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Death of a Salesman

Death Of A Salesman, by Arthur Miller, and A Worn Path, by Eudora Welty, are two works that share many common themes when it comes to characterization. In fact, when it comes to Willy Loman in Salesman, we could almost say that what has caused his suicide is from him having to travel such a well-worn path during his sales job. We see this in the character of Granny in Path. Granny is also tired, frustrated and suffering from a little case of dementia as is Willy. For she says, “’Seem like there is chains about my feet, time I get this far,’ she said, in the voice of argument old people keep to use with themselves. ‘Something always take a hold of me on this hill-pleads I should stay,” (Welty, 1980: 143).

In a similar way, Willy Loman is kept on his “worn path” of being a traveling salesman. He is tired, frustrated and suffering from a certain degree of dementia also. He also hears voices and talks to himself, like when he gets mad at his neighbor when playing cards because he is imagining his brother is in the room. We see this again when he is talking to Linda and flashes back to the time he cheated on her with the girl in the hotel room that he makes “laugh.” Granny is keeping the illusion she can save the boy who swallowed lye, just as much as Willy keeps the illusion at an age when it is too late that he can make a comeback to his success of earlier years when the world seemed ripe with hope and full of promise. Yet, he flashes back and imagines things that are only true in his mind as much as Granny, like when he thinks of the old days when Ben was making himself a success and his boys were full of promise. Yet, his tired and defeated feelings show through even when he does, “Oh, Ben, how did you do it? What is the answer?” (Bain, Beatty and Hunter, 1991: 1139).

This is similar to the same trapped-in-the-past mentality that Granny suffers from. Because of being old and tired she canno...

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Death of a Salesman. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 00:46, March 19, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1684877.html