away and works on straight commission, returns home from a sales trip that he could not complete. He is weary and tired of life on the road. His two grown sons, Biff and Happy have returned home to visit. Biff has lost his way in life and has returned home after 15 years of drifting. Happy, who lives in his own apartment is also home to visit. Willy has a conversation with his wife, Linda, as he gets ready for bed. Willy cannot understand why Biff is lost, with no job and no money to his name. Willy reminisces about the past and the reader sees for the first time that Willy sometimes lapses into another era, when he talks about opening the windshield on his car. Linda suggests Willy go to the kitchen have some whipped cheese before coming to bed. Meanwhile, the boys are having a conversation in their old bedroom. They discuss their father and the fact that he is becoming senile in his old age. They have been on a date, and through their conversation we see that Happy holds himself to low moral standards. They talk about success, their hopes, and all the while Willy is downstairs having a conservation with no one. Willy is immersed in one of his flashbacks, where he relives conversations and scenes from the past. The boys are embarrassed for him, and the scene transforms into a fall day, 15 years ago. Willy Loman Willy Loman is an elderly salesmen lost in false hopes and illusions. The sales firm he works for no longer pays him salary. Working on straight commission, Willy cannot bring home enough money to pay his bills. After thirty-four years with the firm, they have spent his energy and di... ... middle of paper ... ...this to Willy who is outraged. Willy shouts, "I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman and you are Biff Loman!" Happy Loman Happy is the Loman's youngest son. He lives in an apartment in New York, and during the play is staying at his parent's house to visit. Happy is of low moral character; constantly with another woman, trying to find his way in life, even though he is confident he's on the right track. Happy has always been the "second son" to Biff and tries to be noticed by his parents by showing off. When he was young he always told Willly, "I'm losin' weight pop, you notice?" And, now he is always saying, "I'm going to get married, just you wait and see," in an attempt to redeem himself in his mother's eyes. Happy also tries to be on Willy's good side and keep him happy, even if it means perpetuating the lies and illusions that Willy lives in.
Death of a Salesman Within the drama, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, the Lowman family is presented within the post war economy trying to achieve the American Dream. The father, Willy Lowman, represents a well-off salesman that demonstrates a persistent husband and father figure throughout the late 1940s and early 1950’s. Throughout this piece, Willy desires for his two sons, Biff and Happy, to follow in his footsteps as a salesman and to represent themselves throughout the economic decline. Throughout the storyline, Miller demonstrates the theme of success and failure, the representation of a tragic hero and the symbolism of seeds.
...him reach the truth. But he didn’t stop, he pushed on until he beat his dilemma. It was this mentality that helped him to succeed, he knew what he wanted to do and he wasn’t stopping until he achieved that.
"After all the highways, and the trains, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive," (Miller, 98). This quote was spoken by the main character of the Arthur Miller play Death of a Salesman: Willy Loman. This tragedy takes place in Connecticut during the late 1940s. It is the story of a salesman, Willy Loman, and his family’s struggles with the American Dream, betrayal, and abandonment. Willy Loman is a failing salesman recently demoted to commission and unable to pay his bills. He is married to a woman by the name of Linda and has two sons, Biff and Happy. Throughout this play Willy is plagued incessantly with his and his son’s inability to succeed in life. Willy believes that any “well-liked” and “personally attractive man” should be able to rise to the top of the business world. However, despite his strong attempts at raising perfect sons and being the perfect salesman, his attempts were futile. Willy’s only consistent supporter has been his wife Linda. Although Willy continually treats her unfairly and does not pay attention to her, she displays an unceasing almost obsessive loyalty towards her husband: Even when that loyalty was not returned. This family’s discord is centered on the broken relationship between Biff and Willy. This rift began after Biff failed math class senior year and found his father cheating on Linda. This confrontation marks the start of Biff’s “failures” in Willy’s eyes and Biff’s estrangement of Willy’s lofty goals for him. This estrangement is just one of many abandonments Willy suffered throughout his tragic life. These abandonments only made Willy cling faster to his desire to mold his family into the American Dream. They began with the departure of his father leaving him and...
Of course the tragedy of “Death of a Salesman” still moves to its ordained conclusion. Willy’s discovery of his son’s unshakeable love, the love that kept him wandering the country, fitfully attempting to fulfill his father’s dreams even as he knew they had poisoned his very soul, cannot release him from the grip of a life spent chasing after the only goal he recognized as worthy of a man’s laying down his life: financial success.
In the play “Death of a Salesman” written by Arthur Miller , there is a main character name Willy Loman who greatly wants to see his two sons be successful salesman , also be greatly love by his wife and two sons, but tragedy comes when he dies from suicide hoping his son Biff will use the insurance money of his death to start a business of his own. “What is Tragedy”? According to Aristotle “A tragedy is the imitation of an action that is serious and also having magnitude complete in itself; in appropriate and pleasurable language... ” Tragedy can be defined as a series of events leading up to great suffering. Which in the Play “Death of Salesman”, tragedy is shown twice. First being Willy Loman committing suicide, from the thought of thinking his death would be the only way for his son Biff to
Introduction Death of a Salesman and Glengarry Glen Ross are two plays which attempt to validate the key values that have been strongly advocated for by capitalism. The two plays dwell on somewhat similar themes, but these themes are presented in different styles. Both Miller and Mamet hold a similar interpretation of success in that the success of the main characters in the two plays is measured from a material standpoint. According to Miller and Mamet, these characters will do anything within their reach to stay ahead of other members of the society (the system/principle of capitalism), but as fate would have it, tragedies befall them in the end. Nevertheless, Miller and Mamet interpret these themes from different perspectives.
