DEATH OF A SALESMAN

Opening Blurb - ‘It is small and fine, tell- ing of grass and trees and the horizon.’ + ‘towering, angular shapes behind it, surrounding it on all sides.’

• Visual/Auditory Imagery

• Contrast

→ What does it achieve?:

• The first part is actually what Willy enjoys while what he see is the pressure he + society have built onto him

• Angular shapes connote to claustrophobia and entrapment -> pressure to succeed but also undermines the big claims he’s making -> right from the beginning, its unclear if he’ll ever trump these towering shapes

Opening Blurb - ‘Fragile-seeming house’

• Metaphor

→ What does it achieve?

• Not just the house, but the family and their dreams too.

Opening Blurb - ‘An air of the dream clings…’

• Personification

→ What does it achieve?

• ‘Cling’ as in desperation

The Flute

• Symbol

• Dramatic Irony?

→ What does it achieve?

• The flute connotes to these grassy and meadow like scenery as stated at the beginning, but only the viewers are aware of it and not Willy.

• It, thus, engages the reader and portrays Willy’s disillusionment with who he really is → isn’t aware of his own dreams/what makes him happy

• Tends to start playing when he’s about to go into his head → sort of a signal for the audience and thus, a symbol for his getting lost in his dreams/mental deterioration

Biff Trophy

• Symbol

→ What does it achieve?

• his singular moment of glory within his life, shows how that’s all they have to take pride in

• the sense that they clinging to past glory → helpless, pitiful

Opening Blurb - under and over it we see the apartment buildings.

• Stage direction

→ What does it achieve?

• Futher sense of entrapment

• The urgency and speed of modern life, no break to think about the things that really matter → the idea that america lives to work instead of working to live

Opening Blurb - ‘carrying two large sample cases.’

• Metaphor

→ What does it achieve?

• Not only is this representative of him not being able to achieve anything (his dreams) on the plot level, but the large cases are representative of all his hopes and dreams, symbolizing how they have been yet to be fulfilled.

Opening Blurb - ‘thankfully lets his burden down.’

• synecdoche?

→ What does it achieve?

• his dreams are weighing him down instead of pushing him to greater heights

ACT 1 - ‘iron repression of her exceptions to Willy’s behavior’

• Characterization

• A suppression of her own expectations for him → plays the traditional supportive partner, never lets him get angry and brushes off his shortcomings (even protects him at some point) like a mother would excuse her children

• She simply doesn’t let herself get annoyed

ACT 1 - ‘She admires him’ + longings which she shares but lacks the temperament to utter and follow to their end.

• Characterization

• buys into this dream, she’s also seduced by this false reality

• Relatively flat, round character with only one face which is to support Willy’s role in the story

ACT 1 - ‘calls with some trepidation’ + ‘(Slight pause.) Did something happen, Willy?’

• Stage direction/dialogue

• establishing their home life

• establishes a sense of urgency, that something is wrong

ACT 1 - ‘(very carefully, delicately)’

• Stage direction

• Establishes their relationship, suggests that Linda has to walk on eggshells around him, that she’s scared of how he is → doesn’t want to prompt or spark anything, or make him upset

ACT 1 - Frequent use of poor grammer, repitition, pauses, slang, meandering sentences, contractions, false starts and etc + changing the subject often → ‘Is there any cheese?’

• Dialoogue + Contrast

• This establishes a more realistic, naturalistic scene and gives the characters a deeper, less ficitious ‘role’

• Alternatively, it contrasts with how Linda speaks, which is very correct and formal (a lot of poetic heightening of language) → shows that out of all of them, she is the most educated

• Moreover, it also establishes Willy’s state of mind → that’s all fumbling, all over the place, can’t really make sense of himself

ACT 1 - ‘(She is taking off his shoes.)’ + ‘Be careful on the stairs, dear!’

• Characterization + Stage Direction

• Emphasizes Linda’s mother-like role towards Willy, she’s the one holding them together

• Morever, it emphasizes boy like-nature, that Willy is sort of delicate → at this age, he still hasn’t settled into who he is

ACT 1 - ‘(with wonder)’

• Stage directon

• Glimpse into Willy’s thought processes - he tends to get sucked into his fantasies and finds it hard to get to the point

• Also reinforces the idea of false dreams - he seems always to be dreaming in some sort of way, even when he’s explaining something that happened which is very much true

ACT 1 - ‘I have such thoughts, I have such strange thoughts.’

• Dialogue + Foreshadowing

• These are the first few hints of him wanting to comitt suicide

ACT 1 - ‘I’m the New England man. I’m vital in New England.’

