Dramatic Rhythm in Death of a Salesman, Research Paper Example

Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman” presents the underbelly of a seemingly typical family caught up in the American dream for success.  Dreams and aspirations are wedded to disappointments and tragedy in this illusory portrayal of the influences of the past as it psycho trips over the present and intertwines in twisted revelations of dreams deferred and the ensuing realization of the crushing weight of underachievement cloaked in delusions of grandeur.

Willy Loman is the patriarchal leader of the Loman family whose life is defined by the success of his two boys bred for greatness to be as princes of men.  The play opens with Willy explaining to his wife why his business trip out of town was cut short with his return home before reaching his destination.  This conversation gives way to another conversation about concerns over the future of their oldest son, Biff.  Willy’s wife, Linda, is troubled over one of many arguments that occurred between father and son that morning.  In Willy’s eyes Biff holds the highest promise for greatness, but he views his son’s career thus far as a meandering stew where his full potential has yet to be reached.  Willy’s frustration is insurmountable and it consumes his every thought and action.  Willy is faced with the realization that his own chance for great success has passed and desperately clings to the success of his sons to redeem the meaning of his life.  Willy tries to go to work, but is consumed with a feeling of being trapped in a quagmire of self doubt and failed hopes which seems to constrict and crash down upon his very existence.  He expresses this pent up smothered feeling when he asks his wife “why don’t you open a window in here, for God’s sake and she replies “They’re all open dear” and Willy blames his prison of emotions on the new development in the neighborhood where he frantically asserts that “The way they boxed us in here.  Bricks and windows, windows and bricks,” (Miller, 17) metaphorically conveys his stifled existence.  This quote aptly states Willy Loman’s disposition:

“Willy fails to realize his personal failure and betrayal of his soul and family through the meticulously constructed artifice of his life. He cannot grasp the true personal, emotional, spiritual understanding of himself as a literal “loman” or “low man.” Willy is too driven by his own “willy”-ness or perverse “willfulness” to recognize the slanted reality that his desperate mind has forged. Still, many critics, focusing on Willy’s entrenchment in a quagmire of lies, delusions, and self-deceptions, ignore the significant accomplishment of his partial self-realization. Willy’s failure to recognize the anguished love offered to him by his family is crucial to the climax of his torturous day, and the play presents this incapacity as the real tragedy. Despite this failure, Willy makes the most extreme sacrifice in his attempt to leave an inheritance that will allow Biff to fulfill the American Dream.” (SparkNotes Editors).

Willy’s mental state has deteriorated to attempted suicide and what little happiness that can be afforded in his present state of mind is found in vivid hallucinations of interactions with his family and friends of the past.  Hadomi asserts the view by stating, “Willy retreats into a dream world consisting of his roseate recollections of the past and of fantasies in which he fulfills the aspirations the attainment of which has eluded him in life. Although his memories are based on actual events, these are falsified in his mind by wishful thinking about how they ought to have turned out. Hence in Willy’s mind, reality as it is immediately experienced by him merges in his consciousness with his recollection of distant events to form a seamless continuum of past and present time.” (Gale 157-174)  Willy’s mind traverses to the past where he had the respect and deep admiration of his sons.  It is in the past that the family as a cohesive unit still maintains hope for a prosperous future.  Willy molds his sons to be as a Greek Adonis’s of perfection.  He indulges their every whim; even in their wrong doings his chastisement is slight and often tinged with humorous revelry over their antics.  He often eggs his son Biff on in his dominance over his neighbor Charlie’s son Bernard.  Willy believes that Bernard should bow to his son’s superiority. It is in the past that his sons worship him as a God and spend all their energies in constant efforts to please him at least in his perceptions of the past which may be tainted by delusions of grandeur.  Biff is the favored son and shows the most promise as he is to receive a football scholarship to the University of Virginia.  Happy, the younger brother tries desperately to shine in the shadow of his older brother as he races around as some robot on hyperdrive constantly clamoring for his father’s attention, and frantically asserting “I’m losing weight, you notice, Pop?  Willy like the young Happy was envious of his older brother, Ben, who achieved tremendous success in diamonds in Africa.  Throughout the play Ben serves as the iconic measuring stick for the level of success a Loman man can achieve.  “Ben is an extension of Willy’s own consciousness, and that “through [Ben] Miller provides for the audience a considerable amount of the tragic insight which, though never quite reaching Willy, manifests itself to them in the dramatic presentation the workings of his mind.” (Sister 409-412)  Willy forever laments the day his brother invited him to join him in his quest for greatness and Willy refused in favor of chasing the ever elusive American dream.  The Loman boys have been groomed for success on a grand scale that reaches so high as to liken their foundation in reality to a thinly stacked deck of cards.  One misstep equals immense failure and only by deceiving the mind can they hope to escape the ramifications of not meeting their princely standard.

