J.O.

ENL
Mr. Vachon
3 June 2018

Thematic Essay - Death in Venice and Death of a Salesman

In some works of literature, a character who appears briefly, or does not appear
at all, is a significant presence. Select two OIB texts (one must be Death in Venice)
and write an essay in which you analyse the significance of how such a character
shapes the meaning of the overall work.

* Underline your thesis statement

* Be sure to include the significance of stylistics and how they support your thesis.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence... but once you get there, you may
realize that the grass is artificial turf. Life often challenges mankind by placing seemingly perfect
figures in front of us, as it can be easy to idealize someone one knows little about and lose oneself in
the process. In their works Death of a Salesman and Death in Venice, writers Arthur Miller and
Thomas Mann use briefly appearing characters to warn against the dangers of fabricating idols and
attempting to pursue their corresponding values. Indeed, the influence of these so-called models can
be disproportionate because they aren’t sufficiently well known.

First and foremost, Arthur Miller uses his work Death of a Salesman to convey the risks of
blindly emulating a ‘hero’ when one knows little about them.
In this work, the protagonist, a salesman named Willy Loman, lives in a crumbling world of
illusion and myth. His idea of success and career choice are entirely based on those of a salesman
whom he barely knows, Dave Singleman. Willy venerates this man because he supposedly ‘made his
living’ with little to no effort. Evoked only twice in the work, (once when Howard has fired Willy and
the latter desperately attempts to recover his dignity by harking back to the old, ‘noble’ days of
salesmanship), the character never even physically appears. Nevertheless, his significance to Willy
and overall significance in the work are made clear by the title of the play, which refers, in part, to the
glorious death that Willy comes to expect after having heard Singleman’s “rag to riches” tale.

Several aspects of Singleman’s appearance and lifestyle practically become an object of

worship for Willy. His “velvet slippers” are a symbol of an indoor lifestyle’s comfort, while their
“green” colour calls to mind the hue of the American dollar bill, and therefore the man’s fortune. The
repetition of “green velvet slippers” throughout Willy’s monologue emphasizes the importance of the
man’s success story to this failing salesman, as these everyday household items become the motif of a
salesman’s success. Moreover, the abundance of details in Willy’s description of the old man imply
just how much of an impact the encounter had on him. Precise numeral details (“eighty-four years
old”, “thirty-one states”, “twenty”) as well as spatial evocations (“The Parkhouse”, New York, New
Haven, and Hartford”) create the impression that Willy hung onto the man’s words and has
remembered them ever since. In this manner, Miller shows how easily one can fall for an embellished
ideal.

Similarly, Willy adopts a set of supposed values that most likely took root during that same
encounter. First, the protagonist’s obsession with being “well-liked” seems to stem from his meeting
with Dave Singleman. Throughout the play, Miller uses repetition to show that Willy considers this to
be the main, if not sole determining factor of one’s success in the sales industry. Shortly after having
been fired, he continues to claim that “the wonder of the country is that a man can end with diamonds
here on the basis of being liked!” This naive assumption indicates that Willy believes the ‘American
dream’ or ‘rags to riches’ to operate solely from a social level. Willy partly seems to have deduced
this from the “hundreds and hundreds of salesmen and buyers (...) at [Singleman’s] funeral”. Here, the
blatant hyperbole “hundreds and hundreds” suggests that Willy has over exaggerated the story to
impress not only his former boss but also himself. However, what he fails to grasp is that Singleman’s
likeability and the ensuing crowds were the result, not cause of the man’s successful work.

Onomastics also play an important role in suggesting Willy’s dangerous idealization of this
legendary salesman. Indeed, the component ‘single man’ in David Singleman’s name implies the
“singleness”, “singularity” or uniqueness of what he was able to do. Through this name, Miller
explains that the successful salesman should not serve as a model as such a feat is rare and difficult to
achieve, and Willy does not know what lengths this man went to in order to secure a stable future for
himself. Indeed, if Singleman really achieved the feat of “making his living (...) without ever leaving
his room”, it was because he had worked hard and developed loyal customers that he could rely on for
years after leaving the field job. However, Willy fails to comprehend this, and the man becomes his
unwitting hero. Willy’s own last name also serves as a tacit reminder that his idolization is futile.
Indeed, despite containing the same suffix ‘man’ as “old Dave”, (a nickname through which Willy
tries to establish familiarity and therefore resemblance with/to Singleman), the name Loman evokes
the protagonist’s inevitable failure to rise through the social ranks and become successful; he will
remain “low”, deceitful and poor. Therefore, Miller uses the ‘Dave Singleman dream’ to identify the
flawed logic in following a ‘hero’ that one does not know sufficiently about, and to demonstrate that
doing so can lead one astray.

