illy also wants to be a successful father so that his sons will be successful as well. illy especially wants his son, Biff, to succeed. Biff has inherited some of his father's dreamy nature and has never followed through on anything since he graduated from high school. Biff cannot keep one job for very long and he appears to be bored with no direction. illy wants him to succeed but has given him bad advice and set a bad example over his life. illy has made Biff believe that he can do anything without putting forth much effort. This has caused Biff to become lackadaisical when it comes to making educated choices for his future. Biff becomes increasingly aware of how his father has influenced him and tells him, "I never got anywhere because you blew me so full of hot air I could never stand taking orders from anybody!…...

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Work Cited

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. An Introduction to Literature. Sylvan Barnet, ed. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1985. 1030-1114.

Willy Loman's Failures as a Husband, Employee, and Father in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman
Arthur Miller's play, Death of a Salesman (1949), depicts the slow disintegration of an ordinary man, a traveling salesman named Willy Loman. Willy is past his prime, and unpleasant realities are beginning to close in on him in a deeply personal way. Willy has by now lost most of his grip on reality. In this essay, I will discuss how Willy's illusions, deceptions, lies, and blindness about himself and his children contribute to his failures as a husband, an employee, and a father.

Once a relatively successful salesman, Willy Loman now feels that the key ingredients of the "American Dream": financial success, self-sufficiency, family happiness, and a feeling that his children will surpass him, are slipping away. Willy's carefully manufactured illusions collapse, sending him spiraling into despair. Willy Loman is "past sixty years of age" (Miller,…...

Willy depends on influence, personality, and people liking him. The trouble is, old age has robbed him of these -- if he ever had them -- so he's living in a dream world. He idealizes the death of an 84-year-old salesman who died alone in a hotel room. He ignores the loneliness of such a death and exaggerates the importance of the man's funeral. He likes to think his own funeral will be a big one and lots of important people will come to it. The old man's death underlines the question, "What's it all for?" Why are we so concerned with material success and so unconcerned with the spiritual -- that is, happiness, meaning, and fulfillment?
Willy wants desperately for his son iff to be a star. Success to Willy is the overnight kind, not the kind you build day-to-day, and he believes iff can be a professional football…...

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Bibliography

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. New York, Viking Press, 1981.

In her eleven years, no one had ever noticed Pecola. But with blue eyes, she thought, everything would be different. She would be so pretty that her parents would stop fighting. Her father would stop drinking. Her brother would stop running away. If only she could be beautiful. If only people would look at her."
Pecola has numerous problems and several wishes but her deepest desire to attain a beautiful skin i.e. fair complexion. She believes that being beautiful would solve her problems and she would become a popular girl that everyone desired. But like Willy Loman, 1) she lacks the means to change her reality 2) she suffers because she cannot be content with what she has. By refusing to accept herself as she was, she gave immense power to others just like Willy Loman did. Both of them turned their abusers or those who had victimized them into…...

Fate and Responsibility: Death of a Salesman
At the end of Death of a Salesman, a number of Willy Loman's closest friends and relatives, including his wife Linda and friend Charley, pay homage to Willy Loman. They praise him as one of the small, powerless people who have little sway over their existences. "And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don't put a bolt to a nut, he don't tell you the law or give you medicine," says Charlie, of the way that Willy seemed unable to realize his dreams for himself or his family, "A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory" (Miller 108). Willy is rejected by his sons and discarded by the company he worked for. But although playwright Arthur Miller makes it clear that Willy is treated unjustly by the capitalist system, he also demonstrates that Willy…...

protagonist illy Loman from Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. The writer provides the reader with an exploratory journey through the character of illy Loman including his strengths, weaknesses and downfall. There were nine sources used to complete this paper.
Throughout history literary authors have used their works to convey a message or meaning. hen Arthur Miller penned Death of a Salesman he had know way of knowing that it would become a future classic in schools across America. The story has been examined by millions high school and college students as well as literary critics for years. The character of illy Loman draws a lot of attention to himself because of the complexity of his nature and character. The character of illy Loman is a character that provides the reader with an inside view of many different life lessons. Some of the life lessons that the character plays out…...

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Works Cited

Tad Tuleja, Death of a Salesman., The New York Public Library Book of Popular Americana, 01-01-1994. pg

Phelps, H.C., Miller's 'Death of a Salesman.'. Vol. 53, The Explicator, 06-01-1995, pp 239(2).

Linda Winer, Everyman Revisited / Dennehy is larger than life in a splendid 'Salesman'., Newsday, 02-11-1999, pp B02.

