The American Dream (Arthur Miller in general)

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Product:	Arthur Miller in general
Date:	04/05/01 (22 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Gripping and heart rendering

Disadvantages: none

Death of a Salesman – Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller was born in New York City in 1915. In 1949, Death of a Salesman hit the stage in New York. It would win Arthur Miller a Pulitzer Prize in the same year and go on to be regarded as his best ever work and also the first great play to question the ‘American Dream’. Arthur Miller is also twice winner of the ‘New York Drama Critics’ Award’.

A symbol of unknowing, insecurity and self-deception is the hero of this remarkably imprinting play set over twenty-four hours in the ‘American Dream’ filled world of a salesman.

‘Willy Loman’ is a struggling salesman who lives in the rapidly expanding city of New York in 1949. The play starts with Willy returning from yet another unsuccessful sales trip up north to his home in Brooklyn. We soon learn that he has a towering mortgage, a job that’s days are numbered and a nature which is nothing less than mercurial.

We learn quite early on that Willy is in respect, delusional. He boasts of his brilliance, which we also learn to be well exaggerated. He constantly lies and speaks with a haughty and vain attitude. In flashbacks we learn that he constantly reminded his sons, especially Biff of their good points. This can only prove to be disastrous.

‘Linda’ is the gullible, loving, worshipping wife whose character appears to do nothing much, apart from adore Willy from start to finish.
Linda’s character is often seen as shallow and that she is almost a ‘Horatio’ type figure, in the fact that she is in the play merely to be the loving wife to the core of the play.

The sons ‘Biff’ and ‘Happy’ are the pupils of Willy. They have unbelievable respect for Willy when they are younger. But Biff realises the folly of his father and Happy loses interest in his Dad to worship himself more.

Biff realises the mistakes
of his father and becomes determined not to take the same road, however Happy is a symbol of a repeated Willy.

The story of Willy Loman is a sad one because even though he appears not to realise his mistakes, in my opinion he does, but he tries to convince himself that he had no mistakes to begin with. He sets out to do this by blaming others and never himself.

In my opinion, this is a marvellously sad play and the stage play is much better having only read the book several times and already having formed your own pictures of the characters.

Zeroned

Summary: