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Family in death of a salesman
Family issues in the death of a salesman
Death of a Salesman Analysis 123 help me
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Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman addresses loss of identity and a man's inability to accept change within himself and society. The play is a montage of memories, dreams, confrontations, and arguments, all of which make up the last 24 hours of Willy Loman's life. The tragedy of this story was not evident at first but soon would show its ugly face before long. The Death of a Salesman was a great story to read and watch but it would have been great to see in person. The story begins as any drama would with a great family struggling to make ends meat as most American families do these days. The family consists of a loving husband Willy, wife Linda, and two sons Biff and Harold “Happy”. The loving family would change quickly with the opening act as the happy couple quickly shows their other side.
The first act is Willy coming home from a long day of working sales and an angry wife that is tired of the husband working such long hours far away. Linda talked to Willy about changing area closer to home in New York so he won’t have to travel so much. Willy agrees to talk to his boss but they begin to argue about their son being lazy and not making anything of himself. Willy storms off into the kitchen and this
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This flash back helps the audience feel the affection of the family before the affair destroyed all their lives. Willy comes back to the present and the family always catches Willy talking to himself throughout the house and wonders what is wrong with him. Willy has blocked the affair out of his mind so he doesn’t understand why his son does not love him as much. The first act ends with the family arguing about previous attempts of suicide by Willy and the son cannot understand why he would do that. Linda tries to smooth everything out and scold the boys for treating their dad differently and tell them to try to forgive
Willy's sense of pride is a very big issue in his life; he doesn't like people to give him handouts, although he may need them. But the feeling of failure overrides him when he learns about the loss of his job. "But I got to be in 10-12 hours a day. Other men-I don't know-they do it easier. I don't know why-I can't stop myself I talk to much." (p.37) Willy being a hard working man that tries his best realizes times have changed. His youthfulness and life have begun to fade. A man his age working ten to twelve hours a day is very unlikely. "I don't want you to represent us. I've been meaning to tell you a long time now!" (p.83) When Willy first heard this from his boss, that is a man younger than him begins to cry. A man his age working in a company that long doesn't really deserve to be fired. It makes his life seem a waste, and makes him imagine himself as a failure. "I was fired and I am looking for a little good news to tell your mother, because the woman has waited and suffered." (p.107) Willy is clueless of what is to come of his family and feels he has let everyone down. He failed to support his wife along with his sons. His life was basically devoted to impressing others and the one job he had led him to failure.
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.
... Instead of offering him a job, Howard tells him to take “a good long rest” (Miller 89). This, of course, simply means that Willy is fired. This shows the inconsiderate quality of society, for Howard knows about Willy’s mental breakdown as he asks him if he has had one again (Miller 84). Instead of showing any pity or sympathy, he fires Willy, for there is no place left for an old and exhausted human being in a society where selling and success mean everything.
Foremost, Willy has a problem with his inability to grasp reality. As he grows older his mind is starting to slip. For example, when he talks to the woman and his brother Ben. Throughout the story, Willy dreams of talking to the woman, because the woman is a person that he was dating in when he went to Boston. He was cheating behind his wife’s back. Willy basically uses her as a scapegoat when he’s hallucinating about her. He blames all of his problems on the woman. For instance Willy says, “ Cause you do… There’s so much I want to make for.” (38) This is the evidence right here. Also he dreams about his brother Ben. Willy wishes could be more like his brother who has just passed away a couple of months previously to the story. He also wishes he didn’t have to work and could be rich like Ben. He respects Ben for not really working and making a lot of money. Another example of Willy’s hallucinations are when he says,“ How are you all?” (45) This occurs when Willy is talking with Charley and he starts thinking about Ben. Willy’s inability to grasp reality never changed throughout the story.
Throughout the play, Willy can be seen as a failure. When he looks back on all his past decisions, he can only blame himself for his failures as a father, provider, and as a salesman (Abbotson 43). Slowly, Willy unintentionally reveals to us his moral limitations that frustrates him which hold him back from achieving the good father figure and a successful business man, showing us a sense of failure (Moss 46). For instance, even though Willy wants so badly to be successful, he wants to bring back the love and respect that he has lost from his family, showing us that in the process of wanting to be successful he failed to keep his family in mind (Centola On-line). This can be shown when Willy is talking to Ben and he says, “He’ll call you a coward…and a damned fool” (Miller 100-101). Willy responds in a frightful manner because he doesn’t want his family, es...
