Death of a Salesman

Values and Attitudes of the Author

The way fiction texts begin and end provides a clear indication of the dominant values and attitudes supported by the author

Values and attitudes that the author supports are often reflected in their writing, whether it be in the themes that are involved in the story, or the way it begins and ends. The author adopts a particular point of view and uses that point of view throughout the story to influence and impact readers and viewers. This is most often done through effective use of characterisation. Arthur Miller, in his play ‘Death of a Salesman’ uses his main character, Willy Loman, to heighten the audience to the nature of modern life and “set forth what happens when a man does not have a grip on the forces of life and has no sense of values which will lead him to that kind of grip”.

Willy Loman is 63 years old, a travelling salesman for a New York firm for the past 36 years, in the last stages of exhaustion and headed for suicide. He has his sights set on success. To Willy, success means two things: being rich, and being popular, neither of which he has or is ever likely to attain. We are intended to blame Willy for having all the wrong dreams, or rather, for holding onto those dreams long after they cease to correspond with reality. This is shown in the requiem, when at his father’s funeral, Biff states, “He had the wrong dreams, all wrong.” Biff knows that Willy should have stuck to doing things with his hands, instead of sticking to sales, where he faltered. This is backed up by Biff’s comment to Charley: “… there’s more of him in that front stoop than in all the sales he ever made” to which comes his reply, “Yeah. He was a happy man with a batch of cement.” Willy’s death is seen as the death of a dream.

Willy has chosen to imitate the salesman side of his father, a choice that was influenced greatly by his meeting of Dave Singleman, who comes to represent for Willy the father he never knew, as well as a role model in life, as is shown by Willy announcing to Howard: “… and without even leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I saw that, I realised selling was the greatest career a man could ever want.”

As Willy grows older, he has trouble distinguishing between the past and present - between illusion and reality - and is often lost in flashbacks where much of the story is told. These flashbacks are generally during the summer after Biff's senior year of high school when all of the family problems began. Biff, failing his maths exam, goes to Boston, to tell his father, and convince him to talk the teacher into getting him the extra marks because “he likes you, dad”. It is now, when he discovers his father with another woman that all of his illusions are shattered, his idol debased, and he surrenders to failure in life.

It could be that Willy’s failure in business and sales was a reflection of Miller’s father’s failure; when his business failed in 1929, the family began a downward spiral that culminated in the loss of their home and consequent move to Brooklyn. Miller never forgot the hopelessness that overtook his father and the tensions that it produced between his parents. The loss of personal security at such a crucial point in his development bred in him a lifelong sensitivity to his helplessness in the face of large and incomprehensible social forces, as well as to the impact of such helplessness on his sense of self and family relationships. Knowing this, we can compare this information to Biff’s point of view in the story; Biff sees his father’s failures in business to be the root of the family problems.

The play romanticizes the rural-agrarian dream but does not make it genuinely available to Willy. Miller seems to use this dream merely to give himself an opportunity for sentimentality, himself being a person who is fond of the countryside and in touch with nature. This is shown in the opening of the play; “A melody is heard, played upon a flute. It is small and fine, telling of grass and trees and the horizon.” It is then directly contrasted with the starkness of the newly erected apartment buildings; “… the surrounding area shows an angry glow of orange. As more light appears, we see a solid vault of apartment houses around the small, fragile-seeming home… “ This places emphasis on the urbanisation, and the city taking over, which can be metaphorically compared to Willy, with his dream taking over his life, eventually driving him to his death, as the apartments take over the freedom and openness of the countryside, and Willy is defeated by the city.

Willy Loman's wife Linda is not part of the solution but rather part of the problem with