Willie and Oedipus as tragic heroes in Aristotelian terms

Willie Lowman and Oedipus as Tragic Heroes

Centuries ago, Aristotle provided the world with his definition of the tragic hero. The hero had to be a person of high esteem in society. He also had to have complete confidence in himself and his own abilities and strengths. This confidence is often the very thing that causes the tragic downfall, providing the important ironic element in the play. What specifically leads to the downfall of the tragic hero is not an inherent flaw, but rather a series of mistakes. These mistakes are then highlighted as an example and a lesson for the audience. The fact that the tragic hero begins the play as a person of high esteem and success, makes the downfall all the more tragic. The tragic hero and the tragedy also emerged from the particular society that created it, with the hero being representative of the values of the time. Many of these elements can be seen in both Oedipus from Oedipus the King and in Willy Lowman from Death of a Salesman. Indeed, critics have referred to the latter as the "American Tragedy."

When regarded on the surface, Oedipus appears to fit Aristotle's definition almost to the letter, and also much more closely that Willie Lowman. At the beginning of the play, Oedipus' role begins with his status as king. He is greatly revered and loved by the people of Thebes. He has proved himself very capable of handling difficult administrative and crisis situations in his jurisdiction. The play therefore begins with Oedipus at the height of his career and his success.

This sharply contrasts with Willy Lowman's status at the beginning of Arthur Miller's play. He is a failing, aging salesman. His company has withdrawn his salary, forcing Willy to work only on commission. Having apparently lost his touch as salesman, Willy is unable to make enough for the support of his family. Throughout the play, Willy is shown to delude himself by clinging to what he sees as a glorious past in sales. He believes himself great, and also believes that his sons should be great. When they prove to be the opposite of his expectations, he is unable to understand it or to do anything about it. Because Willy is unable to face the reality about himself and his family, he is also unable to do anything about it. In this regard, Willy does not fit Aristotle's definition of the tragic hero.

On the other hand, one might argue that, although not great in the eyes of society, Willy once was great in the eyes of his family and also of his coworkers. He was the epitome of American Dream and success. While Oedipus therefore represents the pinnacle of greatness in the society for which the play was written, Willy can be seen as representative of his society as well. While he does not begin the play as a success, one could view his distant past as the height from which he fell by making a number of mistakes, like Oedipus. Willy's main mistake is deluding himself.

Oedipus' main mistake is the opposite: he relentlessly and stubbornly searches for the truth, despite warnings from all authoritative voices to turn away and look no further. The truth is however of utmost importance to the king, and he refuses to let any warning or fear divert him from his path towards the truth, even if it is an unpleasant one. Oedipus therefore acts in contrast to Willy, who does not understand why his delusions are turning out to be false. Throughout the play he makes no attempt to understand the truth of his situation. Oedipus does not rest until he finds the entire truth, which also leads to the fulfillment of the prophesy he had desperately tried to escape.

A similar point in both heroes is the fact that neither makes mistakes deliberately. Both try their utmost in their chosen roles: Willy as family and business man, and Oedipus as the king. Both are successful for a time, but fail because of their mistakes. Oedipus unknowingly makes the mistake of murdering his father and marrying his mother. Willy's mistakes are more subtle. He falls from fatherly greatness by trying to force his sons into careers that they do not enjoy and is surprised when they fail at it. He falls from greatness as husband when he has an affair, however brief. These actions cause a rift in his attempt at success in his career and his family life. His failure at both appears to perpetuate each other: his failure as provider translates to his failure as business and family man, and indeed to his failure as American success. In this way, the American Dream is representative of ultimate success. By failing at this, Willy represents the doubts and fears of many Americans; he fails in all the ways feared by society.

Oedipus' failure occurs on a much larger scale. His success relates to his status as the person of highest importance in society. He however reacts differently from Willy, who first lies to himself and then crumbles under the pressure of the increasingly obvious truth. As the truth becomes increasingly obvious for Oedipus, he still refuses to turn away from his search. When all is finally revealed, Oedipus displays his true character by taking responsibility for his actions. Although the king can hardly be blamed for what happened, he nonetheless believes that he has committed a terrible crime and devises a punishment that he believes he deserves; he blinds himself.

Willy in contrast refuses to take any responsibility for his past behavior or present situation. Instead, another of his subtle mistakes is blaming others instead of himself for his failure as a business and family man. He blames his boss for his failure in the former and his sons for not being what he wanted them to be. None of this is detected in Oedipus, who refuses to blame even those bearing most guilt for his situation. He blames only himself and remains alive for his punishment. Willy chooses the coward's way of suicide, and in the end cannot enjoy the final reprieve from his financial difficulties.

The main difference between Oedipus and Lowman is the distance of their fall. Willy's cowardly fall at the end is not a great leap from the beginning, where he was basically a failure at everything. Being unable to break his downward spiral, Willy commits suicide. On the other hand, one could also see Willy's action as a final act of nobility at the end of a very humiliating life. Perhaps in the society that formed him, suicide was the only final attempt at nobility that was an option for Willy. In this, he is parallel with Oedipus, also a product of his society. Oedipus believes it would be best not only for himself, but also for his people if he were to step down as king and made a public display of his humiliation and pain. Oedipus however fell much farther than Willy in concrete terms from the beginning to the end of the play. He begins as the ultimate symbol of success for the society of his time. At the end, he is humiliated and all sources of power are removed from him. Willy on the other hand is humiliated throughout the play. It simply became overwhelming for him, and therefore not even his death has a shred of nobility to it.