Death of a Salesman is regarded as one of the three most remarkable tragedies in America. The author, Arthur Miller, emphasized that the drama should not only express characters’ psychological and subjective world but also convey the real complex social situation. It has successfully characterized the tragedy of a common salesman in America. It is significant to analyze why Willy committed suicide. This paper managed to analyze the causes of Willy Loman’s death, namely, mainly from three perspectives: a personal tragedy, a family tragedy, and a social tragedy. In fact, the society Willy lived in was familiar with in our present era, people are also facing similar problems Willy had at that time. Hence, through analyzing Willy’s death, we could discover that his life revealed some social problems behind the personal and family tragedy in current society, arousing our reflection on ethical and moral standards in a money-oriented society. And the most important thing is to know ourselves.
Along with Tennessee Williams and Eugene O’Neill, Miller was one of the best-known American playwrights after the Second World War. Among his works, Death of a Salesman made a sensation since it was performed in 1949, which secured his reputation as one of the nation’s foremost playwrights.
Set in New York and Boston in the late 1940s, this play describes the tragedy of Willy Loman, an average traveling salesman, in his sixties, who could never familiarize himself with the “American Dream”, nor could he realize the brutal commercial world, always dreaming of the impractical future for his two children. His love for his two sons with incorrect approaches ruined their life. His final suicide, is a sacrifice for his family, especially for the future of his elder son, Biff, however, he could not fully convey his love for his family members.
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Scholars abroad and at home have done much research about the Death of a Salesman, from various perspectives. Many of them focused on the study or critics of the tragedy of the family, the father-son conflicts. Ke Jianhua pointed out that Willy Loman’s tragedy is caused by the conflicts between the ethical dream (American dream) and commercial jungle law (morality alienation). [1] It was from the macro level, but the tragedy was not that simple. Through analyzing the realistic features in literature, character, stage design, and language, Wang Qian argued that Death of a Salesman is a play in which realism is perfectly used.[2] It mainly analyzed the realism, language features, and stage design, not focusing on the protagonist’s death.
Therefore, this paper explores more detailed causes; Willy Loman’s death, we think, was not merely his personal tragedy, but also the family tragedy and the social tragedy, as well.
Dishonest and Hypocritical. As a common person, Willy Loman longed for gaining others’ respect, including his family, his neighbors, and his brother. However, there was no need for him to utilize lies to conceal his failure. Dishonesty was the flaw of his personality. He told lies about how popular and respected he was in the town, and how important he was to New England, wanting to be adored and admired by his sons. In fact, he was not that popular.
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