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Death of a Salesman

by Arthur Miller

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Foreshadowing Willy's Death in Death of a Salesman

Summary:

In Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, Willy Loman's suicide is foreshadowed in several ways throughout the play. Early on, Willy experiences blackouts while driving, hinting at his deteriorating mental state. Linda, his wife, reveals his series of car "accidents" and the discovery of a rubber hose, suggesting attempts to inhale gas. These incidents highlight his desperation and the crushing weight of his failed pursuit of the American Dream. Ultimately, Willy's suicide by car crash is his tragic attempt to provide financial security for his family through life insurance. This reflects his misguided belief in monetary success as the ultimate achievement.

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How is Willy's suicide foreshadowed in act one of Death of a Salesman?

At the end of the play, Willy, accompanied by intense music rising "almost to an unbearable scream," dashes out of the house and drives off, full speed, in his car. The music rises again, becoming "a frenzy of sound" signaling Willy's death. This suicide is the tragic climax of the play and is foreshadowed throughout the play. Below are some examples of how it is foreshadowed in act 1.

At the beginning of act 1, Willy tells Linda that on his most recent sales trip, he had a sort of blackout at the wheel of his car. He says,

Suddenly I realize I'm goin' sixty miles an hour and I don't remember the last five minutes.

He subsequently admits that he "might've killed somebody" and that he has "such strange thoughts." This is rather an ironic foreshadowing of his own death, as the "somebody" is of course himself. And his...

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suicide later in the play is a consequence of the build-up of his own strange, increasingly irrational thoughts.

Later in act 1, Happy says to Biff, in an exasperated tone, and referring to their father, "Jesus, maybe he smashed up the car again!" A few moments later, he remembers being a passenger while Willy drove, and he tells Biff that Willy "stops at a green light and then it turns red and he goes." Biff and Happy laugh, not realizing, of course, the tragic climax that these episodes foreshadow.

There is also, in act 1, a recurring motif of imprisonment and suffocation, as if Willy is struggling for breath more and more as time passes and his mental state deteriorates. Willy, for example, talks agitatedly about the neighborhood being so built up that it feels like they have been boxed in with "Bricks and windows, windows and bricks." He later also complains that "There's not a breath of fresh air in the neighbourhood." While this motif of imprisonment and suffocation doesn't foreshadow Willy's method of suicide, it does nonetheless foreshadow his death in a more general sense. He is finding it hard to breathe from the beginning, and he feels, throughout the play, as if the walls are closing in on him.

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The foreshadowing of Willy's death in Act I represents an intrusion of harsh reality into the little fantasy world he's constructed for himself. Willy's series of car "accidents" and Linda's discovery of the rubber pipe appear to indicate a man who, deep down, knows the game is up and that his life is pretty much over. Otherwise, why else would he be trying to kill himself?

On the face of it, Willy still retains his stubborn optimism, his unwavering Micawber-like belief that something wonderful is just around the corner, something that will transform his family's fortunes. But the auto "accidents" and the rubber pipe symbolize what's actually going on in Willy's tortured soul. They give us a glimpse into the truth of who and what he really is.

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Linda announces to the boys at the end of Act I that Willy has been in a series of car accidents, and that the accidents themselves seem like deliberate attempts to kill himself.  She also states that she recently found a rubber pipe and is concerned that Willy is considering inhaling gas to end his life.  In the end, that is what he does - inhales gas from his car.

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The previous post was very thorough.  I would only like to add how the meaning of Willy's suicide represents the crushing weight of one's dreams.  Willy is trapped underneath the pursuit of the American Dream.  This idea is that one can "be somebody" and this is measured through financial success.  The suicide for the life insurance money is a way that one can see how twisted the desire for economic success can turn out to be if improperly guided.  Willy is not greedy as much as he is galvanized by the idea or hope that he can "become" somebody or something.  This is measured, in his mind, through the acquisition of wealth and the only way he can see this happening is through his own death.  His suicide represents how the American Dream can turn out to be something of nightmare proportions if not fully understood and placed in an appropriate context.

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Additionally,

Willy had a false idea about most aspects of his life: He thought they were in really dire straits when, in fact, the day of his death his wife had posted the last house payment, and said that they were finally "free." However house-debt free they were, to Willy nothing was ever enough.