Lisa Bornstein; News Theater Critic, WILLY LOMAN, TV PITCHMAN SHOWTIME'S 'SALESMAN,' BRILLIANT CAST HIT HOME., Denver Rocky Mountain News, 01-08-2000, pp 6D.

Death of a Salesman
Willy Loman is the main character in Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman. However, there are other important characters in the story. One of them is Willy's wife, Linda. In fact, Linda is one of the central characters in Death of a Salesman for several reasons. First, Linda is the real head of the household. Willy is too mentally disturbed to handle his life and she helps him to confront the truth about their finances. Linda keeps everyone together. Also, she is more reasonable than Willy or either of her two sons. As the mother of Happy and Biff, Linda is also central in their life. She frequently has to scold them for treating their father poorly. Finally, Linda remains alive at the end of the play, so she is the last person the audience relates to. Linda can be thought of as the center of…...

Death of a Salesman: The Relationship Between Linda and Willy
The marriage between Linda and Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman is typical of the early 20th century in many respects. The wife does not work and the husband acts as the provider for the family, despite the fact that the Loman family is struggling. Linda tries to economize by darning her stockings but she is forced to accept Willy as he is, no matter how imperfect. She often makes excuses for him, including when his sons question his authority. Although Linda is a kind woman, she is also very much an emotional enabler of Willy's many faults.

Throughout Willy's life, Linda acted as his cheerleader, no matter how much money he made. She often validated his sense of being persecuted by the world, even when this perspective was suspect: "Few men are idolized by their children the way…...

Exchange at the End of Act Two:
THE WOMAN: I just hope there's nobody in the hall. That's all I hope. To Biff: Are you football or baseball?

BIFF: Football

THE WOMAN: (angry, humiliated) That's me too. G'night.

Both Biff and Happy are shown throughout the course of Death of a Salesman to have a very careless attitude in regards to how they treat women. They treat women like conquests, not as human beings. In a flashback sequence, Linda complains that mothers have informed her that they are worried that Biff is rough with girls; Happy has slept with a number of the girlfriends and fiancees of the superiors at his place of employment. He does so not because he is in love with these women but as a passive-aggressive way of getting back at the people who tell him what to do on a daily basis at work.

In this exchange, the woman…...

He continued to repeat the same behavior without at least trying to do something different. His dream probably kept him alive a little longer than he might have lived otherwise. As pathetic as his dream was, he owned it and believed he could reach it on some level. illy's tragic flaw begins with a delusion. He chooses to foster that delusion instead of moving in another direction. He takes the lazy way out of the situation because anything else would take him out of his comfort zone and he might actually develop into something successful. illy lies to himself and to those around him because that is easy as well. illy is a fictional character but he is far more real than many would like to admit. His humanity makes him worth studying because many people live in this kind of complacent, unfulfilled state. illy is his own obstacle…...

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Works Cited

Ardolino, Frank. "I'm not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman!': The Significance of Names and Numbers in Death of a Salesman." Journal of Evolutionary Psychology. (2002) 174.11.

Phelps, H.C. "Miller's Death of a Salesman." Explicator. 53.4. (1995) p239-41.

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. An Introduction to Literature. Sylvan Barnet, ed. Boston:

Little, Brown and Company. 1985. 1030-1114.

masterful aspects of Death of a Salesman is the extent to which playwright Arthur Miller leaves it ambiguous regarding Willy Loman's culpability for his own condition. On one hand, he is part of a capitalist system which values people solely upon the extent to which they can demonstrate a profit for their superiors and how well-liked they are by their colleagues. Loman is not well-liked enough, and as soon as his sales figures begin to slip he is ostracized by his business colleagues. According to Willy, he has "gotta be at it ten, twelve 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 too much" (Miller 24).
Act I makes it clear that Willy's idealistic version of how to achieve success within capitalism involves get-rich-quick schemes rather than actual effort as well as…...

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Q3. The only character who gives complete and unwavering support to Willy throughout the play is his wife Linda. When his sons show disrespect to him or Willy doubts his abilities as a provider and a father, Linda always steps in to protect him. Of course, to some extent she unintentionally acts against him because she enables him in his delusional behaviors and even defends him against his sons: "Get out of here, both of you, and don't come back! I don't want you tormenting him anymore. Go on now, get your things together!" (Miller 90-91).

