Analysis Of The American Dream In Death Of A Salesman

In Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller’s character, Willy Loman, is desperately trying to achieve the unattainable American Dream. Throughout the play, Willy encounters many challenges that have derailed his course and his perseverance drives him and his family insane.

In Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller, Willy Loman’s life seems to be slowly deteriorating. It is clear that Willy’s predicament is of his own doing, and that his own foolish pride and ignorance lead to his downfall. Willy’s self-destruction involved the uniting of several aspects of his life and his lack of grasping reality in each, consisting of, his relationship with his wife, his relationship and manner in which he brought up his children, Biff and Happy, and lastly his inability to productively earn a living and in doing so, failure to achieve his “American Dream”.

While the play primarily focuses on Willy’s dream, Death of a Salesman also observes Biff and his American Dream, which may be construed as the “right” one. Compared to his father’s, Biff’s dream is a simple one: own a ranch and labor in the countryside close to nature, happy and content. And yet as his father increasingly pressures him to pursue a dream more aligned to his own, Biff experiences an identity crisis of sorts, desperately seeking to please Willy by taking a job in business but always failing in his efforts. Eventually, he realizes that he cannot be his father, and, at Willy’s funeral, contrasts his earlier statement regarding Willy’s state of mind with one regarding his own person: “I know who I am, kid” (Miller 111). Though at the start of the play it was Willy who thought Biff lost, it is now the reverse. Willy, with his aspirations for renown and major success, found himself perpetually adrift in the world, struggling to make ends meet and maintain his family ties. And yet while Willy suffered at the hands of his American Dream, Biff prospered (although not monetarily) in his “proper” American Dream, experiencing true contentment in his craft. While Willy faced constant confusion and an almost bipolar personality disorder owing to his erroneous endeavors, Biff’s main insecurities and difficulties were those brought on by his father’s notion of success. In other words, Willy’s American Dream caused nothing but suffering for him and those he loved, while Biff’s American Dream would have allowed him peace of mind had it not been for his

Finally, Willy failed greatly at achieving the American Dream. People have come to the United States hoping for a life of happiness and success, at the same time, hoping to take pride in what they do and enjoy it. Willy did not achieve the American Dream. He had no pride in what he did, although he hid these emotions. I believe he was so embarrassed because he could not make a single sale or earn a single dollar that he began borrowing fifty dollars a week from Charley, and then pretended it was his salary. He lied to his family and to himself. He did not allow himself to do what he truly wanted to do because he believed that it was more remarkable to be supposedly successful. He therefore failed miserably at the true American Dream, exchanging it for an unattainable fantasy.

Willie Loman is an ordinary man who embodies traditional American values of success. He has reached the age where he can no longer compete successful in his chosen career, that of a traveling salesman. Faced with the termination of his job, he begins to examine his past life to determine its value. At this critical point in Willie’s existence, his oldest son Biff has returned home for a visit, and Willie’s old desire for his son to be a traditional success in life is rekindled. But the old tensions between the two men are also renewed. Once again, to Willie’s great disappointment, his son rejects Willie’s values and aspirations. (“Death of a Salesman Arthur Miller 1949 Drama”)

Willy chooses to exaggerate his success in front of his family and even his boss in Act 2, but when he is contradicted “Now, Willy, you never averaged...” he still continues on with his façade thus further emphasizing his delusional nature. He teaches his children that they should be “liked and you will never want,” which implies that for Willy popularity is more important as it is this that will deem how prosperous one is in business as that man “is the man who gets ahead.” This contradicts the initial ideals of the American dream where you work hard in order to achieve success, and hence could be used by Miller to indicate how futile the concept was as well as how it lead to people conceiving inconceivable dreams - “He had the wrong dreams” as mentioned by Biff in the requiem.

WIlly compares himself to other people that are far too accomplished to be in the same realm as someone like him

The irony lies in Willy's thoughts and perceptions of reality versus true reality. Willy lives constantly lying to himself with self talk and lying to others to cover his disappointments. Willy's notion of the “American Dream” and how he keeps saying affirming how successful he is. Willy longs to live his dream however, Willy is living an illusion. He is blaming everyone else for his failures, if not he would have witnessed the good things in his life.

    “Be well liked” he often tells his sons Biff and Happy. How others perceive Willy is an underlying force that seems to compel him to action. It is more important to him to “be well liked” more than anything else. Willy’s fear is that wants to be viewed as a good decent human being. When in actuality, his underlying struggle is in accepting himself. Miller states,  “The quality in such plays that does shake us... derives from the underlying fear of being displaced, the disaster inherent in being torn away from our chosen image of what and who we are in the world.” Based upon Miller’s statement Willy’s “underlying fear of being displaced” is the real tragady. He wants to do things right, but the fact is he has many incidences like Boston that haunt him.  “Tragedy then is the consequence of a man’s total

The struggle for financial security and success has always been prominent in the American culture. The idea of the American dream captures the hearts of so many, yet leaves almost all of them enslaved in the endless economic struggle to achieve high status, wealth, and a house with a white picket fence. In Arthur Miller's, Death of a Salesman, we see how difficult it is for Willy Loman and his sons to achieve this so called American dream. In Lorraine Hansberry's, A Raisin in the Sun, she examines an African-American family's struggle to break out of the poverty that is preventing them from achieving some sort of financial stability, or in other words the American dream. Both plays explore the desire for wealth, driving forces that

"Death of A Salesman," by Arthur Miller, is a play that tells the story of a traveling salesman, Willy Loman, who encounters frustration and failure as he reflects on and experiences his own life. Willy's quest for the American Dream leads to his failure because throughout his life, he pursues the illusion of the American Dream and not the reality of it. His mindset on perfection, his obsession with success, and his constant reminiscence of the past and foretelling of the future, all contribute to his defeat in the end.

Miller amalgamates the archetypal tragic hero with the mundane American citizen. The result is the anti-hero, Willy Loman. He is a simple salesman who constantly aspires to become 'great'. Nevertheless, Willy has a waning career as a salesman and is an aging man who considers himself to be a failure but is incapable of consciously admitting it. As a result, the drama of the play lies not so much in

Published in 1949, Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is a tragic commentary on the hollowness and futility of the American Dream. This paper will explore Willy’s obsession with achieving material wealth and prosperity and how his yearning for the American Dream ultimately caused him to deny reality and lead the breakup of his family. Ultimately, Miller’s message is not that the American Dream is by necessity a harmful social construct, but simply that it has been misinterpreted and perverted to rob individuals of their autonomy and create inevitable dissatisfaction.

Success: Accomplishing Your Dream Completing the "American Dream" is a controversial issue. The American Dream can be defined as having a nice car, maybe two or three of them, having a beautiful, healthy family, making an impact on the world, or even just having extra spending money when the bills are paid. In the play "Death Of A Salesman," by Arthur Miller, the "American Dream" deals with prosperity, status, and being immortalized.

Willy believes that wealth is the key to your happiness, and the extent of your wealth is exposed by the amount of materialistic items one has. Miller explains Willy’s thoughts in Timebends, “The publicity apparatus tells Willy that if he works hard like Edison, that if he perseveres like Goodrich, that, if he is “well-liked” like Dave Singleman, then he will rise like Charley and become rich and powerful.” Willy’s thought process is foolish, and his belief that failure cannot be tolerated in his family causes him to lie about his success. This is evident when Biff says “We never told the truth for ten minutes in this house! [130]” The American Dream is to blame for imprinting wealth is all you need to be happy, into Willy’s mind.