The American Nightmare: Is Death of a Salesman a stanch critique of the American, capitalist dream?

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The American Nightmare: Is Death of a Salesman a stanch critique of the American, capitalist dream?

        In some ways, Death of a Salesman is a harsh critique of the American Dream, however, in other ways, it seems to be promoting the idea.  In the past, before the play was set, the American Dream used to be a promise of a land of freedom with equality and opportunities for everyone, however by 1900, this rosy and pleasant idea had changed.  The Dream featured throughout the play, set in the 1940s, is, in fact, a darker seeming dream of both financial and social success resulting from minimal effort.  It claims that if you wealthy, you can buy anything you wish for: popularity, success or even love.  However, as this play illustrates, it is fragile and can collapse easily.

        The main way in which Arthur Miller uses the play to put across the American Dream and its effects is through the way in which it governs the lives of the Loman family, especially Willy.  Willy could in fact be considered to be obsessed with the Dream.  For example, he is continually talking to Ben, the only member of the Loman family who ever had ‘that special something’ needed to achieve it.  This ‘special something’ could perhaps be the fact that he is a ruthless manager who does not care about the feelings or opinions of others and only really cares about earning money.  For example, he never actually cared about his family – just whether they were earning a lot of money.  Instead of praising or encouraging Biff when he is successful in gaining sponsorship for three different universities, Ben merely makes him look stupid in front of his family.  He challenges him to a fight and then while he is distracted, knocks him to the floor commenting:

                BEN: Never fight fair with a stranger, boy.

This shows that Ben has little regard for Biff’s feelings and is more obsessed with the American Dream than anything else, including the things that most people (even Willy himself) desire most from life: the respect and support of their families and friends.

The fact that Willy talks to Ben would seem normal and not indicate any obsession with the American Dream on Willy’s part.  However the fact that Ben is dead and Willy only imagines his presence proves that Willy is obsessed with the dream if he feels he has to bring back figures from the past to make it more real for himself.  This happens because Willy has noticed Ben’s success and he is desperate for advice on how to make himself as successful as his older brother.  Willy’s main aim in life is to be loved by all; to succeed in a way in which he cannot; to leave his mark upon the world, he wishes to die the death of a salesman:

        WILLY: He died the death of a Salesman… hundreds of salesmen and buyers were at his funeral.

He has brought his sons up believing this too, and this becomes obvious as they grow up, for example Happy’s belief that he will impress Letta more by pretending to be a high earning Champagne seller than himself:

HAPPY: Why don’t you bring her – excuse me, miss, do you mind?  I sell champagne, and I’d like you to try my brand.  Bring her a champagne, Stanley.

The tone of this suggests that Happy feels more confident than usual playing the role of someone as successful as a champagne seller.  He feels that he can achieve anything in that role.  His confidence clearly reaches out to Letta, who warms to him immediately.  It is unlikely that if Happy playing himself, a less highly paid shipping clerk, had approached her, she would have agreed to see him again.

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        Willy believes that money leads to popularity, which leads to success, which leads to more money:

        WILLY: Can you imagine that magnificence with twenty thousand dollars in his pocket!

He does not seem to realise that he cannot actually enter this circle of existence because he has neither money, success nor popularity.  However he does spend his entire life boasting about how brilliant and successful he is, even though he quite obviously is not.  Willy has always pushed his sons throughout their lives to be successful and popular, but perhaps this continual pressure, from someone who was actually ...

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