• Contradiction + Superlative

• Emphasizes Willy’s fallacy of clinging onto a flase reality, because he has not been earning as he has not been selling. This directly shows he is not the New England Man - he has fallen from that status, either won’t accept it or won’t see it

• Says ‘THE’ New England man, which indicates his sense of exaggeration and the inflation of his own self-importance - can’t seem satisfied with remaining ordinary

ACT 1 - ‘(He starts putting on his jacket.)’ + (taking the jacket from him)

• Stage direction

• Tries to put the jacket back on even though he has just returned home, which is indicative of his failing mental state → disoriented, isn’t cemented in the reality

• Therefore, Linda taking it from him suggests that she is his principle of reality → but it is subtle, she is always gentle in grounding him again

ACT 1 - Linda reminiscing about the boys

• Dialogue → Contrasting

• Establishes this false sense of a happy family, but this gets quickly torn away when Willly brings up what happened

• Thus, by contrasting the past with the present → the illusion of a happy family is broken and tension is built

ACT 1 - ‘When the hell did I lose my temper?’

• Irony

• Struggling to face his reality, cannot see past the illusion of himself → unaware of who he is

ACT 1 - ‘(worried and angered): There’s such an undercurrent in him.’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Builds tension between them

• Audiences see Willy’s side of the story, the expectations he’s placed on him and thus, are similarly sucked into his view of Biff

• Thought, it is still apparent that Willy is just a worried parent → worried about the path Biff is on

ACT 1 - ‘I think if he finds himself, then you’ll both be happier and not fight any more.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• Again, Linda is the grounding force + the principle of reality and recognizes that Willy imposes on him instead of letting him breath

ACT 1 - How can he find himself on a farm? Is that a life? + Not finding yourself at the age of thirty-four is a disgrace!

• Declarative Sentences/Rhetorical Questions + Contradiction

• Further contradiction, because Willy hasn’t found himself either - criticizes Biff for all the things he is → ‘Filth teaches filth, thinking he’s rubbing it clean’

• Even though Willy is seen to be happiest when he is working with his hands and what not, he outwardly has little respect for that sort of life → The false reality he has created for himself is imposed on Biff as well, a reality Biff seemingly struggles to escape from

ACT 1 - ‘Biff is a lazy bum!’ + ‘he’s not lazy!’

• Further contradiction

• Helps to emphasize Willy’s disorientation

ACT 1 - ‘The way they boxed us in here. Bricks and windows, windows and bricks.’

• Dialogue

• Again, Wills seems to recognize the claustrophobic world he has created and one he imposes on Willy, but he never gets further than that - He doesn’t like it either, yet he cannot realize his true dreams

ACT 1 - ‘(turning to Linda, guiltily)’

• Stage direction

• Builds tension/expectation that the audience will come to know why he is feeling guilty, but that expectation is not delivered on

ACT 1 - ‘his dreams are stronger and less acceptable than Happy’s.’

• Stage direction

• Biff shares many of the same dreams as Willy, but they are not tailored for Willy’s false reality and therefore, is less acceptable

• Had fallen into Willy’s flase reality and too, thought he was great at 17

ACT 1 - ‘a scent that many women have discovered’ + (combing his hair) + ‘It got so embarrassing.’

• Stage direction

• Shows Happy’s superficial and shallow nature, mostly concerned about himself and his appearances and doesn’t seem to love Willy to the same extent

ACT 1 - ‘Most of the time he’s talking to you’

• Characterization

• Audiences are able to see the relationship from another perspective → Biff is clearly Willy’s entire world, tends to glorify him too much

ACT 1 - Biff’s speech

• as though he’s stuck in a paradigm

• treated as a model of some sort of ideal life for Willy, the harbringer of glory, but that is not what Biff wants

• A clear expression of how the American Dream affects ordinary people

ACT 1 - ‘(with rising agitation)’

• Stage Direction

• Continues to build up tension, creates this feeling of urgency

ACT 1 - ‘It’s why I came home now, I guess, because I realized it. This farm I work on, it’s spring there now, see?’

• Dialogue

• Continues to meander like his father - both of them have a lot in common, but it is also a reflection of how he, as a person, is also lost

ACT 1 - ‘After a pause: I’ve always made a point of not wasting my life, and everytime I come back here I know that all I’ve done is to waste my life.’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• It’s like coming back to where you started, which therefore adds to this sense of defeat and failure

• It also raises the question of why Biff thinks he’s wasting his energy → because of himself or his father?

ACT 1 - ‘I just — I’m like a boy.’

• False starts

• Signifies his confusion and just how lost he is as a person too

• The declaration is also representative of Willy as he is often told to grow up → Biff seems to be a reflection of Willy himself, just that neither of them are willing to see it like that necessarily

ACT 1 - ‘I’m lonely’

• Kind of superficial, projects self-pity onto people and forces them to empathize with him too

ACT 1 - ‘(with vast affection): Sure, we’d be known all over the counties!’

