Arthur Miller: Death of a Salesman (1949)
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How is Miller's handling of "illusion vs. reality"? What
is the symbolic function of the jungle? How does the flute music function
symbolically?
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In what ways do Ben and Charley function as opposites?
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Do you find Willy pathetic rather than tragic? If pathetic,
does this imply that Willy is a victim rather than a man who acts and who
wins our esteem? How much of Willy Loman's tragedy is caused by his own
personality and how much is the result of the American society?
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Do you feel that Miller is straining too hard to turn a play
about a little man into a big, impressive play? For example, do the musical
themes, the unrealistic setting, the appearances of Ben, and the speech
at the grave seem out of keeping in a play about the death of a salesman?
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The critic Kenneth Tynan has written, in Tynan Right and
Left: "Death of a Salesman ¡K is not a tragedy. Its catastrophe
depends entirely on the fact that the company Willy Loman works for no
pension scheme for its emplyees. What ultimately destroys Willy is economic
injustice, which is curable, as the ills that plague Oedipus do not." What
do you think of Tynan's view?
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Characterize Linda and comment on the role she plays.
Miller says that tragedy shows man's struggle to secure
"his sense of personal dignity" and that "his destruction in the attempt
posits a wrong or an evil in his environment" ("Tragedy and the Common
Man"). Do you think this makes sense when applied to some earlier tragedy
(such as Oedipus the King or Hamlet), and does it apply convincingly
to Death of a Salesman? Is this the tragedy of an individual's own
making? Or is society at fault for corrupting and exploiting Willy? Or
both?
 ¬ÛÃöºô¶¡GDeath
of a Salesman (Introduction to Literature, Spring 1999 )
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