Willy's American Dream

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In Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, the plot follows a salesman by the name of Willy Loman. It’s easy to mistake this story for one that just follows that simple man while he tries to make life work while subsequently falling off the wagon and spiraling into oblivion. With illusions of grandeur bestowed upon him by seeing his brother’s success, along with a smidgeon of success in his prime, he tries to forge his own path toward the American Dream. Though it’s soon evident that his dream is unachievable, which leads him to pay the ultimate price. Willy isn’t the only character in the play in pursuit of their own dream. Each of the Loman boys have their own American Dream. While Happy has a clear-cut path to his dream, to work his way up …show more content…
As Erkan states “he believes that the American Dream is to be rich. He thinks that the way to get rich is obtained either by having a good personality or “being liked”, but not through hard work.” While being rich could be placed in the top spot on many people’s list of dreams, Willy has distorted reality with a skewed vision on how it should be achieved. No person in their right mind would think that having a good personality is grounds for being rich, especially as your country is clawing its way out of the Great Depression.
During his unrelenting journey to achieve the perfect American Dream, Willy was able to successfully alienate himself from his family as he tried to push his twisted reality on to his sons. He bestowed the wholly incorrect notion to his boys that being popular and well-liked is the only thing a person needs to be successful which only serves to set them up for failure. He then turns to having an affair with another woman. Doing so for what “The Woman” provides, words of attestation, something that Willy desperately seeks. His floozy only poisons his mind and helps steer him down into the …show more content…
He comes to terms with the reality that he couldn’t achieve the dream like his brother Ben. This spiral which was long foreshadowed through the play ultimately forced him to turn his once picturesque life into a ruinous hellscape. One where he must make the ultimate sacrifice to have some semblance of success and finally provide the financial security to his family that he wasn’t able to achieve. As Ribkoff put it though “Driven by shame, he kills himself in order to preserve his dream of being “well liked” and a successful father and salesman. Of course, the irony is that because of his suicide the odds are very good that neither of his sons will benefit from his sacrifice, and nobody from his world of sales comes to his funeral.” Further proving that while everyone is entitled to their own vision of the American Dream, it is impossible to lie, cheat and fake your way to your dream. Willy’s ultimate sacrifice, one final act of what he perceived to be selflessness, was all in
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