Willy is interrupted from his imaginarium as Linda enters the kitchen and reality creeps back into view.  The present day Loman sons have not achieved the success that Willy foresaw in the past.  His oldest son, Biff, works as a farmer out West and has very little in personal assets, and Happy relishes happily in a delusional reality of the accomplishments of his life.  Willy’s disappointment in Biff is more pronounced as his hopes for Biff were so high.  Guilt plays a part in the derision that exists between Loman and his son Biff.   Reflected in his son’s eyes Willy views the full measure of his disappointing life as his son’s unexpected visit interrupts a liaison between him and his mistress in Boston.  It was at this instant that Biff needed his father the most to save his academic career which hung in the balance with his scholarship to the University of Virginia as the price.  In Biff’s mind this deception uncloaks a life of false truths and the once perceived God-like view of his father has been stripped bare to reveal a small man, a low man.  Biff’s idolatry ends and with it his dreams which were so wrapped in his father’s vision of the American success.  This passage from the play elicits the apex of the conjoined ambitions of father and son as recited in revelry by Willy Loman:

“Willy:  Like a young god. Hercules-something like that. And the sun, the sun all around him. Remember how he waved to me? Right up from the field, with the representatives of three colleges standing by? And the buyers I brought, and the cheers when he came out-Loman, Loman, Loman! God Almighty, he’ll be great yet. A star like that, magnificent, can never really fade!” (Miller 68)

This scene is relevant in the summation of the varied influences on the lives of both father and son.  Willie’s elation at this moment displays his immense pride in his son which he views as a forecast for future success wedded to his own perceived success as his buyers he brought all present as the Loman name is resounded with the accompaniment of cheers of adoration.  A Greek God and his prince of a son bask in the glory of the day.

The anti-thesis to Loman’s youthful herald of his family’s greatness is ironically present in his neighbor Charley and his meek son Bernard who were often snubbed by Willy Loman and his sons.  Willy guided his sons in every facet of their lives toward the American dream of success and greatness, whereas his neighbor Charley lent a freer hand in raising his son Bernard which has culminated in Bernard becoming a big success.  Willy comments in wonderment “And you never told him what to do, did you? You never took any interest in him” (Miller 95) Willie suffers a further assault to his shattered ego in that he has to borrow money from Charley on weekly basis to supplement his income and on this day of all days his company has let him go and the remnants of his pride will not let him accept a job offer from the now superior Charley and son.  The neighbors who were often bothersome and annoying have somehow tapped into the American dream that has somehow eluded the Lohman family.  Willy is now full primed for the success in suicide that he could not achieve in life.  His wife would have the insurance money and his boys would not suffer the burden of his care.

The veil of delusion is lifted by Biff in his realization that he has an inflated sense of self after his failed interview he rallies, “How the hell did I ever get the idea I was a salesman there? I even believed myself that I’d been a salesman for him! And then he gave me one look and- I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been!  We’ve been talking in a dream for fifteen years. I was a shipping clerk.” (Miller, 104)  He further reveals the delusions of his family as co-conspirators as he confronts his brother, Happy with the truth, “You big blow, are you the assistant buyer? You’re one of the two assistants to the assistant, aren’t you?” (Miller, 131)  He then turns to his father in his final denouement, “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, Willy! I tried seven states and couldn’t raise it.  A buck an hour! Do you gather my meaning? I’m not bringing home an prizes any more, and you’re going to stop waiting for me to bring them home!” (Miller, 132) and in exhaustive retort he collapses into resignation, “Pop, I’m nothing! I’m nothing Pop. Can’t you understand that? There’s no spite in it any more. I’m just what I am, that’s all.” (Miller, 133)  Biff collapses in his father’s arms and Willy is overwhelmed with his son’s touching display of affection and intimacy, and with this knowledge he can now let go of his life in the “Death of a Salesman.”

Works Cited

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman: Certain Private Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem. New York: Viking, 1949

SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on Death of a Salesman.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2002. Web. 1 Apr. 2010.

Hadomi, Leah. “Fantasy and Reality: Dramatic Rhythm in Death of a Salesman.” Modern Drama 31.2 (June 1988): 157-174. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Janet Witalec. Vol. 179. Detroit: Gale, 2004. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 18 Apr. 2010.

Sister, M. Bettina. “Willy Loman’s Brother Ben: Tragic Insight in Death of a Salesman.” Modern Drama 4.4 (Feb. 1962): 409-412. Rpt. in Drama for Students. Ed. David M. Galens and Lynn M. Spampinato. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale, 1998. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 18 Apr. 2010.

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