• But they lose themselves fantasizing and dreaming again

ACT 1 - ‘See, Biff, everybody around me is so false that I’m constantly lowering my ideals…’ + ‘The only thing is — what can you make out there?’ + ‘I gotta show some of those pompous, self-important executives over there that Hap Loman can make the grade.’

• Further, unconcious irony

• It is clearly Biff that is flase, but he projects this onto other people, because he contradicts himself literally a few lines later (not direct contradiction, but-) one can tell that Biff’s main motivator is money and women and sort of ‘leaves Biff behind’ for it

• This further characterizes them as two separate reflections of Willy → Biff, the true side of him trying to figure himself out and what truly makes him happy, and Happy, all the poor sides of him that doesn’t have much redemption

ACT 1 - ‘But look at your friend. Builds an estate and then hasn’t the peace of mind to live in it.’

• Perhaps what Biff wants is to be at peace.

ACT 1 - ‘Somebody with character, with resistance! Like Mom, y’know?’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Firstly, this is alarming because it shows he wants someone that can take care of him and baby him instead of a real partner → again, superficial. He is looking only for what benefits him

• Secondly, Hap is again representative of Willy, who Linda seems to mother and take care of constantly

ACT 1 - ‘...maybe I just have an overdeveloped sense of competition or something, but I went and ruined her, and furthermore I can’t get rid of her.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• Seems to see women as trophis or objects → again this superficiality and shallowness

• It is sort of disgusting as he sees them as a means to get petty revenge, they seem to have a monetary value to him like money does → no true love or passion in his life

ACT 1 - ‘He put his arm on my shoulder, and he said, »Biff, if you ever need anything, come to me.«’ + ‘I know he thought the world of me, though. I was the only one he’d let lock up the place.’

• Dialogue

• The art of plays and theatre → because we are learning of this directly through Biff’s own recounting, we have no direct way of confirming or denying it. Therefore, this is unreliable narration.

• This may be just another one of their fantasies Biff has fallen into - playing up a false reality like Willy

ACT 1 - ‘A look of pain crosses Biffs face.’

• Stage direction

• It’s clear he still loves Willy - he is either grieving Willy as he is right now or he is grieving their past relationship.

ACT 1 - The description as Willy is falling into his false reality → ‘The apartment houses are fading out….’

• Stage Direction

• Firstly, Willy is clearly reminiscing about the good old days, which are coated in his own notsalgia → The description is reminiscent of an earthy, nature like place which reinforces this idea that that is what Willy truly wants

• Secondly, the thing he reminisces about most is his relationship with Biff even thought back then they had as much money as they do now → What matters the most here is clearly his relationship with his son

ACT 1 - ‘Too young entirely, Biff….(He laughs) Boy, you must really be makin’ a hit.’

• Dialogue

• The way he moves from trying to lecture Biff to indulging in him is indicatives of their relationship → he tends to coddle Biff and rarely disciplines him and keeps his eyes on the ball, this is where his lack of work ethic, thinking what he can do comes from

• He glorified him before he had any real chance to earn glory, so Biff walked around with a damaging, flase bravado that didn’t do him any good

ACT 1 - Them cleaning a car + Willy talking about hanging up a hammock

• Dialogue

• Again, these are Willy’s real dreams where the real happiness comes from

ACT 1 - ‘I’m losing weight, you notice, Pop?’ +

• Characterization

• As is apparent throughout the play, Willy’s main focus is on Biff and it seems Miller is conveying how overlooked Happy is sometimes by Willy → he seems to be earning for his father’s attention/affection

ACT 1 - ‘Well, I borrowed it from the locker room. (He laughs confidentially.)’ + ‘(laughing with him at the theft)

• Stage direction

• This is a ‘we both know what I mean’ sort of laugh and it again highlights how little Biff gets disciplined in his childhood → Willy coddles and indulges him, glorifiying in a way that Biff can never truly make a mistake in his eyes and therefore, confines him into a space where he cannot grow to actually attain the ‘big dreams’ he’s been set up for

• Moreover, Miller deliberately uses the word ‘theft’, ensuring that audiences understand → Willy does not see it as wrong.

ACT 1 - ‘He’s liked, but he’s not — well liked.’

• Dialogue

• Willy seems to think being liked is the key to success

ACT 1 - The stories Willy tells his boys → ‘Met the Mayor.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• They’re all highly exaggerated and play into his false reality → he inflates his own self-importance, which further creates this effect of hope and glory, that he’s gonna make it big soon or that he already has

• Sort of reflective of Happy’s own inflated ego

ACT 1 - ‘Gee, I’d love to go with you sometime, Dad.’

• Foreshadowing? Dramatic Irony?

