arthur miller's play death of a salesman

The stream of conscious is observed in the play, which allows understanding Willy’s experiences. Because of social pressures, the protagonist faces the necessity to alter his way of thinking. He is an average citizen of a postmodern society who is not ready to live in the new materialized world and fails to become successful in it. The major issue is that the man does not have a chance to return to his previous life. He is not perceived as an individual and serves as an element that connects production and consumption. Willy is frustrated since he becomes a victim of technology.

The sense of isolation is spread, and human power is substituted by the advanced equipment, which leads to depression (Miller 12). The postmodernist era is characterized by the consumer and technological society. As Willy becomes unable to support his relatives, he decides to commit suicide in order to allow them to obtain insurance costs. The love of his family also turns out to be a concept that is measured by money. Therefore, the protagonist faces one more failure because of his inability to understand the realities of the postmodern society.

Willy has good contact with his two sons from the very beginning, but the situation worsens with the course of time. The same is true for the relationships between the characters. The protagonist lives in a world of false dreams, which prevents him from reaching them and becoming satisfied. In this way, it can be seen that Willy lives in the modernist world, but he does not yet realize its features and is not willing to follow them.Īccording to postmodernism, metanarratives, such as the American Dream, are also treated as a great lie. As a result, he does not have an opportunity to reach success in his business. The man fails to keep up with the time, which makes him uninteresting for buyers (Miller 6). He does not understand the necessity to emphasize individualism and sticks to generalized concepts. Willy is a salesman who uses those selling approaches that are out of fashion. In addition to that, it is possible to observe the reality of modernism in Miller’s work when focusing on the influence of technology and progress on a workplace. Hence, Willy fails in his life because he does not manage to become rich. One of its characters, Willy Loman, speaks about the American Dream, stating that this concept has no sense if it is considered only from a financial point of view, but it is actually so. A similar situation can be observed in the play Death of a Salesman. The concept of the American dream seems to be nonsense in this way since modernism treats the existence of societal structures (national identity, for instance) as something useless and fruitfulness. First of all, it rejects totality, which is characterized by increased guidance. Modernism can be seen in several elements of the play.

Arthur miller's play death of a salesman