Willy from The Death of A Salesman: Character Analysis Essay

Introduction

Willy is a male character who lived and worked as a traveling salesman in post-war America. His life is complicated by foolish pride, disloyalty and wrong judgment, which lead to his tragic end. Willy has an ambition of greatness, and he firmly believes that anybody could become great regardless of their humble beginnings, just as the "American Dream" states (Bartleby). However, he had a flawed perception of success as he believed that all one needed to excel was a great personality. Indeed as a salesman, his charisma paid for three decades before he got so advanced in age. Although Willy has potential to succeed, his high level of self-deception makes him misdirect it. As such he sets unrealistic goals for his career. Also, he has insecurity, which makes him live in lies that mess up his life further. Despite his high ambition and potential, Willy is a mediocre marketer whose prominent success in sales work only happens in a dream.

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Willy's Insecurity: Lies and Self-Deception

One of the most prominent behaviors of Willy is his insecurity. Aware that he has failed to measure up to his goals in life, he begins to tell himself, and his family lies to avoid shame and guilt. He falsely presents himself as a very accomplished salesman, using arrogance to cover up his self-doubt, and anxiety (Stanton 156). Willy continually faces difficulty maintaining his strength and image. Eventually, he gives up and begins to seek help from the truly successful people. Unlike he imagined, Willy realizes that he is not treasured at his workplace. It also dawns on him that he is neither well liked nor popular and would never be. Moreover, when his son Biff uncovers his unfaithfulness to his wife, Willy chooses to distance him instead of facing reality and correcting his mistake. Such behavior points further to his insecure personality.

The Wrong Philosophy of Success: Charisma vs. Hard Work

Secondly, Willy fails in life because he has a wrong philosophy about success. He does not only think, but also teaches his sons, happy and Biff that the drivers of success are a charming personality, popularity, and luck. Despite shining his shoes and putting on a smile his entire life, the character ends up poor and miserable because he disregards the true secret of success- hard work, ambition, and thrift. Besides, Willy also has foolish extravagance as he takes many luxuries on borrowed money. His drive to make his family lead the best life makes him buy a car, a vacuum cleaner, and a refrigerator on loan. As his life spiraled down and he could no longer make money from sales, he kills himself to have his family transfer his massive debt to his insurance provider.

Denial of Reality: Escaping Problems and Living in the Past

Thirdly, Willy is a failure in life because of his behavior of denying the reality. Never at any point in life did he stand up to face the truth (Stanton 156). When the fact of his poor life becomes inevitable, he decides to escape from it by killing himself. He reasons that it would help his family for his to be dead as his insurance policy would pay them. There is a sense in which the character kept running away from his problems instead of solving them. Indeed, when he dies, the insurance gives his wife enough money to finish the payment of the mortgage. Hence, she confesses that her family is free. Also, Willy spends his later life regretting and living in the past. As age catches up with him, Willy steadily goes back into his past. His days are full of dreams and nostalgic thoughts of the good old days when he was relevant at work and his family appreciated him better. His sticks his mind to the past, trying to understand where he lost the way.

Willy's Adulterous Behavior: Betrayal and Family Struggles

Furthermore, Willy is adulterous because he cheats on his wife Linda with some woman in Boston. After catching him in this act, Biff quarrels his father for spending his little resources on the woman while his family languished in lack. Biff felt that Willy betrayed them when he provided for a stranger and left his family struggling.

Conclusion: Willy's Perception of Failure

Lastly, Willy considers himself a failure because he does not end like Dave Singleman (Bartleby). He is now getting aged and can no longer bring similar results for the company as he did in his youthful days. Therefore, the employer has no choice but to lay him off. Despite denying ever having an affair, Willy inwardly regrets cheating on his wife. He has lost the respect and trust of his son Biff, who has discovered his tendency of living in a fantasy. The play ends when things are too much for Willy. He comes to a point where his failures are undeniable and at the same time, too many to handle. As such he finds his solace in suicide. In his last days, he turns into an obsessive, angry and contradictory person because of how his life turned out. Willy by no means compares to a successful person like Dave Singleman because he spent his youthful days fantasizing instead of working hard.

Works Cited

Bartleby. "The Character of Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman." Bartleby.com: Great Books Online -- Quotes, Poems, Novels, Classics and Hundreds More, www.bartleby.com/essay/The-Character-of-Willy-Loman-in-Arthur-PKWRDXZVC.

Stanton, Kay. "Women and the American Dream of Death of a Salesman." Death Of A Salesman (2007): 156.