• Because it is when he visits Willy in Boston that everything falls apart

ACT 1 - ‘(taking Willy’s hand): This Saturday, Pop, this Saturday just for you…’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Builds up how their relationship used to be, contrasts with what it is now and makes the change os much more devesatating

• Therefore, builds up anciticipation from audiences as it prompts them to ask ‘What happened?’

ACT 1 - ‘Bernard can get the best marks in school…you’re both built like Adonises’

• Appearance Vs. Reality → He again plays into this flase idea that being liked is better than actually having skills and he genuinely believes his boys are going to make it big just because they’re likeable

• Allusion to Adonis → Beautiful boy from greek mythology that was loved by both Aphrodite and Persephone, died as a result of it

ACT 1 - ‘Chevrolet, Linda, is the greatest car ever built.’ → Proceeds to talk about it like a good for nothing car

• Contradiction + Superlatives + Characterization

• Willy exaggerates so much, conflates his ego and everything else around him except when the situation doesn’t call for it → reflection of his own personality

ACT 1 - ‘The way they obey him!’ + ‘Well, that’s training, the training.’

• Dialogue

• Although Linda is often the principle of reality, she too gets sucked into their world of inflated egos, of all this false glory → Like Willy, she too sets Biff on a pedestal that he’s not prepared to stand on/without preparing him to stand on it

• Moreover, Willy equates it to ‘training’ i.e how he’s trained him, which indicates how for him, Biff’s accomplishments are his own - He seems to bask in Biff’s reflected glory.

ACT 1 - ‘(without hesitation): Two hundred gross. That’s... (She figures.)’

• Dialogue

• Yet again, Linda acts as the principle of relaity to his fantasy. She is the bring him down to the cold hard earth when he gets sucked into his fantasies.

ACT 1 - ‘The trouble was that three of the stores were half-closed for inventory in Boston. Otherwise I woulda broke records.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• This is something we can note often. Whenever something goes right for Willy, (eg. Biff’s trophies and highschool glory) he tends to link it back to himself positively, but whenever it doesn’t he tends to make up excuses for it

• It, again, seems as though Willy cannot face his reality → whenever something doesn’t the flase reality he’s created for himself, he marks it down to meaningless coincidences or faults that have nothing to do with him

• Inflation of ego holding him back

ACT 1 - The talk about having to pay more for the refrigerator.

• A criticsim of american consumerism - higher purpose purchasing

• That it is actually more expensive to be poor because you cannot afford good quality products that you are having to constantly replace them which costs more money in the long run

ACT 1 - ‘My God, if business don’t pick up I don’t know what I’m gonna do!’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Also helps to add this dramatic tension → a tonal shift from previously where everything was happier and he was talking about how much everyone loves him, but now he’s lost and depicted as not as great as he said to be → Appearance vs. Reality

• Gets very close to a critical self-evaluation, but never fully commits to it

ACT 1 - ‘I’m very well liked in Hartford. You know, the trouble is, Linda, people don’t seem to take to me.’

• Further contradiction, and one which is back to back.

• Willy is completely unaware of himself and this depicts his deteriorating mental state I believe or just the idea that Willy finds it hard to distinguish between his false reality and what is truly happening.

ACT 1 - ‘Linda goes into the kitchen and starts to dam stockings’ + Stockings

• Stage direction + Symbolism

• It’s that Willy buys more stockings for the other woman while Linda has to mend hers → This contradiction within Willy’s character and whether he truly loves Linda or not

• Also symbolises the difference between Willy’s two sides → Linda’s side which is a family man, affectionate and satisfied with his real dreams of the country side and working with his hands or the other woman’s side, a man who wants to make it big in business and who is false, artificial even → MAYBE THIS IS A STRETCH

ACT 1 - ‘ I’m fat…’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• A shift from his earlier inflated ego, he seems self-concious now and again those walls around his false reality seem to be breaking, but he never fully gets there

ACT 1 - Linda and Willy’s moment + The woman in the background + ‘You didn’t make me, Willy. I picked you.’ + ‘I’ll put you right through to the buyers.’

• This choice of structure, layering the woman’s voice over Willy and Linda’s moment seems to help contrast/contradict the idea of Willy loving Linda

• I do, however, believe that he does love her and that he feels guilty about what he did

• However, most importantly, it shows a different side to Willy’s character and how he’s not completely a good person?

• Moreover, I think this is again the difference between what he wants and where he is happiest versus what he is unnecessarily seeking → representative of him sacrificing his family and love for the monetary money and success of the contemporary world

• Lastly, the fact that she picked him I feel also adds to this idea that this isn’t necessarily what Willy wants, but what he’s made to think he wants.

• Additionally, this idea of her ‘putting him through to the buyers’ reinforces this idea that she represents his dreams and ambition, that he is sort of betraying his family for his dreams because he thinks that’s what he’s supposed to want.

ACT 1 - ‘(angrily, taking them from her): I won’t have you mending stockings in this house!’