The second complication that destroys Willy is his aging. By getting older he can't do the things he used to do. His aging affects his work because he is not the salesman he once was. He is not making enough money to support his wife, Linda, and himself. Being 60, Willy is getting too old for the traveling he does for his work. Willy asks his boss, Howard, for a raise and Howard fires him. Willy is really worn out and Howard knows this. This situation in end destroys Willy's pride and he could never ask his sons for money.
To conclude, the beginning of act 2 reflects a great deal of the rest of the play. It’s turn to optimistic and hopeful tone riddled with foreshadowing of death correlates it as a tragedy. It shows the all the connections of family we see in the rest of the play with Linda’s role and Biff’s effect as well as Happy’s lack of a role. The American Dream’s destructive feel is felt through Willy’s misfortunes i.e. long mortgage, short on cash and deceived by the corporate manufacturers. Miller’s techniques of language style are as clear here as everywhere else and the consistencies of the subtle in the passage back up what is vital to the rest of the play. As much as the inconsistency of the tone etc. in this passage helps to convey the causes of Willy’s madness, shown in the reverse for added force in their effect, and to fit the tragedy model
In addition, Willy has changed his feelings towards his family in different ways throughout the story. His position in the family with his goals and specific ways towards his family has failed them to discover that
Willy’s pride affects his relationship with his son that ultimately causes tension and resentment within the family. It made Willy live life that consisted
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is a tragic play about the downfall of an everyday man. Willy Loman is an aging and struggling father and salesman in the late 1940s. Even though Willy is the protagonist, the supporting characters do much to define him. Ben bestows Willy with a misguided perception of success.
Willy still struggles to find out why his son, Biff, has not made anything of himself yet. Instead of a stable job, Biff has been a farmhand across the country earning only $35 a week (Act I. Scene I). Willy does not know where he has gone wrong with raising his kids, with his job, and overall with his life (Krutch, 308-309). To find the solutions to the problems driving him insane, Willy looks to his past. While he is day-dreaming he actually talks to himself and makes his family worried about his health and sanity. He daydreams and feels as if he is actually encountering the past once again in his journey. Willy is desperately trying to find out what has gone wrong in his life, why no one responds to him in the positive way that he used to, and why Biff does not have a stable job or a family. Through his trek to finding his mistakes in life, Willy finds r...
In other words Willy is just so caught up in his dream he does not realize what it is doing to his family or himself. He keeps going along with this made up dream that will lead him nowhere. Even after he failed he just keeps going in hopes of everything to just change. One of the biggest down fall in Willy’s life is when he cheats on his wife. Sadly, he also gets caught by his son Biff, which takes a toll on their relationship.
Arthur Miller used the efficient idea of using flashbacks to allow the play to take place within a few days instead of years. Willy Loman as the central character, lives with his wife, Linda and has two sons, Biff (elder) and Happy.
In the play, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, protagonist Willy Loman represents not only a tragic hero but a senseless victim. The play is based upon a salesman named Willy Loman, who lived in New York City in the 1940’s with his wife Linda, in the same house for twenty-five years. He thinks he has it all going for him, however, every little action and thought of his went sideways. Willy came from no money, a low paying job, and a personality that made put everyone in anger. Years ago, Willy’s house sat far apart from others, but as time went on the house became surrounded by apartment buildings which made him feel closed in and constantly unhappy.
It taught me a lot like how a family should be and how a family should not be. The play makes you think wow this can really relate to me as a high school student and athlete. Linda needs to learn to speak her mind no matter what her husband says because people have rights and she should be able to talk about what she thinks is going on with her family. “When Linda converses with her husband it’s almost as if se walking on eggshells and almost that she is taking to a frail eggshell that is her husband’s mental state.” (Source 2). Nothing Linda says to try to help her husband will work because she is someone who gets under her skin and makes it a lot worse to willy but too anyone else she is doing anything in her power to help him much like and other wife would do for their husband. A couple weeks after willy dies after all that the family has been through with him it’s a very sad dad but the family is very mad at him still so it is a very hard position to be in and I know I would never want to be to in the position that this family is in. willy was a very mean and angry person to his family and had a lot of stress going on in his life this is why we need to realize that all he wanted was to make his family happy but it was just something he could not do so he gave up and just took all of his anger out on