Within The play Death of a Salesman there are many prevalent and discussion worthy themes. However the most interesting and most story changing themes would be Person vs. Self, Person vs. Society and lasty the American Deam. Person vs. Society is a rather interesting theme because of the very manner it affects Willy. Willy as the main character strives for success (in this case the American Dream). While he still struggles to achieve this goal, many around him have already attained. This in particular is very important because as society moves forward he is moving financially backwards. As a result people look down to him. Charlie offers him a job as a gesture of friendship, because he sees through the deceiving acts Willy plays pretending as if he is as financially stable as can be. Willy also tends to hide his instability because he is truly afraid of what may happen and what people may think of him if they knew of his struggle. He is a very self-conscious person when it comes to the subject of success.
Willy, attempting to be secretive of his financial struggle hides it not only from others, but himself as well. Willy lets himself believe that he has achieved the American Dream, when in reality he hasn’t done so. His self-consciousness misled him to believe that he goes through each day a successful man, when in reality he is just as bad as both his sons Happy and Biff. Happy and Biff. Because he has pretended that this struggle doesn’t exist for such a long time the minute he realizes it is reality it will cause his downfall.
The theme the American Dream is what every aspect of this story revolves around. Willy goes through so much trouble hiding his financial crisis from others and himself because he wants to think he has accomplished the greatest goal of all, become someone from no one. This idea in itself guides Willy's mind to think and do what he does throughout the length of the story. Also because almost all people around him have already accomplished the American Dream it simply makes it worse for Willy to handle. If the american dream did not exist, Willy might not have been so content on making money, instead using his personal time to spend with the family. The story in itself would not have existed without the American Dream, knowing that it is the one factor that causes his pain and stress.
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The theme the American Dream is what every aspect of this story revolves around. Willy goes through so much trouble hiding his financial crisis from others and himself because he wants to think he has accomplished the greatest goal of all, become someone from no one. This idea in itself guides Willy's mind to think and do what he does throughout the length of the story. Also because almost all people around him have already accomplished the American Dream it simply makes it worse for Willy to handle. If the american dream did not exist, Willy might not have been so content on making money, instead using his personal time to spend with the family. The story in itself would not have existed without the American Dream, knowing that it is the one factor that causes his pain and stress.
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Great work kid. The themes mentioned in this blog were very prevalent indeed. They are very noticeable themes that are quite easily identifiable while reading the book. Keep up the good work and please... stay classy
ReplyDeleteI like the themes you chose to write about. They are the ones that seem most relevant to the book, to me at least. A job well done.
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