Willy: " I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman and you are Biff Loman!"
Willy Loman is one of the most tragic heroes in American drama today. He has a problem differentiating reality from fantasy. No one has a perfect life. Everyone has conflicts that they must face sooner or later. The ways in which people deal with these personal conflicts can differ as much as the people themselves. Some insist on ignoring the problem as long as possible, while some attack the problem to get it out of the way. In the case of Willy in Arthur Miller’s, Death of a Salesman, the way he deals with his life as a general failure leads to very severe consequences. Willy never really faced his problems in fact in stead of confronting them he just escapes into the past, whether intentionally or not, to those happier childhood times where problems were scarce. He uses this escape as if it were a narcotic, and as the play progresses, we learns that it can be as dangerous as a drug, because of its ability to addict Willy, and it’s deadliness.
In the play, Death of A Salesman there are many characters but the main one that it always seems to circle back to is the father, otherwise known as Willy. Willy has two sons and a loving wife. Sadly, he does not seem to accept this fact for what it is. Seeing as he is sixty-three years old his brain his failing him. He no doubt has Alzheimer’s Disease or at least that’s what all the signs throughout the play points too with a huge red finger.
Willy believes that he is much more successful than he is in reality. The first sign of Willy’s illusion about his life occurs rather early in the play. He has the illusion that “[he’s] the New England man. [He’s] vital in New England” (14). In reality any person could have taken Willy’s position at work. This illusion leads to his downfall because as his life begins to fall apart, he lives in the illusion that he has enough money to support his family, so he does not recognize that he has to put the pieces of his reality back together. More towards the end of the play, in an outburst of anger Willy refuses to be called “a dime a dozen” and states “I am Willy Loman, and you are Biff Loman” (132), as if the Loman family is a special figure in society. His unclear view of his place in society leads to his destruction; with only one view of his life, Willy believes that he is living his life to the fullest.
Although there are many things we do not know about the characters in Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman”, in the beginning we are left worried about the attitude of one of the main characters—has he had a relationship crisis? What causes him to act the way he does? There is one thing we are sure of from the start: He is an exhausted, hot-tempered, old man. In the play “Death of a Salesman” the setting fluctuates between either the late 1940s or the daydreams of Willy’s past. During this time, men’s roles were very high, due to the fact that they were the breadwinners. With the progression of the play we see some of the many complications Willy faces within his life. Willy’s daydreaming flashbacks give us a sneak peek into the life he used to live, and also important details from the past needed to understand the meaning behind other parts of the play. Willy was once “on top” with sales and wanted the best for his son Biff. Miller’s style helps the reader see into the life of the old man enough to have a clear understanding as to why he does the things he does and act the way he does. Later we find out that not only his current predicament is affecting him, but also his oldest son, Biff’s, predicament. Throughout the story there is a series of events that takes us into the lives of these characters and also their past. A major concern within the story is with the theme failure to success. In Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” the use of characterization and symbols are central to the structure of the theme.
job. He once believed you could flourish on the merits of disposition alone but now he wonders if he is too verbose. Willy now wonders if he ever controlled the qualities of a prosperous salesman.
The play Death of a Salesman is a tragedy written in 1949 by Arthur Miller. A tragedy is a play dealing with tragic events and having an unhappy ending, especially one concerning the downfall of the main character. Following that definition, Death of a Salesman is a tragedy because there is an unhappy ending with Willy’s death. Death of a Salesman is also a tragedy because of several tragic events that occur before Willy’s death, such as him losing his job, and Biff’s discovery of Willy’s infidelity. A tragic hero, as defined by Aristotle, is a literary character who makes a judgment error that inevitably leads to his/her own destruction. Arthur Miller himself believed the common man was a tragic hero. A quote from an essay he wrote for the New York Times states, “I believe that the common man is as apt a subject for tragedy in its highest sense askings were. On the face of it this ought to be obvious in the light of modern psychiatry,which bases its analysis upon classific formulations, such as Oedipus and Orestes
Death of a Salesman deals with many timeless issues. Though these issues are portrayed through the story of Willy Loman in the nineteen forties or fifties, their presence in today's world is still very prominent. The relationships in Death of a Salesman are riddled with jealousy, hope, love, dreams, hate, disappointment, and many other very human emotions.
In the writing world today, there are many definitions for technical terms that are used to describe certain genres of theatre, music and literature. There are romantic novels, musical dramas, and tragic plays. Tragedy is a difficult genre to pinpoint and label. The title ‘tragedy’ can be placed on virtually any piece of writing that involves a death. But it also is up to the individual as to what they believe a tragedy is defined as. The play, Death of a Salesman is not tragedy in the traditional sense of the word. This essay will discuss this idea, define tragedy hero according to historians, and broaden the definition of tragedy to fit a modern society.