Death of a Salesman is a notorious American play written in 1949 by Arthur Miller which has won numerous awards including the Pulitzer Drama Prize. Assignments and essays on Death of a Salesman essay topics are frequent and focus on its various themes/ aspects (illusion vs reality, American Dream, aspiration,...and greed, happiness, materialism/ consumerism), on the analysis and critical evaluation of the play, and its characters (their flaws, tragedies, antiheroic nature). The play raises individual and social issues that are perfectly valid for our current society. Before writing your essay on Death of a Salesman essay topics, you should check our original essay samples provided here – these might help you in learning about the content, assembling the perfect outline, selecting the appropriate paper structure and style, etc.
Arthur Miller, who is a devoted writer, shows his concern in the well-being of the American society in his piece Death of a Salesman. This piece is a perfect example of how the pressure to achieve the American Dream can control your mind and lead...
The idea of money being the key to happiness is a continual theme in the play “The death of a Salesman”. The symbiotic relationship between working and spending time with your family is lost in this play as Willie is so determined that he and...
After the Second World War, writers started to use their platform as a way to voice their opinions and concerns with the world. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller which was performed in 1949 tells the tragedy of Willy Loman who gave his life...
From its very infancy, the American continent was often equated with boundless opportunity. In A Description of New England John Smith characterized the early colonies of 1616 as a land of economic potential, declaring that “If a man work but three days in seven, he...
“The jagged edges of a shattered dream.” Do you find that the play leaves you with such an impression? Death of a Salesman tells the story of a man confronting failure in the success-driven society of America and shows the tragic trajectory which eventually leads...
The salesman in the novel “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller is a perfect example of how life of today works. Willy Loman made a mistake – a big one – and tried to correct it to no avail. His misdeed left him so...
In the play, “Death of a Salesman,” Willy Loman experiences both the positive and the negative aspects of bipolar disorder: one moment he is upbeat and pleased, and the following he is furious and swearing at his children. Their connections are clearly difficult ones. Willy...
Every person in the world has a split persona, their public persona can be way different from their private persona. Willy Loman in the tragedy play Death of a Salesman, written by an American Playwright, Arthur Miller, functions as a complex character. Throughout the course...
The issue of gender equality is a pressing topic in our modern society. Over the course of the past century, we have established human rights, racial rights, and even animal rights. So why is it that when a woman demands equality, she is looked at...
There is a reason why Willy Loman is considered as a tragic hero where a great deal of it has to with his pride. As a matter of fact, through the character of Willy, Arthur Miller is able to build the theme of pride around...
Two plays by Arthur Miller, Death of a Salesman and The Crucible, both contend that society is the indifferent, sometimes brutal, force that crushes an individual. Although the plays take place in different time periods, they each convey the force of society through setting and...
Money is one way to achieve one of the “American Dreams.” The “American Dream” is different for everyone and that dream for most people depends on how they were raised. There are many plays that critique the “American Dream” but only two will be focused...
In the Death of a Salesman, the main purpose of using day dream was to give to the audience ideas of what was going through Willy’s mind. The flashback and hallucinations played a big part in the audience eyes because they showed each event and...
America has long been known as the land of opportunity and the idea of the American Dream is rather appealing to most. Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman, addresses the ongoing conflicts within one family. However, he also uses the play to offer an...
“Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller displays a man whose inability to accept change within himself, and the reality of his life led to his and his family’s loss of identity and grasp of the truth. This man is Willy Loman who’s fear of...
Karl Marx is one of the greatest names associated with communism, but arguably his greatest works stem from economics rather than politics. Marx saw the destruction caused by industrialism and capitalism, which lead to many of his theories collectively known as Marxism. This school of...
American Dream, Antonio Gramsci, Capitalism, Communism, Das Kapital, Dictatorship of the proletariat, Friedrich Engels, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Ideology, Karl Marx
Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller, is a tragic play focusing on the common man during the late 1940’s. Much of the story is told by flashbacks of Willy Loman’s past, including him cheating on Linda, his wife. His older son, Biff, witnessed the...
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is a deceptively simple play. The simplicity of the play, however, quickly dissolves into a respectful ambiguity through Miller’s ingenious stage directions, nonverbal expressions and, most importantly, his musical design. From the opening notes to their final reprise, the...