• Stage Direction + Dialogue

• He seems guilty for the fact that Linda has to mend her socks while he bvuys new ones for the other woman, therefore showing his guilt through anger

• Chartacterizes Willy as, again, someone who can’t seem to own up to his mistakes properly because of an inflation of the ego → Not particularly mature.

ACT 1 - The switch in Willy’s dream + ‘Why is he taking everything?’

• Tonal Shift + Unconciouss Irony

• → Bernard’s insistence of Biff studying, Linda’s comments on him bringing back that football and that he’s too rough with the girls undermines what he and Willy were saying in the beginning - reinforces the idea of them living in a flase reality

• Again, Willy also seems to be blaming it on Biff and is confused as to why he is acting that way - there is a disillusionment here and Willy is clearly not aware that Biff is a reflection of his own teaching

• As he says before, ‘Training’, except only when it serves him

ACT 1 - Willy breaking down at the end of his halluciantion

• Tonal Shift + Cut-off, mingled Dialogue

• Creates overwhelhmed sense of suffocation, entrapment and gives the impression that a lot of things have gone wrong for him to be at the state he is

• Also the idea that it is all centered around Biff → Biff is his shining beacon, Biff also represents his dreams

ACT 1 - ‘Willy is alone in the kitchen, wilting and staring. The leaves are gone. It is night again, and the apartment houses look down from behind.’

• Description/Stage Direction

• Throughout Willy’s hallucination, Miller builds up anticipation/expectation until it all comes crashing down and as the it shatters, the description is contrasted from the beginning of Willy’s hallucination

• Willy is alone - without family, without what is essentially the most important thing emphasised in this book. It’s the idea that chasing all these dreams is what tore them apart.

• ‘wilting and staring’ → Extended metaphor of the growth of plants for the growth/success of a person, he is wilting, he is essentially ruined now

• It being night again seems to symbolize the loss of hope → connotes to dark, gloomy, lifeless atmosphere

• The apartments look down → I feel like apartments conote to this modern american success/dream that everyone longs and they are also very tall, signifying prestige, but they look down on him - one hand, signifies that he’s still beneath them, hasn’t achieved that status, one the other, connotes to this sense of entrapment or suffocation - he is suffocated by his dreams

ACT 1 - ‘Why is he stealing? What did I tell him? I never in my life told him anything but decent things.’

• Dialogue

• Again, Willy is not self-aware. He again blames Biff or literally anything that is not him for his behaviour

• As Biff is a direct representation for his dreams, he seems to be making excuses for when his dreams aren’t the way he imagined

ACT 1 - ‘Walked into a jungle, and comes out, the age of twenty-one, and he’s rich!’ + ‘The world is an oyster, but you don’t crack it open on a mattress!’

• Dialogue + Metaphor

• The jungle here seems to be representing the stock market or the business world and the idea that Ben marched into it, got what he needed and left.

• Also the second sentence seems to be a metaphor of how ‘you can’t win’ if you don’t take the risks, you can’t win if you stay idly and stay comfortable/don’t move

ACT 1 - ‘Where are you guys, where are you? The woods are burning! I can’t drive a car!’

• Metaphor

• Connotes to a sense of urgency and imminent destruction

• He seems to have regarded his sons, particularly Biff, as his saviours, but they are not ‘playing their part’. He is seeking support from them, but there is no support on their end to give.

• The idea that everything he has or has built ‘the woods’ are falling apart, coupled with ‘I can’t drive a car!’ seems to connote to this idea of losing control → He can’t drive the car. He can’t control the wheel.

ACT 1 - ‘No, you’re ignorant. You gotta know about vitamins and things like that.’

• Dialogue + Foil

• It seems Bernard and Charley act as a FOIL to the Lomans. They are more educated, they work hard, they are lowkey and more mature compared to those chasing dreams without anything to back it up.

• Something Willy is aware of too, so whenever he’s with them, he tries to save face and act like he’s at the same level as Charley, but it only makes him look childish and is sort of shaemful.

ACT 1 - ‘(After a slight pause.) What the hell are you offering me a job for?’

• Characterization + Dialogue

• The slight pause seems to indicate Willy wrestiling with feelings of pride and humiliation at being offered a job from someone he is jelous of. Moreover, in a theatrical sense, it creates tension, especially between Charley and Willy

• Moreover, it’s clear that what holds him back from accepting a job is his own self-pride as Charley’s success serves as a painful contrast to Willy’s failures.

ACT 1 - ‘I got nothin’ to give him, Charley, I’m clean, I’m clean.’

• Dialogue

• Again helps not only to build tension between him and Biff, but also engages the audience in raising questions, because structurally, we have not seen them interact yet. There are just the accounts from them individually, contrasted by the hallucination Willy has.

