Willy Loman's Mental Health

In Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, the main character, Willy Loman is a salesman who has had a successful life as a salesman. He traveled from city to city while his wife and two sons stayed home. He had an older brother named Ben who became rich after finding diamonds in Africa, but is said to have died at the beginning of the play. As the years pass, Willy is much older and has started to struggle with his job. He gains a lot less and people don’t like him as much as before, yet he still wishes to achieve more in life. Biff, Willy’s eldest son, discovers that his dad had been in an affair with a woman and ends up leading a life with no goals after this incident. Happy, Willy’s youngest son, grows up and find a stable job and an apartment, but still has issues within himself. Linda, Willy’s wife, is loyal to her husband and is always there to support him and their family no matter what. This entire ordeal leads Willy Loman to commit suicide. In the play, Arthur Miller displays Willy as a victim to his own decisions and consequences; while representing the everyman, Willy

Mental health of something that many people struggle with not just in America. In the play, mental health plays a major role in Willy’s persona. He was shown to constantly talk to his brother Ben out of nowhere. For instance, Ben appears while Charley and Willy are playing, Willy starts talking to Ben but then Charley asks him “What are you talkin’ about?” (Miller 1448). And on another occasion, as he’s going to see Charley, Charley’s secretary asks Bernard, Charley’s son, to deal with Willy as he’s arguing in the elevator by himself (Miller 1471). He seems to be so stressed and lost that he seems to start losing his sanity. Going back and forth with flashbacks and appearances of his dead brother, this is another reason why he couldn’t better himself and ended up