When he took his insurance policy it was not for the reasons why rational people would take it. It is RICHness what Willy sees as "the American Dream". To have it all, or to have nothing. Even if before his death he had already paid his home off, the truth is that this, to Willy, is part of his obsessive connection between money and success. Hence, instead of thinking of a life insurance policy as a way to leave his family save, he committed suicide for Biff to cash in the policy, start a business, and become rich.

In all, Willy had a wicked fascination with money and success which led to the twisting of reality, and the devaluation of the things that matter the most.

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What are Willy's suicide attempts in Death of a Salesman?

Willy's inner conflict was, essentially, his fantasy world versus his reality. It is evident in more than just the constant hallucinations that he suffers throughout the play.

Throughout his life, Willy forged a philosophy of life, like many of us do, in order to try to make sense of it. His final product, that is, his idea of life, is that success can be acquired quickly and swiftly if one is well-liked and knows how to work a system. 

To Willy, it was better to neglect the true, inner self in favor of an outer shell that would befit the needs of such system. This, in his opinion, was a formula for success. 

Therefore, Willy bypassed the fact that he was an outdoors man, and that he was great at building things, and decided to enter the world of sales instead of following his true calling in life. He figured that he would make money quickly this way, and become successful.

Moreover, he wanted to lead a life similar to that of a man who did exactly what Willy did: Dave Singleton. A man who supposedly died rich and popular, Singleton became Willy's model of existence, even driving Willy as far as trying to make a name for himself, and leading the life of a high-rolling, playboy businessman.

America is full of beautiful towns and fine, upstanding people. And they know me, boys, they know me up and down New England. The finest people....there’ll be open sesame for all of us, 'cause one thing, boys: I have friends. I can park my car in any street in New England, and the cops protect it like their own.

Sadly, Willy ended up believing that he was really that fake person, while encouraging his children to be the same way: shallow, handsome jocks with clever, smart-mouths, and able to get ahead from the rest the easy way. 

Time, however, starts to affect Willy's over-inflated and false sense of pride. He ages broke, nearly unemployed, never achieving a formal, steady salary at the firm, never really making many friends, and never really having the time or dedication to plant roots from which he could sow any benefit for the future. All he had was his life insurance. 

The hallucinations and constant conflict that he endures throughout the play are signs of the clash between Willy's fantasies and reality; between what was, what was not, and what could have been. All of it pointed out at one thing: Willy will die a dissatisfied, frustrated, incomplete man. His sons will go on living until they meet a similar ending, as well. Something has to give: Willy must sacrifice himself and take himself out of the chaotic equation that is his family, and let them cash his life insurance to start a new life over. This is what Willy's rationale was at the time that he made the decision of ending his life. It was a way to give his sons a chance to have a different destiny. 

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Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is about the gradual but steady degradation of a human being. Willy Loman has spent his life on the road working as a traveling salesman. His perpetually suffering wife Linda takes care of their house while their two grown sons, Biff and Happy, aimlessly stumble through life. Willy treats Linda poorly and is frequently critical of Biff for the latter’s failure to find his place in life. Willy, however, is increasingly forced to come to grips with the approaching end of his career and life. He and Linda have struggled to stay above water, never quite able to reach their goal of financial security. In one exchange between the two, Willy and Linda discuss the approaching attainment of one major goal, the final mortgage payments on their home:

WILLY: Whoever heard of a Hastings refrigerator? Once in my life I would like to own something outright before it’s broken! I’m always in a race with the junkyard! I just finished paying for the car and it’s on its last legs. The refrigerator consumes belts like a goddam maniac. They time those things. They time them so when you finally paid for them, they’re used up.

LINDA (buttoning up his jacket as he unbuttons it): All told, about two hundred dollars would carry us, dear. But that includes the last payment on the mortgage. After this payment, Willy, the house belongs to us.

