Throughout history many families can’t face reality. In the play Death of a Salesman the main characters Willy, Linda, Biff, and Happy use self-deception as a means to mentally escape the reality of their lives. Biff is the only character who becomes self-aware by the end of the play. Willy wants to live in his dream world; Linda and Happy don’t even realize that they’re in a dream world. Biff had no idea he was in a dream world until he had an epiphany. Willy Loman was, a man known all around New England. At least that’s what he says. Willy is a working man, who is real good with his hand and can talk to anyone he meets. When he was younger no one could stop this man. He had the world in front of him, but as time went on Willy stayed the same. He kept living in the past. Literally living in the past. He saw dead people, talked to himself and would bring up random events in his life that no one else remembers. There are plenty of times Willy goes into his dream world or when someone tries to pull him out of his self-deception he won’t accept their help. LINDA: I’m just wondering if Oliver will remember him. You think he might? WILLY: [coming out of the bathroom in his pajamas]: Remember him? What’s the matter with you, you crazy? If he’d stayed with Oliver he’d be on top by now! Wait’ll Oliver gets a look at him. You don’t know the average caliber any more. The average young man today—[he’s getting into bed]—is got a caliber of zero. Greatest thing in the world for him was to bum around. (Miller 67) Willy just thinks that no matter what Biff does he is doing it right. He can’t escape his dream world. Linda Loman’s, a wife, a mother, a girl stuck in a dream world. She is much like her husband, Willy and, lives in a dream wo... ... middle of paper ... ...like. In Death of a Salesman the oldest son Biff had an epiphany and changed his life forever. Linda and Happy can’t get out of their dream world and are stuck in their until they change. Willy will never be able to see reality and never wanted to. He’s dead and could never face reality. Biff is the only one in the family who got out of this cycle and moved on in life. Many family’s deal with the problem of not being able to face reality and the Lomans are the perfect example. Works Cited Death of a Salesman . Dir. Volker Schlöndorff. Perf. Dustin Hoffman. 1985. Film. Miller, Arthur. death of a Salesman . New York: Penguin Book , 1949. Print. Miller, Aruther. Death of a Salesman. n.d. Miller, Aurther. Death of a Salesman. 1949. Shmoop Editorial Team. "Death of a Salesman Theme Quotes." Shmoop.com. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 8 May 2014.
Death of a Salesman Brainstorming After finishing your reading of Death of a Salesman, brainstorm your ideas about the key concepts of the drama. Record as many ideas as possible. 1. Title Death of a Salesman (Consider at least two different meanings)
Willy doesn’t want to accept that he is not successful anymore, he still recognize his son as handsome heroes. Biff as the football star when he was at high school and Happy an...
Written in 1949 the play Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller takes the reader to the post war era in America. Here, Miller tells the story of the Lomans. Willy Loman is a sixty-year old traveling salesman. He has worked for thirty-five years to get his salary cut and put on commission, but he chooses to keep his low wage job, even though his neighbor Charley offered him a salary job. Willy suffers from self-inflicted hallucinations about his eldest son Biff Loman and his elder brother Ben, which ultimately leads to his death. Biff Loman is the eldest of the two sons. Biff is thirty-four years old, and he doesn’t have a job. Biff was the star player on his high school football team, but due to flunking his football dreams vanished before his eyes. Now, Biff is the only family member of the Lomans to realize that they are living in this false reality that they are doing better than they actually are. Happy Loman is two years younger than Biff, but he is more successful job wise. Happy is the second born and Willy treats him that way. The reader often sees Happy seeking attention from Willy by talking about his job or saying he is going to get married. Lastly, Linda Loman is the mother and wife. She is an enabler when it comes to Willy because she says nothing about his hallucinations. Linda is the only one between her and Willy to recognize that they are happy and that the money was not needed to make the family happy.
Linda Loman is the enabler of the Loman family, and also uses self- deception to escape her life mentally. Linda never spoke up to Willy, and did nothing but feed his unrealistic dreams. Linda lived a life of “what ifs” with Willy. They both did the bare minimum in every aspect of their life, which is why
All in all Willy, Linda, Biff, and Happy all use self-deception to mentally escape the reality of the average lives. They are an American family who obsesses over material wealth such as having a nice car and a nice house and a good paying job, and belittle the small things in life like doing what makes you happy even if it doesn’t pay much. They chase the American dream and barely get buy doing it and are average at everything they do. Biff the oldest son is the only one in the family that becomes aware of this by the end of the play. .
In Arthur Miller’s Death of a salesman the play is based on one man trying to reach the a personal dream while unknowingly hurting his family. During Willy Loman’s life he caused his family to be damaged by living a life that he could no longer fulfill. His sons Biff and Happy realized what their father is going through and are their for him in his time of need. Willy traveled around the east coast selling merchandise but as he grew older he lost his ability to travel. Willy tried to force his dream on to his sons Biff and Happy after he realizes that he can no longer cut it for his traveling job. He risks his life and is eventually fired after a lifetime of hard work. Willy subconsciously decided that he need to create a future for his children. His realization that he can not fulfil his dream crush him and he starts to complain about
Willy also has very poor parenting skills. He has two children Biff and Happy. Willy excuses Biff for a lot of events when he was younger. If Biff stole something, Willy just brushes it off and says that is was no big deal. He didn’t even care when Biff failed math and did not graduate from high school. He measured success in how many people you knew not what your grades are. In one breath Willy would say that Biff is lazy and then in the next say he’s not.
