Discuss the Role and Importance of the First "Flashback" Scene in Death of a Salesman.

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Discuss the Role and Importance of the First "Flashback" Scene in

Death of a Salesman

The main point of this scene is to show how Willy feels and what he is thinking. It also explains to the audience the reasons for why Biff's life has been turned upside down and how Willy was connected to this. We are not entirely sure whether all of this is true: I think that Willy changes his memories to how he interprets them.

The structure of the scene is a crescendo. Basically it starts off with Willy remembering the best things that he did and how good those days were. Then as he remembers more he recalls all the bad things that happened and that maybe it wasn't such a good time. Everything in his life was going well, he was successful at his job, he had respect, his family looked up to him and his two boys were also doing well. Then Willy's bad memories start to filter through. There were signs that Biff was stealing and was not performing well at school when he takes a football from school without permission and Bernard informs Willy that he is going to flunk maths. We also find out that he is not doing so well at his job as he made out to his sons when he talks to Linda: he is not selling that much when working and that people don't really take him seriously. Probably the main revelation is that we find out that he has had an affair with a woman in Boston while on business. Finally we see Bernard and Linda bombard Willy with complaints about Biff, saying " He's driving the car without a license" and  "All the mothers are afraid of him" suggesting that it is Willy's fault that Biff's in trouble and he should do something. This is how there is a crescendo of Willy's bad memories- getting worse and worse as he goes along.

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Continuing with structure, there are a few contrasts in this act, which I will point out. Firstly there is a big contrast between what he tells his sons about how well he is doing and the real truth which is he is not being successful. He says to Biff and Happy "Knocked 'em dead in Providence" but he says to his wife "People don't take to me". The main contrast in this scene is when he's talking to his wife but then starts talking to the woman he has an affair with.

When Willy is talking to Biff and ...

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