• Moreoever, it hints at how much Willy does still love Biff, but also foreshadows what will happen at the end. Having ‘nothing to give him’, he gives up the last his very self.

ACT 1 - ‘A man who can’t handle tools is not a man. You’re disgusting.’

• Contradiction + Characterization through Dialogue

• Again, Willy is deluded and not self-aware of his own dreams. Instead, he chases what he thinks he should, what makes a successful man.

• Possibly, this idea may have been implanted in him having seen his brother go away at a young age and become rich - looks up to Ben, likely why Ben appears to him when he is feeling low in esteem and status.

ACT 1 - ‘(Uncle Ben, carrying a valise…..)

• Characterization + Stage direction

• Ben is wrought in mystery and this otherworldly quality that makes him seem more like a legend or a fictious figure, which means that Willy’s dreams of success (which Ben represents) is of the same nature.

ACT 1 - ‘Did you call me Ben?’

• Dialogue

• Not particularly significant, but it works to bring audiences to reality and highlights the idea that Willy very much stuck in his head, that he’s not mentally ok and that what they are seeing is not ok.

• Separation of audience from the character.

ACT 1 - ‘I only have a few minutes.’ → Ben constantly coming and disappearing, but never staying for too long, never staying just when Willy needs him to the most

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Ben throughout the play works to create this sense of urgency, this unpeaceful motion that is almost suffocating.

• He comes around at times, but always disappears quickly. Reinforces this idea that he prioritzed money and success over family, that he may be at the top, but he doesn’t have anyone, which is reinforced by how he left Willy behind when he was only a baby.

ACT 1 - Ben appearing for Willy when he is low

• Narrative/Structural Point

• Moreover, he tends to come to Willy when he is at his lowest, serving as a reminder for the outrageous ideals and goals that Willy longs for. A representation of the American Dream → False reassurance

ACT 1 - ‘That’s too bad. Fine specimen of a lady, Mother.’

• Characterization + Dialogues

• Again, reinforces this idea that even if Ben ‘made it’, he gave up his family and relationships and everything sentimental for that sake.

ACT 1 - ‘I have many enterprises, William, and I have never kept books.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• Coupled with his speech of ‘going into the jungle’, it seems that Ben’s sucess is morally questionable and vague on purpose - a criticism of American society and its exploitive nature to becomes successful. It is more about boldness and risk.

ACT 1 - ‘But I’ve only a few minutes...’ + ‘No! Boys! Boys! (Young Biff and Happy appear.) Listen to this. This is your Uncle Ben, a great man! Tell my boys, Ben!’ + (to the boys): You see what I been talking about? The greatest things can happen!

• Dialogue

• For Willy, Ben represents the idealized American Dream and is almost ‘proof’ that you can make it big in this country, which is why presenting him in front of his sons sort of validates his claims about material success and dreams and helps to ‘fire’ them up.

• By calling on Ben to "tell my boys," Willy seeks external validation, suggesting his insecurity and need for affirmation that his values and beliefs are correct. Especially because Ben is a romatic, idealized figure in his life-it’s like he’s trying to appeal to both sides.

• The hallucinations show how deeply he retreats into the past to escape the present, and his desperation indicates his growing sense of failure and impending breakdown.

ACT 1 - Ben’s speech about his and Willy’s father

• Dialogue

• He embodies the frontier spirit of America: adventurous, self-made, and constantly moving toward new opportunities.

• The comparison between their father and "a man like you" (referring to Willy) sharpens the divide between this romantic ideal and Willy’s reality.

• Willy's failure to live up to this myth contributes to his feelings of inadequacy and fuels his tragic pursuit of validation through material success.

• Willy's fixation on passing on a legacy to his own sons, particularly Biff, mirrors his longing to live up to his father’s example—a longing he ultimately cannot satisfy.

• Ben’s recounting of their father is likely exaggerated and tinged with nostalgia, making it more myth than fact.

• The contrast between the myth and Willy’s reality highlights the destructive power of unattainable ideals.

ACT 1 - Sequence of Ben & Biff fighting - ‘(to Willy): Why must he fight, dear?’ + ‘Never fight fair with a stranger, boy. You’ll never get out of the jungle that way.’

• Dialogue + Metaphors

• This entire interaction is a metaphor for the business world or the journey you have to take to succeed per the American Dream. Linda wondering if he has to fight, reinforces her role as the principle of reality and she becomes sort of a ‘mouthpiece’ for the broader theme within the novel: Is money success? Do you have to be great to be happy?

• Moreover, Ben’s advice about ‘not fighting fair’ underscores this recurrent moral ambiguity of success in American society - if you wanna succeed in the business world (jungle), you will have to do some immoral things.

ACT 1 - (withdrawing her hand coldly, frightened): Have a nice trip.