Within the play, Death of a Salesman, one can deduce that people surrounding the main character Willy, shaped the dreams and life of Willy and the next generation. As Willy’s goals were carved by others, he forgets about his own desires. His astray ambitions oriented his life towards deceit, delusions, failure, and finally death. As he taught the same erroneous philosophies to his progeny, he unintentionally set them up for a failure. Due to misguidance and following other’s dreams, the lives of Willy and Biff are sacrificed for their fathers’ dreams. Although having dreams in life can drive one forward, following wrong dreams can lead to a disaster.
Miller: Death of a Salesman. Ed. Thomas Siebold. 1st ed. San Deigo: Greenhaven Press, Inc., 1999. 134-35. Print.
The only way to become a truly happy person is to surround yourself with the things that make you happy. Setting logical goals and pursuing dreams is going to lead to a successful life. In the play, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, Willy, Linda, Biff, and Happy use self-deception as a means to mentally escape the reality of their lives. Biff is the only character who becomes self-aware by the end of the play. He realizes that his whole life has been a lie and that Willy’s standards for Biff’s achievements in life are simply unreachable. Happy is too caught up in himself throughout the play to realize that his father is in need of an escape from his dysfunctional life. Willy has lived his whole life setting these goals for himself that he simply can’t attain. Happy makes it known at the end of the play that he is planning to follow in his father’s footsteps. This foreshadows the downfall of Happy’s life to come. Linda is constantly reassuring Willy that the decisions he has made are the right choices. She finds out about his possible suicide attempts and she refuses to seek help for him. She constantly tells his that he is doing great when in reality his career is going nowhere and his relationship with his sons gets worse as the days go on. Willy was a man who claimed to have a good sense of pride. He believes that he thrived in his times of struggle. He lost the battle for his life and ended his life due to the constant disappointments and failures that he had to live with every day. Willy refused to see the truth in his life and continued to feed off the lies. He got so caught up in his lies that he lost what the truth really was.
Lying is a string that ties together a great part of the plot in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. The Lomans are all greatly self-deceptive, and in their particular fancies and delusions to reality, they fuel and nourish off of each other. Willy convinces himself that he is effective, overall loved, and that his children are bound for significance. Unable to adapt to reality, he totally forsakes it through his vivid dreams and eventually through suicide. Linda and Happy also accept that the Lomans are going to become showbiz royalty. Not at all like alternate parts of his family, has Biff developed to distinguish that he and his relatives reliably bamboozle themselves, and he battles to escape the cycle of lying.
The line between reality and illusion is often blurred in Arthur Miller’s play, Death of a Salesman. Whether it is incorporated in the content or the actual structure, this struggle between recognizing reality from illusion turns into a strong theme; it eventually leads to the downfall of Willy and his family. Willy is incapable of recognizing who he is, and cannot realize that he, as well as his sons, is not capable of being successful in the business world. Happy and Biff both go through some battle between reality and illusion that cause a collapse in some part of their lives. The line between Willy’s flashbacks and current time also send him into turmoil when he cannot distinguish between the two.
Although the parents in Arthur Miller 's play Death of a Salesman want their sons to be successful, their sons Biff and Happy struggle to communicate with them, which results in fights that creates further dysfunctional relationships in the Loman family. Success is crucial to the father Willy, who believes he is above other salesman, giving him the wrong idea of his position. When Willy saw his brother Ben as a success, jealousy swept over him. Willy is a pushy father who wants to show his children Biff and Happy that success is most important. Biff is a realist and wants his family to accept the fact that they may never live the dream. Happy has his father’s traits but is much more understanding with Biff.
Dreams come true a sentence can make us fly, but sometime it can make us lose who we are. Some small temptations or frequent invisible offers draw for us a light future which will never end. On the other hand, these easy touchable causes for the dream to become true can draw for us a dark future which can make us lose our self and people who we really love. The Death of Salesman one of the most literature story that make an impact in every one of us from some social issues perspective. We are living in a world full of the same story, in a world represents the elusive goals as a very easy thing to have, and in a world that some people think what they are doing is the best thing to do. The salesman was one of these victims
Miller uses the last dialogue of Linda to end up his story. Linda tells Willy that “[she makes] the last payment on the house… And there’ll be nobody home. [They’re] free” (139). At the end, after Willy’s effort, he finally gets a house, but he cannot live in his own house. He spends all his life to follow a dream called American Dream without considering the consequence of it. Willy Loman represents a part of people in nowadays society. Everyone has different dream, but the only common goal is to be successful, get rich and have a good life. People try to earn as much money as they can, to make their life better, and they do not know that, success and money is nothing if they do not have chance to offset it. They spend a life to achieve it, and then they also die because of it.