David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross

Through a Marxist’s eyes, Death of a Salesman represents the struggle of middle-class families in a capitalistic world. From an early age, kids are taught to do well in school, be involved with sports and activities, and to go on to college; all in hopes of achieving the American Dream. This dream of obtaining success through hard work leads many into the

In David Mamet's essay "The Rake: A Few Scenes from My Childhood" he reminisces to a time in his childhood filled with abuse, neglect, and altogether toxic behavior. This essay is not only based on the author’s childhood memories, but also Mamet’s sister. The story beings with Mamet describing their kitchen, specifically, the family’s dinner table. The kitchen or “the nook” seems to be not only the essence but also the undoing of the family. Throughout the entire story, neither the boy nor his sister feels safe in the midst of their home. Constantly being blamed for whatever goes wrong within their household (around dinner time especially), they reluctantly endure living with their mother and stepfather. The suffering within their home is evident

In 1949, Arthur Miller wrote a play called “The Death Of a Salesman”. This play is known for its compelling view on the mind of the middle class working man. The characters in “The Death of a Salesman” all have various dimensions of development throughout the story. These characters can all be seen as components one collective mind using Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory; the Oedipal, Id, Ego, and Superego. These characters all strive for success by way of the American Dream and all of it’s inconsistent factors and betrayal that personify it so well.

Since the beginning of its time, America has set a global standard for offering chances at prosperity and career opportunities for qualified adults. Its people have been implicating the idea of the “American Dream” into its culture for many years and has become widely recognized by individuals all across the world. People pack up their lives and families to travel to American soil to try at a chance of a better life, and in doing so, they too venture on a path to achieving this so commonly understood “American Dream.” Arthur Miller, a well-known literary writer in America, seems to disagree with this national phenomena, offering a different view in his play Death of a Salesman. In this play, he demonstrates through the life of an average

The story ‘Death of a Salesman’ written by Miller focuses on a man doing all he can to allow him and his family to live the American dream. Throughout the story it is shown how the Loman’s struggle with finding happiness and also with becoming successful. Throughout their entire lives many problems come their way resulting in a devastating death caused by foolishness and the drive to be successful. Ever since he and his wife, Linda, met she has been living a sad and miserable life, because she has been trying support his unachievable goals. Also by him being naïve put his children’s lives in jeopardy and also made them lose sight of who they really were. Miller uses the Loman family to show how feeling the need to appear a certain way to the public and trying to live a life that is not really yours can turn into an American nightmare.

In his play Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller uses “the common man as a fit subject for tragedy in the highest sense” (Lawrence, Trudeau and Ross Vol. 1) and failure in the accomplishment of the American. The play tends to recline more in the direction of masculinity where men’s sole role is to get a job and support the family and the woman be seen and ordered which brings out the idea of traditional gender roles at its best. Though this is the case, it is very evident that women played an important role in this play. Although every character in the served and had a main purpose, women served a major role not only as subjects of submission and satisfaction who helped define who the men really were in the 1940’s but also as elements of support and wisdom.

Social pressures change as time passes, therefore it is interesting to see how these three texts whom differ by almost four hundred years perceive society and the effect this has on the protagonists; Shakespeare’s King Lear which was first performed in 1606 during the Jacobean era, presents a patriarchal society. Whilst, Arthur Miller uses the characters in ‘Death of a salesman’ to show the failure of the ‘American dream’ during the “golden era” of America in the late 40’s. The ‘American Dream’ was a set of ideals which suggested that anyone in the US could be successful through hard work, and had the potential to live a happy life. The sense of the deterioration in the equality of opportunities links to the fall in power and hierarchy in

    What a person does to make a living often defines who that person is. Because so much time and energy is invested into work, work is often seen as an extension of oneself. One of the first questions that someone asks after meeting you for the first time is about what you do for a living. The belief is that by knowing what you do, one should be able to tell something about who you are. People almost never ask the more telling question of whether or not you are happy. They rely on the nature of the occupation to tell them something about your happiness. If you are a doctor, lawyer, or celebrity, it is assumed you are happy because of the money associated with those

Glengarry Glen Ross portrays a harsh view of American business that not only contradicts, but also befouls the values of the "American Dream." The idealistic importance of fairness, equality, and the idea that hard work brings success included in this "dream" of American society is clearly not reality in this play. The values of work ethic, and equal opportunity are betrayed, and there is a notable presence of racism, sexism, and an savage system of "dog-eat-dog" competition.

Many people in today’s society find themselves guilty of believing the common misconception that money can buy happiness. They go to school to become a doctor, lawyer, or other high paying job, with money and social status as their only incentives. Many will find that they have fallen into a trap, when they start earning their large salary, but still are not happy. While there were many messages present throughout Studs Terkels Working: a graphic adaptation, the most important reoccurring message seemed to be that having pride and dignity as well as working at a job that fulfills one’s life passion or is simply enjoyable are more important qualities than earning a large salary and having a high rank on the social ladder. The interaction of

Glengarry Glen Ross and Death of a Sales man were two extraordinary plays that were released decades ago and are still the basis of many conversations and debates today. The main protagonists in these plays are Shelley Levene; a middle aged sales man who was once very successful in his line of work, and Willy Lowman; a 62-year-old salesman who has been chasing after the American Dream his whole life. These two shared a lot of similarities, the main one being that they are not tragic heroes. Many writers have debated over the past decades whether or not Shelley and Willy are meant to be tragic heroes. From the views of Aristotle and Miller, they are not tragic heroes.

Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman tells the story of the failure of a salesman, Willy Loman. Although not all Americans are salesmen, most of us share Willy’s dream of success. We are all partners in the American Dream and parties to the conspiracy of silence surrounding the fact that failures must outnumber successes.(Samantaray, 2014)

All throughout America, competition flows through the people’s blood like an epidemic there’s no cure for. From the age Americans are infants, it is bred into them. They are taught that there are winners and there are losers, and not to be a loser. Although some believe this kind of competition can lead to success and happiness, the outcomes are quite the opposite. This is shown in Arthur Miller’s, Death of a Salesman when the main character, Willy Loman, not only lives his life by the myth of competition but also drives this myth into the minds of his family. This causes one of Willy’s sons to be led down a path of misguided aspirations, leads Willy to have very low self-esteem, and evokes poor relationships with others. Through this, Miller shows that competition is just a widely believed American myth which doesn’t lead to a fulfilling life.

The play Glengarry Glen Ross by David Mamet really left me with a different impression on play writing and literature in general. The play focuses around the characters of four real estate agents--Shelly Levene, Dave Moss, George Aronow, and Richard Roma--and their boss--John Williamson. The agents compete with each other by any means necessary, including scamming clients in order to secure the sale. Their goal is to make the most sales by the end of a certain time period. The winner receives a brand new Cadillac and gets all the bragging rights. Williamson controls all the cards in their competition. He handles who gets the best leads, meaning the future buyers of a house. The best leads would be the people with a steady financial background

The play, The Death of a Salesman, has had an impact on my knowledge of human behavior that actually refers much about the American consumerism as displayed and exhibited in our society today. Society in present day possesses many gifted individuals, however the predominant issue is that these people are not willing to accept that they inhabit in a troubled society. In addition, these people are confronted with more issues than just the ordinary problems. In the story, Death of a Salesman, Willy Loman suggests, “There’s more people! That’s what’s ruining this country!