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The Requiem In Willy Loman's Death Of A Salesman

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The Oxford Dictionary defines a requiem as, especially in the Roman Catholic Church, a Mass for the repose of the souls of the dead and an act or token of remembrance. After Willy Loman killed himself, his family is in a state of mourning and it takes a toll on everyone especially his wife, Linda. The requiem title was used as a tribute to Willy Loman, something Act III or Epilogue wouldn’t show properly without reading it. Willy understood the importance of his family and their wellbeing, so he killed himself for Biff. 20,000 dollars would be enough to give Biff something use to pursue his dreams, a commodity Willy did not have. When Linda states that she has paid off the final bills of the house, it shows that if Willy hadn’t killed himself
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I don’t like that the book describes the funeral by how they reflected on his life but they didn’t celebrate his life and they weren’t able to handle him going away to look at the good aspects of his life. We should celebrate the deceased time on earth but we should also look back on his or her life: “Should we celebrate a life at the time of death? Absolutely. But a Christian funeral also should retell the Gospel story, should affirm that we died with Christ in our baptism and will be raised with Christ” (Funerals). There can be crying and sorrow at a funeral but it should be for the right purpose.

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I always heard yelling and screaming from their house, and it was often an argument between all four members of their family. The constant arguing always led me to believe that Willy yelled at his family because of his experiences as a child, and it worried me about how it would affect Linda and the children. Furthermore, my preconceived notions especially intensified when Biff would disappear for months at a time. However, there was one loud argument that, oddly enough, made me realize that all the yelling and arguing were done out of love. During the altercation, Biff was trying to tell Willy the truth about the nature of situations he (Biff) found himself in over the last decade of his life.

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891 Words | 4 Pages

Linda is so wrapped up and making sure that he is happy that she thinks he can do no wrong. Willy’s affair is not seen as a wrongdoing, but it is seen as an get away for him. It is a portrayed as a dream or hallucination to the audience. In that way it gives off a feeling of sympathy for him, because of his illness.

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399 Words | 2 Pages

Willy's logical inconsistencies brings confusion towards the audience itself toward the start of the play; in any case, they soon turn into a characteristic of himself. Willy's conflicting conduct is the after effect of his powerlessness to acknowledge reality and his propensity to control or re-make the past trying to get away from the present. For instance, Willy can't leave himself to the way that Biff never again regards him on account of Willy's affair with another woman. As opposed to concede that their relationship is irreparable, Willy retreats to a past time when Biff appreciated and regarded him. As the play goes on, Willy disassociates himself more from the present as his issues turn out to be excessively too much, making them impossible to manage.

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212 Words | 1 Pages

Willy Loman’s decisions are responsible for his death in Death of a Salesman. For example, Willy’s tendency to blow his son’s football game out of proportion and brag about it gives a sense that he is self-centered. At the beginning of the play Willy states “The way Biff used to simonize that car? The dealer refused to believe there was eighty thousand miles on it” (8).

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1638 Words | 7 Pages

Willy responds by saying, “Charley, look... (With difficulty.) I got my insurance to pay. If you can manage it — I need a hundred and ten dollars.” (Miller

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877 Words | 4 Pages

Willy believes that he wishes to purchase his wife a new refrigerator even though she is satisfied with what they have. As he strives to live the American dream he honors those who have been victorious at doing so, like his successful brother. Additionally he penalizes those who did not make any efforts towards that ideal or achieve it, like his son Biff, and for the most part prominently himself. The unattainable dream that he has lived all his life was struggling to achieve has brought him to complete disappointment and a loss of wisdom in his judgments. Willy formed a reality for himself where eventual result of his disenchantment.

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1008 Words | 5 Pages

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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613 Words | 3 Pages

The main foreshadowing Miller uses in the play is the title itself, and when Linda tells Billy about Willy trying to attempt suicide. The audience can figure out that Willy will eventually die because of foreshadowing by the title. In the play Willy's death is expected, but it is never fully explained how he dies so we should assume that he killed himself through a car wreck. The unclear ending adds to the chaos in play. The whole story tells us about Willy Loman spent his life chasing a false American dream.

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924 Words | 4 Pages

In Death of a Salesman, Linda is Willy’s loyal and loving wife, who always unconditionally supports Willy’s unrealistic American Dream and defends Willy against the criticisms of their sons. She criticizes that Biff should not wander from place to place any more because she and Willy are getting older and will leave this world one day. Biff replies to Linda’s statements, but he doesn’t mention Willy at all. Biff’s behavior makes Linda upset and angry; Linda tells Biff that he either respects his father or leaves home. When Linda tells Biff that Willy often mumbles to himself, Biff is ashamed of Willy’s irrational behavior.

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1009 Words | 5 Pages

This helped lead Willy to his own downfall because he was always lacking and felt unwanted and

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741 Words | 3 Pages

Biff, a consequence of Willy, attempts to bring Willy out of his fantasies and his see the realities of his life, but in the end fails to. The two are different in their ideas, demeanors and personas, yet have some akin characteristics.     Willy and Biff’s physical traits are different. At what point, Willy tells his wife Linda, “I’m fat. I’m very foolish to look at, Linda.”

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1537 Words | 7 Pages

Willy finds out his dream of being an popular, well respected salesman is impossible and takes his own life. Linda supports Willy despite the abuse and confusion he puts her through with his various attempts to take his own life, with his delirious ramblings and hallucinations, and with his constant deception. Happy still sees his father as a hero and Biff finally begins to grasp the truth of the “American Dream”. When Willy kills himself, all of the Loman family, including Willy, break free from the web of false dreams he spun and begin to understand Willy’s failings. They also realize their own flaws.

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850 Words | 4 Pages

This shows how willy can not admit his failure to his family. The main character Willy doesn’t want to show how deeply down he had fallen and is starting to lose hope on his

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1581 Words | 7 Pages

In his seminal work, Death of A Salesman, Arthur Miller portrays wretched conditions inflicting the lives of lower class people amid class-struggle in 1940s America. Miller sets the story during the great financial depression in the US , in between times after World War I and around World War II, though his characters hardly speak about the trauma of two World Wars. Miller earns an enormous success by putting an ordinary salesman as the protagonist in his play instead of putting a man of social nobility. In the play, Miller depicts his central character, Willy Loman as a destitute salesman struggling to rise up the social ladder in a capitalist society, who remains deluded by a 'dream of success ' and takes on a relentless pursuit of happiness that eventually brings his tragic demise. Though some critics speak in favor of the popular account of the cause of his death being his excessive obsession with so called the American dream and the 'capitalist oppression ' ; however, many still refuse to ascribe the cause of his death to capitalist oppression, which I will use synonymously with American dream here.

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