The definition of a tragic character is something that has been considered set in since the times of ancient Greece. Aristotle’s Poetics defined what makes up a comedy and tragedy, and that definition has been widely accepted since then. However, Arthur Miller believes that Aristotle’s...
In ‘Death of a Salesman’ Arthur Miller provides the theme of disillusionment and depression, the conflict to cope with urbanization and misplaced identity. Willy Loman’s personality is portrayed with the aid of Miller captures the trauma of one who cannot compromise and change with the...
America has long prided itself on being a land of opportunity. Since the fifteenth century, pilgrims have flocked to American shores, urged onward by the thought of making money, off the rich lands and resources available here. As time has gone on, this image of...
Arthur Miller, David Mamet, Death of a Salesman, Glengarry Glen Ross, Miller’s characters, Money and Success, Portrayal of Willy Loman, Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Sales
The play, Death of a Salesman by Author Miller, focuses on the nostalgic dreams of the main character. The Lomans, especially Willy, pay particular attention to these dreams while fearing that these goals are unreachable. Yet this fear is necessary to the hope; Willy would...
“Death of a Salesman” is a play written by playwright, Arthur Miller. This play is believed to have been one of Arthur Miller’s greatest bodies of work in the theatrical realm. “Death of a Salesman” was written from the trials of the playwright’s own life...
Arthur Miller’s American masterpiece Death of a Salesman, first presented on the stage in New York City in 1949, represents a successful literary attempt at blending the themes of social and personal tragedy within the same dramatic framework. Yet the story of Willy Loman is...
Arthur Miller, Arthur Miller’s American masterpiece Death, Character of Willy Loman, Death of a Salesman, Deconstruction, Destruction, Door-to-door, Life, Sales, Story of Willy Loman
Arthur Miller chose a Low-Man as his hero, because the queens and the kings don’t live anymore and writers can’t write about them. I think it’s great that Miller chose a person like Lowman to be his hero. Lowman is a regular person, he doesn’t...
Affair, Arthur Miller, Billboard Hot Country Songs number-one singles, Death of a Salesman, Delusion, Delusional disorder, English-language films, Human, Humans, Ignorance
In Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman,” Willy Loman is an individual who strives to achieve the “American Dream” in the 1940’s. This era was characterized by America’s climb out of the Great Depression in addition to its recognition as a world superpower following...
Arthur Miller, Brian Dennehy, Death of a Salesman, Dream, Elia Kazan, Elizabeth Franz, Fathers and Sons, Lee J. Cobb, Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Success
The roles played in Arthur Miller’s, Death of a Salesman can be considered stereotypical at best. The characters have this problem of only looking at what their lives should be or how they messed them up. Their outlook on life is completely based on society’s...
Happiness is a thing individuals spend their entire lives in pursuit of. In countless shapes and forms, while the feeling is universally understood, it is unique to each individual and cannot be shared or imposed upon others no matter how hard one tries. So the...
To an unusual degree, The Death of a Salesman interweaves past and present action. Willy Loman, the play’s protagonist, repeatedly revisits old memories, sometimes even conflating them with the present moment. But these memories are not the sentimental, slightly melancholy daydreams of a contented man....
The first man to ever coin the term American Dream was James Truslow Adams, in which he describes a dream of a place where everyone has an equal opportunity regardless of predetermined life factors. By putting a name to this ideology, Adams gave many American...
Willy Loman, Linda Loman, Biff Loman, Happy Loman, Ben Loman, Bernard, Charley, The Woman, Howard
Symbols/motives
Mythic figures, the American West, Alaska, the African jungle,Seed, diamonds, Linda’s and The Woman’s stockings, the rubber hose
Themes
The American Dream, the anatomy of truth, and infidelity.
Quotes
“Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!”
“I’m gonna show you and everybody else that Willy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. It’s the only dream you can have - to come out number-one man. He fought it out here, and this is where I’m gonna win it for him.”
“And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. ’Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-four, into twenty or thirty different cities, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people?”
“You can’t eat the orange and throw the peel away — a man is not a piece of fruit!”
Interesting facts
The play premiered on Broadway in February 1949 and ran for 742 performances.
The play has been adapted for cinema ten times.
The play Death of a Salesman won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award for Best Play.