Willy kills himself. He has fallen asleep at the wheel in the past, but this time he deliberately crashes his vehicle so that Linda can use the life insurance payment to finally pay off the mortgage. It is the final act of desperation by a man beaten down by life. Willy is being marginalized by his job and the secret buried deep within himself. His secret, namely, his own extramarital affair, was accidentally discovered by his son and has torn at the moral fabric of the father-son relationship. Willy has reached a point where he believes he has nothing to gain by continuing to live the only life he has known. The business contacts he has maintained over the years have proven ephemeral and, in the end, only Charley is there to mourn Willy’s passing.  Willy’s funeral is attended only by Willy’s family and Charley despite Willy’s protestations over the years of being rich in personal relationships. With the family in disarray, constant financial pressure, and the specter of death as a pauper staring at him in the mirror, Willy reacts the only way he can contemplate: suicide. While Willy’s death enables Linda to pay off the mortgage, his death is more than financial in nature. In the play’s final scene, Linda expresses her surprise at Willy’s act just when they were on the cusp of paying off the mortgage. Charley’s response captures the essence of Willy Loman and why he killed himself:

LINDA: I can’t understand it. At this time especially. First time in thirty-five years we were just about free and clear. He only needed a little salary. He was even finished with the dentist.

CHARLEY: No man only needs a little salary.

Willy was a lonely, bitter man whose failure as a salesman and as a father haunted him, so he escapes through death.

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Why does the title of "Death of a Salesman" foreshadow Willy's death?

Arthur Miller once wrote an essay called "Tragedy and Common Man."  In it, he talks about how tragedy - a form of plays in which the main character fails (and usually dies) because of his own mistake - has changed in the modern world.  Tragedies used to be about kings and nobility - now they are about common men, everyday people.

"Death of a Salesman" is about an everyday man - Willie - and it is a tragedy.  Willie fails in his life because of his expectations and his inability to see life for how it really is and to work for what he really wants.  As a result, he has lost touch with the world, which leads to him being alienated from his family and to him losing his job.  His resulting depression is what causes him to kill himself.

Miller wants us to know from the title that this will be a tragedy, because then we are prepared to look for certain details.  By knowing that Willie is going die, we look for the reasons and the clues that lead to his death.  Our experience is focused.  We also have more sympathy for Willie, and can relate to him more.  If we didn't know that he was doomed, then we might react less sympathetically to his behavior.  We would turn our attention and or compassion to Linda and the boys more so than to Willie, and therefore the message of the story would be lost.  Traditional tragedies - such as Shakespaere's Romeo and Juliet - went under the heading "tragedy" when they were advertised for the same reason.  The playwright wants to get a specific lesson across to the audience, and focuses our attention through revealing the end result first.

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In Death of a Salesman, why is Willy ready to commit suicide after struggling with Biff?

After the argument at the restaurant, Willy realized Biff had lied about the job.  It was supposed to be a celebratory dinner, because Biff was supposed to have gotten his job back at the sporting goods factory.  However, because Willy found out that Biff hadn't been forthright and truthful, it was the last straw; Willy was totally finished trying to help him be successful.  Willy himself was no longer successful, and all of the so-called, scatterbrained advice that he had given Biff was no longer of use.  The only way he could help anyone, including his wife, financially, was to end his own life and use the insurance money to pay off some bills.

It's very sad that Willy felt he had to go to this extreme.  Biff could've been kinder to Willy at the restaurant, but at the same time, Willy had high expectations for him, and since Biff averaged a new job every six months or so, it wasn't exactly realistic for Willy to have such expectations of his wayward son.  Willy not only lacked proficiency as a salesman, but also as a father it would appear.

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In Death of a Salesman, why does Willy attempt suicide?

There are two different reasons.  One is that he realizes that his career as a salesman has been a "failure," that he can no longer adequately support his family ... that his life is no longer worth living.  This explains some of his early attempts in the car as well as the "tube" in the cellar.

Later on, after his conversation with Ben (who shows him both sides of the proposition), he decides that the best thing he can do for his sons (actually, just Biff, as usual) would be to "die" and provide them with the $20,000 that his life insurance would provide (ironically, it probably provided nothing since most life insurance policies do not pay on suicides ... and they know that Willie had tried to kill himself from actions spoken of earlier in the play when Linda relates her conversation with an insurance inspector).

Once again, Willie loses in the end.

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