INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE, LITERATURE

AND TRANSLATION STUDIES (IJELR)

RESEARCH ARTICLE

ARTICLE
Vol. 7. Issue.1. 2020 (Jan-Mar)

DEATH OF A SALESMAN: A MODERN TRAGEDY

NITESH
Language Lab Instructor
Govt. College, Jind
Email:[email protected]

ABSTRACT
Arthur Miller’s Pulitzer Prize winning drama Death of a Salesman established its
author’s reputation as a leading and significant writer. This drama is a man’s journey
of self re-evaluation late in life. It creates a man’s entire life in terms of past and
present. The drama portrays the tragic vision of the theme of disillusionment of a
common man caught with in the whirlpool of American myth of success. This drama
Article information is different from Aristotle’s concept of a tragedy who has given it a concrete shape by
Received:20/02/2020
defining it as ‘the imitation of an action…in a language beautified in different parts
Accepted: 17/03/2020
Published online: 22/03/2020
with different kinds of embellishment, through action and not narration and through
doi: 10.33329/ijelr.7.1.167 scenes of pity and fear bringing about the catharsis of these emotions.’ This paper
deals with Arthur Miller’s concept of tragedy in his play Death of a Salesman.
Keywords: Tragic Flaw; Tragic Vision; Disillusionment; Dreams; American Social
setup.

Introduction:

“Unlike the drama by Sophocles, Shakespeare and Lorca, Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is a
tragedy set in our characters who, however, we regard that quality of their thought speak in our own
languages and with our own peculiar accents.”

These lines of Beirman, Hart and Johnson define Arthur Miller’s tragedy Death of a Salesman in a beautiful
way. It is a tragedy which is different from Aristotelian concept. In his masterpiece, The Poetics, Aristotle defines
tragedy as imitation of an action. It must have a beginning, middle and end. The function of tragedy is to arouse
the emotions of pity and fear. The best tragic plot is one which shows a good man suffering as a consequence of
some error or Hamartia, on his own part. The plot must have three unities of time, place and action. But Death
of a salesman is a tragedy, different from the classical and Elizabethan tragedies as its hero Willy Loman does
not belong to a noble family. He is an everyman caught within the whirlpool of American myth of success.

Willy Loman is the protagonist of the play. But he is not as Aristotle defines his tragic hero. The character
of Willy Loman is not from high rank.But Willy is a common man. He is a modern American salesman who is
suffering from the economical and social insecurity. He nurses the illusion that in his old age, he will become a
famous salesman. And in the image of his illusions and false beliefs, he brings up his children. He never allows
his sons to face reality. His admiration Dave Singleman’s prolonged success illustrates his obsession with being
successful. He says,

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 Int.J.Eng.Lang.Lit & Trans.Studies (ISSN:2349-9451/2395-2628) Vol. 7. Issue.1. 2020 (Jan-Mar)

“And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. ‘cause what could
be more satisfying than to be able to go at the age of eighty four, into twenty or thirty different cities,
and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people?”

Yet he wins our admiration because he knows his course of action. He is a representative of the whole mass of
the American civilization. He is the symbol of increasing urbanization at the cost of man’s mental peace. He
represents what civilization, artificiality and the blind chase for success is doing to every sensitive soul. His ideals
and dreams are constantly being shot at. His massive dreams and his achievement form a ridiculous contrast.
Willy has failed as a business as well as a father. Willy imagines and always boasts of his being well-liked by a lot
of people. Ironically his funeral is attended by nobody except his friend Charley and his son Bernard. Miller
writes,

“I did not write Death of a Salesman to announce some new American man or an old American man,
Willy Loman is, we think, a person who embodies in himself some of the most terrible conflicts running
through the streets of America today.”

Aristotle says, ‘tragic hero is a person who must evoke a sense of pity and fear.’ He is considered a man of
misfortune that comes to him through error of judgement or Hamartia. This play arouses pity but no fear. Willy
Loman is too little and passive to play the tragic hero. Some critics agree that catharsis reconciles or persuades
to disregard, precisely those material conditions which the play calls our attention to. Miller believes that the
common man is apt as a subject for tragedy. The whole concern of the play is competition, success and money
in the materialistic sense. Willy is a man of flaws. His problems are basic and are faced by the common people.
He makes false choices in life and prepares his own destruction. ‘Attention, attention must be paid such a
person’, says his wife Linda to her sons when she recognizes the depth of his anguish. The play persuades to pay
attention to the tragedy of this victim of the American social set up. Miller’s depiction of the truth of the
individual psyche and also of the world around the individual is certainly noticeable. He writes,

“I hope I have made one thing clear to this point- and it is that society is inside of man and man is inside
of society, and you cannot even create a truth fully drawn psychological entity on the stage until you
understand his social relations and their power to make him what he is and to prevent him from being
what he is not.”

Miller adopts the structure in which an explosive situation is both explained and brought to a crisis by the
gradual revelation of something which has happened in the past. Willy makes one false move one after another
in pursuit of success. Willy, Biff, Happy and Linda –all characters are unable to cope with the competition. When
Biff makes him realize that Willy himself has been the cause of his son’s failure, destroy the strongest value in
Will’s life and he commits suicide by smashing his car.

Unlike Shakespearean or Greek tragedies which begin with the hero’s ignorance but end with the hero’s
achievement of self knowledge, Willy does not achieve any self-knowledge and he remains the same. He has
lofty dreams and ambitions, but does nothing to fulfill them. He wants so many things but all he manages to do
is to suffer. His failure is not only due to the pressure of competitive system, but also due to his inability to tell
the truth even to himself. He brings his sons up on false principles and ruins them also. He is too weak to face
the harsh realities of life. He remains in utter ignorance throughout his life and dies with his illusions. M.W.
Steinberg writes,

“While we may be prepared to accept the argument that a common man, that is one without rank, may
achieve heroic stature, the tragic nature of Death of a Salesman does not stem from this possibility. Willy Loman
fails to gain this size. He falls a victim of the society. His moments of clear self knowledge are few…”

There is also a conflict between man and his family, between man and his society, between man and god,
between man and his dreams as well as within man himself. It is through his dialectics of intra family and social
interactions that miller has unveiled the illusive layers of the success along with Loman’s subconscious and
unconscious guilt and fear, as Linda explains,

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 Int.J.Eng.Lang.Lit & Trans.Studies (ISSN:2349-9451/2395-2628) Vol. 7. Issue.1. 2020 (Jan-Mar)

“He drives seven hundred miles, and when he gets there, no one knows him and what goes through a
man’s mind driving seven hundred miles home without having earned a cent?”

Death of a Salesman is a powerful diagnoses and a ruthless exposure of materialism, Industrialized America
through the character of Willy Loman’s inevitably choosing a path full of disastrous consequences. Any
comparison between Willy and any other Greek tragic hero is highly debatable. Willy is here too weak to play
tragic hero. It is a tragedy in the light of Miller’s own views which is different from the classical and Elizabethan
tragedies as its hero does not belong to a noble family and he is a common man who is representing the blind
pursuit of American dream of success.

References:

1. Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. Penguin Classics: 2000.

2. Hinchliffe, Arnold P.. Drama Criticism: Developments Since Ibsen. London, The Macmillan Press: 1979.

3. Lall, Ramji. Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman: A Critical Study. New Delhi, Rama Brothers: 1992.

4. Sen, Dr. S.. Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman: A Critical Evaluation. New Delhi, Unique Publishers: 2018.

5. Sen, Dr. S.. Aristotle’s Poetics. New Delhi, Unique Publishers:1985.

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