Line #35 Theatre/DeathOfASalesman


1	%%Zero Context Examples will be commented out until proper context is given.
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3	[[quoteright:349:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/7da_thu_death_011907.jpg]]
4	[[caption-width-right:349:This guy's a salesman. [[ForegoneConclusion He dies.]]]]
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6	->''"He's liked... but not well-liked."''
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8	Once upon a time, playwright Creator/ArthurMiller set out to disprove one of the fundamental theories about the TragicHero -- specifically, that they must be royalty, nobility, or some other type of great man who has far to fall and much to lose. Miller intended to write a play with said hero's shoes filled by [[TheEveryman an everyman]]. In doing so, he wrote what is often considered the greatest American play.
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10	Willy Loman is an aging, washed-up salesman obsessed with the concept of greatness and convinced that being liked and respected is the most important thing in life. Biff is his equally washed-up son, once a high school sports hero with a bright future, now a perennially unemployed loser. The play follows the family's attempts to make one last grab at UsefulNotes/TheAmericanDream.
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12	First produced on Broadway in 1949 with Creator/LeeJCobb as Willy Loman, ''Death of a Salesman'' is a very stagy play, since it's from Willy's dreamy, hallucination-and-flashback-ridden perspective. Nonetheless, several [[TheFilmOfThePlay screen adaptations]] have been made, including a 1951 theatrical film starring Creator/FredricMarch[[note]] The original Broadway cast reprised their roles except for Lee J. Cobb and Arthur Kennedy, the original Biff; the role instead went to his counterpart in the original West End cast, Creator/{{Kevin McCarthy\|Actor}}. [[/note]] and made-for-TV versions on Creator/{{CBS}} (1966, with Lee J. Cobb; 1985, with Creator/DustinHoffman), Creator/TheBBC (1966, with Creator/RodSteiger; 1996, with Creator/WarrenMitchell), and Creator/{{Showtime}} (2000, with Creator/BrianDennehy).
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14	----
15	!!This play and its various performances provides examples of the following tropes:
16	* AbusiveParents: One of Miller's main arguments is that Willy, despite truly loving his sons and never physically abusing them, caused them a huge amount of mental trauma with his constant praise and insistence that they were destined for greatness, thus unknowingly abusing them. Biff realizes that Willy lied to him all his life and led him to think that he'd be immediately successful in whatever he tried to do, which has only made him unable to stick with anything--the instant a job or hobby gets difficult, he loses all interest in it, turning him into a LazyBum. The ending suggests that this knowledge will give Biff the ability to move on and at least try to improve his flaws, while Happy, [[StepfordSmiler still in denial]], refuses to believe that Willy was anything but perfect.
17	* AdaptationalAttractiveness: In one of the film adaptations, Creator/DustinHoffman plays the character of Willy Loman, who in the play's original script was described as fat and unattractive. The film edits out references to Loman's weight and replaces them with jabs at his intellect and height. Apparently Arthur Miller told Dustin Hoffman his original vision of Willy Loman was a small man, despite how casting for the first play turned out.
18	* AmbiguouslyJewish: The way the Loman family phrases certain sentences, the Brooklyn setting, and Miller's own heritage suggest the Lomans may be Jewish. The script does not confirm this either way.
19	* AnAesop: You don't have to follow UsefulNotes/TheAmericanDream, just find something you want to do and be happy with it.
20	* TheAllAmericanBoy: Biff was a high-school athlete who carried his football time, caught the eye of every girl, and loved his dad more than anything else in his life. He was everything Willy hoped he would be, which is why Willy is now so angry that his son has no job or family despite being thirty-four years old.
21	* AloofBigBrother: Willy's older brother Ben, who got rich by going to Africa and finding diamonds when he was trying to go to Alaska. He appears in flashbacks as a practically godlike figure in Willy's mind, and is always talking about how rich he is, once offering Willy to join him in Alaska.
22	* AlwaysSomeoneBetter: Uncle Ben is this to Willy, who seems to symbolize "greatness" the way that Uncle Ben was successful: becoming a SelfMadeMan and rich, now sitting at the top of the proverbial food chain.
23	* UsefulNotes/TheAmericanDream: Deconstructed; Willy's pursuit of this dream causes him no end of suffering. Though whether it's because the American Dream itself is a sham or because Willy "doesn't know who he is" and doesn't realise he's pursuing it the wrong way is a matter of constant debate.
