Death of a Salesman, Playwright

Death of a Salesman, playwright Arthur Miller places emphasis on the major theme of reality vs. illusion to better demonstrate that the Loman family generally cannot distinguish between the two concepts, and that confusion will ultimately lead to Willy Loman's downfall.

When it comes to Willy's ability to distinguish between reality and illusion, scholarly critic Irving Jacobson (American Literature) can clearly see - and writes what he believes about Willy with literary passion - why it might be difficult for this confused character to make that pivotal distinction.

After all, in Jacobson's view, Willy cannot "be alone," and cannot "summon the intelligence and strength to scrutinize his condition," so how would he know fact from fiction, or real feelings from pretensions? (p. 247). He's on a downward slide towards oblivion. it's a rhetorical question, no doubt. It isn't just confusion that leads to Willy's undoing, albeit confusion takes its toll, in Jacobson's mind.

The real reason results from the way in which his mediocre mind works, and the way he raised his family, among other shortcomings that push Willy over the top.

Jacobson has little if any sympathy for Willy Loman; indeed, Jacobson does not buy into the view that Willy is "a modern Everyman" - and moreover, he sees Willy as anti-intellectual, a bourgeois romantic who is given to "petty cruelties." It doesn't take a psychological savant or a rocket scientist to see how Jacobson arrives at his skepticism about Willy. There is so much material in Miller's book shedding negative light on Willy one would have to be reading the book upside down to miss the pivotal passages that define this quintessential loser.

Still, there are constant reminders in the play that Willy not only can't discern what is real from what isn't, but that Willy teaches his kids how to be deceptive about reality. On page 49 (Act I) Willy gives son Biff advice about applying for a job, which is certainly ironic because Willy hasn't exactly set the world on fire in his career. "Tell him you were in the business in the West, not farm work," Willy advises.

By Act II it is clear that the sons have picked up on dad's inability to stand on facts, or to even relate to hard cold facts, because fudging and bending the truth by now runs in the family. And on page 76, readers learn that Biff has made a fool of himself while waiting to see a former employer Bill Oliver and now he and his brother Happy are discussing how to tell his father.

How the hell did I ever get the idea I was a salesman there?" Biff asks rhetorically with his brother next to him. "I even believed myself that I'd been a salesman for him! And then he gave me one look and - I realized - we've been talking in a dream for fifteen years...I was a shipping clerk."

Tucked into that passage is more evidence to back up this paper's assertion that this is an exercise in dream world vs. real world. For "fifteen years" Biff admits he's been "talking in a dream." And on page 78, there Willy goes again, stumbling over reality on his way to his make-believe world. He is having drinks with his sons. Biff starts out clearly wanting to be straight and not hide the truth in his explanation to his dad.

I'm going to tell everything from first to last," Biff states. "...Facts about my life came back to me...who ever said I was a salesman with Oliver?" "Well, you were..." his dad replies. "No, Dad, I was a shipping clerk." "But you were practically..." his dad chimed in. Willy tries hard to revisit unreality by stubbornly insisting that Biff was a salesman. But Biff has had enough of the non-reality of his father's world. "Let's hold on the facts tonight..."

The direction of this dialogue is hijacked soon as Willy admits to his sons that he has been fired. For just a moment readers and playgoers might believe that Willy is coming full circle from his phony existence to a place in the reality space. "The gist of it is that I haven't got a story left in my head, Biff. So don't give me a lecture about facts and aspects."

Facts and aspects, indeed. Jacobson (p. 251) makes mention of the fact that the Loman family (driven off-course from real world substance by Willy) believe "prominence brings affection and privilege." This wrongheaded assumption leads the family to "boast or lie about themselves," Jacobson continues. The example of Willy coming home from a business trip bragging, "I'm tellin' you, I was sellin' thousands and thousands, but I had to come home" is classic living in a fake world behavior. And Jacobson goes on to explain, poignantly, that Willy's "fabrications create so extreme a polarization with his incapacities that an acceptance of failure - his own or Biff's - becomes impossible" (Jacobson 252).

Meanwhile, H.C. Phelps, writing in Explicator (Phelps, 1995), is quick in his essay to point out that both Happy and Linda are living in a fantasy world. They believe somehow, through years of foggy Willy-inspired interpretation probably, that Bill Oliver will not only give Biff a job, but also will "stake" biff to a business venture (Phelps 239).

He did like me," Biff says. "Always liked me." His mom chimes in, "He loved you...he thought highly of you Biff." That seems pretty unlikely given that Oliver couldn't remember who Biff even was. But then a number of circumstances and scenes in this play are highly unlikely.

Phelps discusses the judgments that are made on Willy's life at the Requiem; Biff seems tense and bitter, and argumentative. Phelps wonders if perhaps Biff realizes that "to make plain the sad futility of Willy's act would be to robe the ceremony of what little dignity it possesses" (Phelps 240). And there are other "eloquent" if "contradictory" judgments on what Willy's life meant. Biff asserted that his dad "had the wrong dreams" and "never knew who he was" (Phelps 240). Certainly Biff was correct in recounting that he dad was lost in dreams, but saying the dreams his dad lived by were the "wrong" ones of course misses the mark. Much of what Willy did was "wrong" and dreaming was only the salve to attempt to keep the wounds from festering even farther out of control.

Critic Bert Cardullo ("Death of a Salesman, Life of a Jew: Ethnicity, Business, and the Character of Willy Loman"), in Southwest Review, frankly thinks that Arthur Miller missed the mark with his play. But he spends a good deal of time blasting Willy's fragile intellect; indeed, Willy is an "insulted extrusion of commercial society battling for some sliver of authenticity before he slips into the dark." Authenticity after all requires an approach to reality, which Willy does not have. Further, Cardullo points out that Willy contradicts himself blatantly and often. An example given is when Willy says, "Bill is a lazy bum!" In short order Willy says, "There's one thing about Biff - he's not lazy." So a reader sees that reality is not something Willy approaches with any skill at all.