• Stage direction

• Ben embodies the reckless, cutthroat version of the American Dream—one achieved through risk and exploitation. Linda, as the moral and stabilizing force of the play, sees Ben as a dangerous influence on Willy, whose admiration for Ben borders on obsession

• She values family, stability, and loyalty, while Ben represents self-serving ambition and opportunism.

• She is grounded in reality

ACT 1 - ‘No, Ben, I don’t want you to think... (He takes Ben’s arm to show him)’

• Stage direction + Dialogue + Characterization

• Willy clearly values Ben’s perception of him and the short, statements of his previously represent his disappointment or disdain

• Thus, Willy is trying to reinforce the idea that he is also on his path to success and-because its just an illusion-he’s trying to reassure himself as well, especially because Willy is a prideful man and doesn’t want to admit to his shortcomings.

ACT 1 - The sequence with the watchman and Charley trying to tell Willy - ‘Willy, the jails are full of fearless characters.’ + ‘(angrily): Shut up! He’s not stealing anything!’

• Structure + Stage Direction + Characterization

• Willy's misguided ideals have led Biff astray, contributing to his disillusionment and lack of direction.

• Charley points out that recklessness without responsibility or moral grounding often leads to failure or ruin—hence the jails being "full of fearless characters.” → Those people who were fearless ended up in bad situations.

• Charley serves as a foil to Willy, embodying practical, grounded values that contrast with Willy’s romanticized notions of risk-taking and charm.

• Willy’s permissive attitude toward such behavior (e.g., dismissing Biff’s theft of the football as "initiative") fosters a false belief that charisma and daring alone can lead to success.

• Willy internalized Biff’s failures as his own, but he is too prideful to admit it even to himself-thus, refusing to acknowledge or recognize it. He has glorified him so much, he doesn’t want to see Biff’s flaws.

ACT - ‘My New England man comes back and he’s bleeding, they murdered him up there.’ + ‘It’s contacts, Charley, I got important contacts!’ + ‘(sarcastically): Glad to hear it, Willy.’

• Dialogue + Metaphor + Contrasts + Irony + Foreshadowing

• Firstly, the line captures Charley’s recognition of how the business world exploits individuals like Willy and clearly shows Charley’s practical, grounded views

• This contrasts with Willy’s romantic and idealized view of the world, allowing him to act as a FOIL

• He is repeatedly trying to tell Willy what’s going on and tries to help him, but Willy is too deluded to listen

• The idea of him being deluded is further shown by irony - Charley clearly says ‘they’ murder him, referring to the people Willy works with as a Salesman only for Willy to remark that success is all about contacts → He can’t understand that the very thing he is striving for is what will kill him whereas Charley sees the bigger picture and recognizes that Willy’s approach has always been doomed to fail.

• Charley then gives up and yet Willy still can’t hear the sarcasm in his voice.

• The image of the salesman "bleeding" and "murdered" conveys the violence and cruelty of the business world. Salesmen like Willy are seen as disposable, their worth tied only to their productivity.

• Willy’s clinging to "contacts" also represents his pride and his refusal to accept Charley’s help. This stubbornness ultimately isolates Willy further, deepening his despair and hastening his downfall.

ACT 1 - ‘You’re just what I need, Ben, because I — I’ + ‘ I still feel — kind of temporary about myself.’

• Dialogue + Characterization

• For all the confidence he puts on, he still hasn’t found himself. This contrasts with Willy’s attitude about ‘Biff’ finding himself - again he criticizes Biff for all the things he is.

• Furthermore, it shows that Willy had all the wrong dreams, that he worked for something he never truly wanted because that’s what he thought he should do.

ACT 1 - ‘I’ll be late for my train.’

• Structure + Dialogue

• This comes up exactly as Willy starts to open up. Not only does this signify Ben’s priorties-putting business over love and family, but this connotes to the pressure of time.

• Ben, representing the American Dreams, squashes Willy’s pursuits/realizations of himself, because ‘there’s no time’ to think about those sorts of stuff. He just has to keep working and providing.

• It also gives the impression that Willy keeping chasing Ben i.e the American Dream and how it won’t stop for him.

ACT 1 - ‘(giving great weight to each word, and with a certain vicious audacity): William, when I walked into the jungle, I was seven- teen. When I walked out I was twenty-one. And, by God, I was rich!’ + ‘To walk into a jungle! I was right! I was right! I was right!’

• Repitition

• This line is constantly repeated in association with Ben, which I believe is a criticism of the American Dream again. It is so vague and meaningless, we can attribute it to luck, exploitation and boldness - a success without any substance. This is why is can’t be replicated by everyone and it is systematically poor → Yet, Willy is too deluded into thinking it can happen for him too.

• The last line also connotes to a childlike excitement based on fantasies that don’t align with the reality → he prefers his false reality and will take anything that supports it.