24	* AnachronicOrder: The past and present get put in a blender, and set to puree. There aren't even any scene changes between them, just sepia-toned or other lighting switching on. This is probably because Willy is starting to go insane. The actors also ignore the walls in flashbacks, reinforcing the dream-like state of the flashbacks.
25	* ArcWords: Willy demeans a neighbor he dislikes by saying "he's liked, but he's not ''well liked''. The same phrase is repeated several times over to express the same principle, until eventually it is used to describe the hollowness of such a value system, when Willy's perception of being "well-liked" by his boss and clients did nothing for him once he was down on his luck.
26	* BlatantLies: Both Willy and Happy tell plenty. Only those who don’t know either guy are fooled.
27	** Happy says to one of the prostitutes he sleeps with that Biff is the quarterback for the New York Giants. That year, the primary quarterback was Tuffy Leemans.
28	** In the same scene, Happy claims to have graduated from West Point.
29	** Happy tells the prostitute that his father is "just some guy at the bar" when Willy becomes an embarrassment.
30	** After Happy goes off with the hooker and abandons his father (who's reduced to mumbling nonsense to himself in the restaurant bathroom), he later returns home and assures his mother that Willy had a great time at the restaurant.
31	** Willy tells Biff that the girl in his room is only there because the hotel staff is doing maintenance work in her room.
32	** Willy lost his salary and hasn't made any successful sales for commission for quite some time. He "borrows" money from Charley and tells his wife and kids that it's money that he earned.
33	* BrokenPedestal: Biff idolized his father, until he found out that Willy was [[spoiler:cheating on his wife/Biff's mother with another woman]].
34	* BungledSuicide: Linda thinks the real reason that Willy crashed his car a few months before the play started is that he was attempting to kill himself. Her suspicions are only furthered when she finds out Willy was fiddling with the gas hose, as if he was planning to suffocate himself with it.
35	* BusinessTripAdultery: Willy Loman is a traveling salesman who spends a lot of time on the road away from his wife and sons. When Willy's son Biff gets in trouble at school, he decides to track his father down so Willy can come back to New York and fix the situation. When Biff arrives at the hotel where his father is staying, he discovers his father with a woman. They are clearly having an affair and Biff has a massive BrokenPedestal moment and never forgives his father. It is implied that Willy seduces the secretaries of his clients both to feed his ego and to guarantee him better sales.
36	* ButtMonkey: Willy Loman can never seem to catch a break. Deconstructed in that the play places most of the blame on Willy himself for his complete and utter refusal to give up chasing his dream, even despite evidence that it's only going to lead to more heartache.
37	* CallingTheOldManOut: Biff has essentially been doing this non-stop, deliberately (if subconsciously) striving to disappoint his father. Eventually, it culminates with Biff saying "Pop, I am a dime a dozen, and so are you!"
38	* TheCasanova: Happy is an inveterate womanizer. He's certainly not above calling on call girls. [[spoiler:He must get it from his old man, who's been cheating on his wife, although it seems that only Biff is aware of that fact.]]
39	* CatchPhrase: Several characters have them, in various permutations.
40	-->'''Uncle Ben:''' When I walked into the jungle I was seventeen, and when I walked out I was twenty-one. ''(laughs)'' And by God, I was rich!
41	-->'''Willy Loman:''' He's liked, but he's not ''well liked''.
42	* CentralTheme: UsefulNotes/TheAmericanDream, and how it affects the average working Joe's attitude towards their job and money. Other themes include betrayal of trust, and perception of reality.
43	* ChekhovsGun: Several times whenever Linda is seen mending her stockings, Willy yells at her to put them away. Late in the play, it's revealed that [[spoiler: when Biff traveled to Boston to ask him to talk to his math teacher, the woman Willy was having an affair with demanded that he give her the new stockings he promised her if he wanted her to leave his room--apparently, Willy tried to pass off the stocking purchase as a present for Linda.]]
44	* ConspicuousConsumption: As with so much else about the American Dream, this is deconstructed. The Lomans tend to make flashy but ill-advised purchases based on such things as what has "the biggest advert" to give the illusion of success and wealth. This just leaves them with expensive duds that constantly need to be repaired and act as a drain on their finances, such as a refrigerator that constantly needs the fan belt replaced and a car that's always breaking down.
45	* DeadpanSnarker: Many of Charley's remarks to Willy and Biff are sarcastic teasing.
