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Death Of A Salesman Willy's Dream Analysis

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In the Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller, the main characters are constantly being impacted by Willy’s dream. The main aspect of this is seen in Willy; in his family, his job, and his life. When Willy talks to his wife, he is constantly harassing her and critiquing her. Willy’s dream is seen affecting his job when he reminisces about Dave Singleman, the salesman, and his view of success. Finally, the “Loman Dream” can be seen affecting Willy when he imagines Ben and his constant conversations with him throughout the book. Starting in Act One, Willy is seen talking to Happy and Biff about their career opportunity with Oliver. Throughout this conversation, Linda is constantly chipping in with optimistic comments. “Willy: Lick the world! You guys together could absolutely lick the civilized world. Biff: I’ll see Oliver tomorrow. Hap, if we could work that out… Linda: Maybe things are …show more content…

Earlier in Willy’s life, when he was deciding whether or not to go try and find his father in Alaska, he met a man named Dave Singleman, and he set the picture of the perfect working man in Willy’s mind. “... I met a salesman in the Parker House. His name was Dave Singleman. And he was eighty-four years old, and he’d drummed up merchandise in thirty-one states. And old Dave, he’d go up to his room, y’understand, put on his green velvet slippers-I’ll never forget-and pick up his phone and call the buyers, and made his living. And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want.” (pg. 81). This view of the “greatest career a man could want” was the defining ideal of Willy’s life. He wanted to be so much like this man that he will “never forget”. In the end of WIlly’s life, he wasn’t exactly like that man, but he thought that if he could go with the amount of money that Dave had, and “that funeral will be massive! THey’ll come from Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire!” (pg.

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Death of a Salesman undertakes the loss of personality and a man's powerlessness to acknowledge change inside himself and society. Willy Loman is unable to tolerate the truth that he is an average salesman. Instep Willy strives to achieve much form of the American dream, achievement and a better reputation, regardless, he will be compelled to deny actuality in place of attaining it. In the play, Willy's most loved memory is of Biff's last football game since Biff promises to make a touchdown only for him. In the scene before, Willy can barely wait to recount the story to his buyers.

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He wanted to be successful so badly, that when he doesn’t get it, he doesn’t know what to do with himself. When Willy was younger, he had great connections in the areas he would sell. The people respected him and he took great pride in the fact that his name held value with those people. However, as he aged, so did the people he used to sell to. When he isn’t able to make the amount of sales he used to, he doesn’t know

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While Linda enabled him, Willy could not help himself too keep ruining the good opportunities he had and turning them into some factious reality. At Willy`s funeral Biff comes to the realization that his father had all the wrong dreams and visions of success. Willy`s only dream was the fake “American Dream” that people believe will happen overnight. Willy`s failed attempts and happiness bonded into one and played a part into him creating this false reality and persona that he was the best salesman and that he was well loved by everyone around him.

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Linda defends Willy and insists that Willy, as a traveling salesman, merely exhausts himself rather than become crazy. Even if Willy’s financial reality reveals the fact that he can never come true his American dream, Linda still refuses to break his fantasies and see through his lies. Instead, she supports Willy’s American dream and believes in Willy’s idea that success is possible for anyone. Even though Willy is often rude to her and ignores her opinions, she protects him at all costs. She loves Willy, so she can accept all of his shortcomings.

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Success is a noun which comes from the latin root word, successes, meaning, "an advance, succession, happy outcome.” Success can therefore be defined as an accomplishment of a desired end (dictionary.com). Everyone has his or her own interpretation or definition of what they think success is, but in this interpretation, there is always a common goal at the end. That goal is to have a happy and good outcome. Willy Lowman’s definition of success was skewed, and for this, he did not achieve a happy and good outcome like he may have planned.

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However, pursuing this goal came with a price. Since he was highly motivated to becoming a successful salesman, he rarely stayed at home. Instead, he spent most of his time travelling around the country to conduct sales. He became a workaholic, forcing himself to make sacrifices in his family life in order to seek his own ambitions. Therefore, Willy’s perfectionistic ideals led to his demise.

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