ACT 1 - ‘(looking straight up): Gotta break your neck to see a star in this yard.’

• Metaphor + Subconcious Irony

• On one hand, this is representative of Willy’s true dreams, how subconsiously his real self doesn’t want all this rigid, material success.

• Secondly, I feel like it is also a metaphor of the amount of work you have to put in this society to be given the right to live comfortably → Injustice, a rough and tumble, ruthless world.

ACT 1 - ‘You pawned it, dear. Twelve, thirteen years ago. For Biffs radio correspondence course.’

• Dialogue + Characterization + Foreshadowing

• Again, shows how much he put into Biff because Biff’s achievements were directly linked to his own. However, I also believe he did this out of love. All together, it foreshadows his later actions of giving up his life for Biff → makes it more acceptable/understandable that Willy would do this for him.

ACT 1 - ‘(calling after Willy): But in your slippers, Willy!’

• Dialogue

• Again, shows Willy’s mental derterioration and disorienatation, especially in his current financial situation.

ACT 1 - ‘Well, come around more often; you’ll hear him. (She sits down at the table and mends the lining of Willy’s jacket.)’

• Stage Direction + Dialogue

• I believe this shows Linda’s values in contrast to the wider society of America in the novel. Her plea that they ought to come around more often than emphasizing any success or whatever shows that she cares more about family and sentimental ideals. It also shows her devotion to Willy in the way she tries to take care of him even if he’s not there.

ACT 1 - ‘It’s when you come home he’s always the worst.’ + The duality of Willy when it comes to Biff

• Characterization + Dialogue

• Again, from now one, we’ve only seen Biff and Willy’s relationship based on accounts from other people or from the past, which strongly contrast with each other. By structurally building up these account, Miller is able to build up anticipation within the readers about their relationships and prompts readers to ask ‘What happened?’ between them.

• Moreover, it also shows that Willy does care for his son as he is genuinenly excited to see him again, but this is stained by Willy’s dreams for his son and his subsequent disappointment in him not achieving them - again, his failures are Willy’s.

ACT 1 - ‘Biff, a man is not a bird, to come and go with the springtime.’

Poetic heightening of language

• The ‘springtime’ may symbolize a time of fruition and prosperity, indicating that men do not have the luxury of constantly ‘prospering’ or only being around when things are ‘good’

ACT 1 - ‘I just stopped dyeing it, that’s all.’ + ‘Dye it again, will ya? I don’t want my pal looking old. (He smiles.)’

• Metaphor + Dialogue + Parallel + Characterization

• I believe this represents Biff’s deperate urge for the past, for the ‘good old’ days just like Willy’s hallucinations do as well. Thus, this helps to parallel their characters together and shows that they are more alike then previously thought.

• It is as if they are both grieving the past and attempting to coat it with nostalgia. Morever, it shows Biff’s insistence on family, especially his mother. It, therefore, makes his falling out with his father for his mother’s sake make so much more sense.

ACT 1 - ‘He always, always wiped the floor with you. Never had an ounce of respect for you.’

• Metaphor

• By contrasting Linda’s clear devotion with the way Biff sees their relationship, it builds tension within the environment and subtly tells audiences why they might have had a falling out/the fact that Biff knows.

ACT 1 - ‘Then make Charley your father, Biff….You called him crazy-’ + ‘A small man can be just as exhausted as a great man.’

• Speech/Dialogue + Periodic sentences + Repitition

• Arthur Miller reinventing what it means to be a hero → writing a play about ordinary people who are not any more special than their peers.

• Willy has strived his entire life to be great, but he is still not a hero, in the end he is a ‘hero’ (tragic, but nonetheless) because he loved his son enough and he was good enough to sacrifice himself for it.

• The sentence about attention is periodic, making the point come at the end, therefore audiences have to hand on until the end, which makes it more impact.

• Repirition of ‘He’s not…’ helps to make the subsequent counterclaim much more effective, reinforces this idea that ordinary people have just as much value as great people.

• The last line: The idea that ordinary people have as value as a great person.

ACT 1 - ‘(indignantly): I didn’t know that, Mom.’

• Dialogue

• Firstly, it criticizes the American Dream and society in general, because despite all the work he’s put into the company, he’s being treated like nothing for it. He’s being given no respect for it → Thus, underscores the pragmatic, ruthelessness of the American Society

• Moreover, it also shows Happy’s hypocrisy, as Linda points out, because he acts much in the same way these business people do.

ACT 1 - ‘(sharply but contained): What woman?’

• Dialogue + Talking over each other

• Makes things realistic, but also adds tension, because the audience infers soemthing Linda misses. Like this, Miller consistently weaves around these hints that the other woman is the reason Biff is upset with his father

• Especially structurally, they were just talking about what could have happened between Biff and Willy.