Similarly, in Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, an idealized but mysterious character

contributes to the protagonist’s downfall, even if the origin of the main character’s downfall is more
ambiguous. Tadzio is a 14-year-old Polish boy vacationing with his family in Venice, in the same
resort as the protagonist, Gustav von Aschenbach. Upon seeing him, Aschenbach becomes infatuated
with the child and attempts to pursue him without ever actually physically or conversationally
engaging with him. Throughout the novella, Mann never fully explicits the nature of Aschenbach’s
obsession. It is ambiguous whether Aschenbach’s interest stems from true love, a simply aesthetic
admiration, a pursuit of lost youth, yet a combination of these elements build up an intense adoration
that eventually leads to his downfall.

From their first distant encounter, comparisons to Greek divinities and religious imagery
suggest the intensity of Aschenbach’s idolization : “[his countenance] recalled greek sculpture of the
noblest period”, “god-like beauty of this human creature”. The superlative “noblest” indicates that the
main character places the boy on a pedestal based off a purely aesthetic-based judgement. Likewise,
the antithesis or opposition established between “god” and “human” shows that Aschenbach has
deified a mere teenager, while implying the character’s flawed logic : by placing the nominal group
“god-like beauty” before “human creature”, Mann suggests that Aschenbach has overlooked the
mortality and humanity of this boy in favor of an idealized version of him. This inability to see
imperfection in Tadzio leads Aschenbach’s obsession to grow and eventually consume him.

Several tacit and explicit allusions to beautiful yet vain figures in greek mythology and
antiquity further this impression : Aschenbach compares Tadzio to Narcissus, a greek deity who
perished when he fell in love with his own reflection, Phaedrus, a young man appearing in a Socratic
dialogue about love and desire... The culmination of these comparisons appears in Tadzio’s
resemblance to the greek Eromenos archetype, a coy, attractive, and youthful man, often depicted in
the midst of erotic wrestling matches. Tadzio most jarringly evokes the Eromenos figure in the final
scene of the novella, when his friend Yashu begins to wrestle with him on the beach. Despite Tadzio
being physically weaker and eventually losing the match, his friend is described negatively as a
“subaltern”, which shows just how far Aschenbach’s allegiance to the former goes. Through these
comparisons, Aschenbach attempts to harness Tadzio, to attach him to a tangible concept that
magnifies his beauty. However, in so doing, the protagonist distances Tadzio from reality and
detaches him from the flawed mortal that he inevitably is.

Throughout his work, Mann continuously suggests that Aschenbach’s infatuation is flawed, as
he has fallen in love with an ideal, not a person.
Aschenbach’s name indicates the importance of onomastics in the work, as it reveals a great deal
about his character and the origin of his desire. “Aschen”, meaning “ash” in German, evokes the
remnants of an extinguished fire, and therefore symbolizes the death that awaits Aschenbach. His
name also recalls the ash-grey colour of his hair, which he eventually grows ashamed of and has dyed
black. Aschenbach’s obsession with the adolescent also stems from his pursuit of youth. Indeed,
Tadzio increases Aschenbach’s awareness of his aging, which leads to the main character’s shame and
self-loathing. However, despite the importance of naming, the adolescent’s name is kept mysterious.
The name “Tadzio” is the result of a educated guess on Aschenbach’s part after several errors
(“Adgio”, “Adgiu”). Moreover, he later explains that there are several variations on the name Tadzio
in the Polish language, such as “Tadeusz” and “Tadziu”. The possible inaccurateness of Aschenbach’s
surmisal and the several variations on the same name could signify that there are variations to the
boy’s character that Aschenbach is unaware of. In this manner, Mann implies that Aschenbach’s rapid
infatuation with Tadzio will cause him problems, as he barely knows the teenager.

Likewise, Mann employs symbolism to highlight Aschenbach’s misguidedness. The sun acts
as a recurring symbol throughout the novella, and often appears in conjunction with Tadzio. Mann
evokes its presence at the beginning of Chapter 4 with an allegory, or an allusion to Helios, the greek
god of Sun : “god with the flaming cheeks soared upward naked, driving his team of four fire-
breathing horses through heaven's acres, yellow ringlets fluttering wild”. The description of the god’s
“yellow ringlets” immediately calls to mind Tadzio, and likens him to the sun. This could initially be
considered a positive comparison seeing as the sun symbolizes the truth in the socratic dialogue “The
Republic”. However, the sun blinds, and one cannot look at it for too long; the fire imagery in the
sentence also accentuates the dangerous consequences of this action. One could therefore argue that
the sun symbolizes Aschenbach’s inability to see Tadzio as he is, as the protagonist continues to
idealize him until the dénouement. Through the use of imagery, allusions, and symbols, Mann
conveys the dangers of pursuing a ‘model’ that one knows little about, or perhaps refuses to know
about.

In Death of a Salesman and Death in Venice, both authors use a juxtaposition of major and
minor characters to exemplify the danger of losing oneself in the idea of a mysterious person. In
Death of a Salesman, although Willy Loman is not infatuated with Dave Singleman, he does actively
want to become him. Meanwhile, Aschenbach may not look to fully become Tadzio, but he certainly
seeks out some of his qualities, such as youth and beauty. Nevertheless, it would seem that both
writers agree on the safety, though tediousness of constructing models based on those who are
familiar and close to oneself.