Biff is the most honest character regarding his father but that also causes his father to be enraged at his son, given that Biff often tells his father uncomfortable truths. "I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You were never anything but a hard-working drummer who landed in the ash can like all the rest of them! I'm one dollar an hour" (Miller 98). Willy clearly wants his son's love and affection but he cannot accept Biff as he is and constantly tries to impose his dreams of success on Biff even though Biff is clearly unhappy working in an office. Happy, in contrast, never tells the truth to his father and seems to buy into the same lies about easy success with no effort, as represented by the shadowy figure of Ben in the play, whom Willy envisions as fabulously wealthy as a result of his willingness to go boldly into the wilderness. Of all of Willy's friends only Charley combines compassion and truth -- he acknowledges Willy's weaknesses but also states "Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory" (Miller 2014).

Other significant figures in the play include Bernard, who works hard in school and becomes a famous attorney. This character represents the difficult path to success that Willy shuns. Howard, the man at his company who fires Willy, represents the cruel and unfeeling nature of the capitalist system Willy buys into for most of his life.

"(Miller, 96) However, even if it can appear that illy's death is a further failure and humiliation, Happy points out at his funeral that Loman had the braveness to pursue his dream to the end, despite the fact that he did not succeed: "I'm gonna show you and everybody else that illy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. it's the only dream you can have - to come out number-one man. He fought it out here, and this is where I'm gonna win it for him."(Miller, 111) the promise that Happy makes to follow his father's dream and accomplish it for him is again ironic however. Miller points thus to the perpetuation of the American Dream in society, and hints at its probable permanence.
Thus, Miller's play is one of the most 'American' productions as it points to the conflictive relationship established between the American Dream…...

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Works Cited

Gordon, Lois. "Death of a Salesman'; an Appreciation," in the Forties: Fiction, Poetry, Drama, Everett/Edwards, Inc., 1969, pp. 273-83.

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. New York: The Modern Library, 1975.

Critic Heyen says, "There is no question but that the play is elusive. As Miller himself has said, 'Death of a Salesman is a slippery play to categorize because nobody in it stops to make a speech objectively stating the great issues which I believe it embodies'" (Heyen 47). Therefore, many critics look at the play in different ways, attempting to categorize it and reference it according to their literary and dramatic experience. Heyen, on the other hand, tries to give his own personal reaction to the play, which is that Willy dies happy because he thinks what he is doing is right. He says, "Willy Loman, and this is his new and peculiar dimension, ends up dying happily, ecstatically, because he holds to the dream of meaning, holds to his sort of spiritual Franklinism" (Heyen 56). Willy dies happy, believing he is doing the right thing, and in…...

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References

Clurman, Harold. "Willy Loman and the American Dream." Readings on Arthur Miller. Ed. Tomas Siebold. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1997. 132-136.

Heyen, William. "Authur Miller's Death of a Salesman and the American Dream." Arthur Miller Death of a Salesman. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House,1988. 47-57.

Jacobson, Irving. "Family Dreams in Death of a Salesman." Critical Essays on Arthur Miller. Ed. James J. Martine. Boston G.K. Hall & Co., 1979. 44-52

Miller, Arthur. "Death of a Salesman." Masters of Modern Drama. Ed. Haskell M. Block and Robert G. Shedd. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1962. 1020-1054.

Finally, there is a sense of release or uplifting at the end of the play. Linda's comment, "We're free" (Miller 1054) seems to encapsulate the family's struggles and inner turmoil. Willy has died in a blaze of glory, utterly convinced he is doing the right thing, and perhaps that has made his last moments happier than they have been in years. He will never know he failed again, and failed his family in the most permanent way. However, there was so much argument, turmoil, and strife in the family, perhaps removing himself was really the thing the family needed. There is a feeling, even though it may be implied, that the family will come together as a result of Willy's death, and that they will survive. There is also a feeling that the two sons will have some impetus to make something of themselves, even if it is because they…...

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References

Miller, Arthur. "Death of a Salesman." Masters of Modern Drama. Haskell M. Block and Robert G. Shedd, ed. New York: McGraw-Hill. 1962. 1020-1054.

Tragedy and the Common Man," he contemplates the idea that only the wealthy, noble characters can fully understand tragedy, and therefore appreciate it. That thought is not a reflection of his own opinion, as Miller argues the case of tragedy and the common, working class man - for tragedy knows no income boundaries, but rather that this person would "lay down his life...to secure one thing - his sense of personal dignity." To that end, Willy Loman epitomizes what Miller is speaking about.
Willy Loman is most certainly a tragic hero, according to the modern-day, Arthur Miller type definitions. Loman is hardworking and relentless in his pursuit of his American dream. His tragic flaw is that he cannot recognize how desperately his family wants to love him, yet Willy loves his family deeply enough to sacrifice self in order to give Biff the American dream that he could not obtain…...