Death of a Salesman

Death of a Salesman

There were many causes of the tragedy of Willy Lowman. But the real question is how much of Willy’s death is the cause of his own personality and how much was put on him by American society. In this essay I will analyze the character of Willy Lowman to find the reasoning behind his thinking when he took his own life. Through my analysis of Willy Lowman’s thinking I will determine how much of his death is his own doing or what society has put on him.

From my reading of Death of a Salesman I figured that Willy’s personality was not that of an average man. Willy Lowman was a very insecure man; which is why he would lie to his family as well as himself. He seems to be a very arrogant man throughout the play but I feel like it is all just a cover up. I found a quote proving this point even more “He disguises his profound anxiety and self-doubt with extreme arrogance” (Willy Lowman par. 3.) The main characteristic about Willy that leads me to believe that his personality is not that of a regular man is his flashbacks. Throughout the play I notice that Willy is losing grip on reality and on time. I feel that Willy’s flashbacks are a way for him to escape from the present time. Willy feels that his life has not been all that it should have been so he escapes to a time where life was better. Willy feels as if he did not live up to the “American Dream” so in turn his life was not all that it should’ve been in his eyes.

Willy’s personality is not the only cause of the tragedy of his death at the end of the play. I feel as if American society put a lot of pressure on Willy to live up to their standards. Society painted this picture of the “American Dream” that all Americans should strive for. It seemed that society put on Willy that if he did not reach those goals then he had failed as an American citizen. The pressure of reaching this so called “American Dream” affects a lot of the people of the United States even today. In my opinion the pressures...