Willy’s idea of success lies somewhere in the future, and thus he does not even acknowledge any other form of progress from a pragmatic perspective. On the contrary, he only dreams of success, and he tells his children, “Someday I’ll have my own business, and I’ll never have to leave home anymore” (Miller, p. Consequently, he does not put in the required hard work and strategic execution of goals to become successful. Willy Loman, the protagonist in Death of a Salesman, is such one character representing the delusional side of this dream.Īccording to Willy, anyone living in America and has good looks, charisma, and a certain level of likeability, he or she is guaranteed success. This delusional thinking has seen many Americans fail to exploit their full potential because they live under the illusion that they are wired for success. On the other hand, another group of individuals mistakenly assumes that by virtue of being Americans living in the country, they have the inherent right of becoming successful, even without working hard. This was, and still is, the beauty of the most coveted American dream. Mgamis argues that American society “celebrated people who, with nothing but pluck and ingenuity, created financial empires that towered over the national imagination” (p. This is the positive side of the American dream – the idea that a person could become highly successful as long as he or she is willing to pay the cost through diligence. On the one hand, some people are willing to work hard and exploit the available opportunities to become successful, especially in terms of wealth accumulation. The American dream is multifaceted with both positive and negative effects on citizens’ lives and wellbeing. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the theme of the American dream in the play, Death of a Salesman, together with the usage of irony in the same context.
In the play, Miller uses the protagonist, Willy Loman, and other characters to explore both the positive and negative effects of the American dream. However, this quest for betterment, albeit positive in nature, had many loopholes and negative impacts on people’s lives. At the time when Miller wrote this play, Americans were eager to renew their lives and establish a promising future especially after the ravaging effects of World War II. According to Mgamis, historian James Truslow Adams coined the idea of the American dream to mean the pursuit “of a better, richer, and happier life for all our citizens of every rank which is the greatest contribution we have as yet made to the thought and welfare of the world” (p. Specifically, the theme of the American dream features prominently in this play. Death of a Salesman is a 1949 chef-d’oeuvre stage play by Arthur Miller, which addresses various issues that were affecting American society at the time.
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