46	* DeconstructedCharacterArchetype: Willy Loman as the SelfMadeMan and {{Determinator}}, embodiment of "the American Dream." According to that Dream, anyone and everyone can become rich and successful if they work hard and never give up. Willy does both--he's exhausted himself with his work and refuses to quit even though his body is beginning to fail him. But despite his endless toil, he isn't happy; his endless pursuit of the American Dream only results in anger, debt, and despair.
47	* DespairEventHorizon: Biff reached this sixteen years ago when [[spoiler:he discovered Willy's affair.]]
48	* {{Determinator}}: Deconstructed. Willy Loman will never give up his dream of being a successful salesman. But that also leaves his family perpetually sad and broke, and causes Willy no small amount of undue stress. Several times, it's commented that [[DetrimentalDetermination Willy should see that he needs to quit, but he won't]].
49	* DetrimentalDetermination: According to the American Dream that Willy is always chasing, anyone can become rich if they work hard enough and never give up. Willy certainly isn't one to give up, and that's his FatalFlaw. The fact that he doesn't know when enough's enough leads to Willy making himself and his family miserable over his dogged pursuit of a dream that [[TragicDream he never really had a chance at achieving]]. Despite throwing everything into his work as a salesman, Willy isn't happy, and he isn't successful. It's implied that he'd be happier if he tried his hand at being a construction tradesman, or if he'd just see that the world of sales is just not cut out for him. At one point, Biff practically grabs Willy and screams in his face that neither Willy nor Biff are going to be massive successes, but Willy still doesn't get it. [[spoiler:And he takes it to his grave, as Willy is DrivenToSuicide in a last-ditch effort to provide for his family without admitting fault.]]
50	* {{Deuteragonist}}: Biff. He has arguably the biggest impact on the plot outside of Willy himself, and he's the only one of the Lomans to positively develop throughout.
51	* DidntThinkThisThrough: [[spoiler: Life insurance policies are void in cases of suicide, precisely to prevent families from making money in cases like Willy's. It's clear that before his suicide, Willy is delusional, engaged in an imaginary conversation where his deceased brother Ben eggs him on, and so far past any rational thought.]] Also a case of AllForNothing.
52	* DownerEnding: [[spoiler:Willy dies and his sacrifice was AllForNothing as Biff refuses to follow in Willy's ideas for success. The rest of the Loman family continues its proud tradition of sucking at life. Happy intends to continue his father's "legacy", almost getting into a fist fight with Biff when he tries to dissuade him. The only upside might be that Biff has rejected Willy's delusions. Maybe. Linda tearfully tells Willy she has finally paid off the house, but will be living in it alone. "We're free."]]
53	* DramaticallyMissingThePoint:
54	** Happy thinks he can just do better than his father at his sales career if he just tries hard enough. The point is that Willy ''was'' trying hard; it's just that he wasn't cut out for the line of work and ignored all evidence to the contrary. At one point, Biff practically grabs Willy and screams in his face that neither Willy nor Biff are going to be massive successes, that they don't have what it takes to be massive successes, and ''that's okay'', they don't ''need'' to be massive successes. Willy takes the exact opposite interpretation to what Biff is trying to tell him.
55	** When Charlie mentions that Bernard is "going to court," Willy thinks he's talking about tennis and teases him. When Bernard himself shows up, Willy's stunned to learned that the young man is actually going to the ''Supreme'' Court to argue a case as a highly successful lawyer.
56	** Arguably, Willy's view of Dave Singleman's life and death could be this. Willy holds Dave's career up as an example of success, and thinks it's admirable that Dave died the "death of a salesman" on the job, in a train car on the way to his next business stop. But he's blind to the emptiness of it: Dave was still working at eighty-four instead of enjoying a peaceful retirement, died alone in a train car with no loved ones beside him, and there's no mention of a spouse or children or grandchildren...only the other salesmen at his funeral. It all underlines how flawed and hollow Willy's priorities are, and how his life might have been much richer if he'd only quit chasing a version of success he's not cut out for and focus on other things.
57	* DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler:Willy convinces himself crashing his car with him in it will let his family pay off their insurance, making his suicide a HeroicSuicide. His brother, the possibly illusive Ben, points out that suicide would invalidate his life insurance and that his suicide is nothing but selfish, but Willy blocks him out and walks to his car as if in a trance.]]
58	* TheDutifulSon:
59	** Happy tries to be, but as Willy, Linda, and Biff all note, he's far more interested in being a "philandering bum." Biff too, up until [[spoiler: he catches Willy having an affair]].
60	** Played with in Bernard and Charlie. Charlie has a much more hands-off approach to parenting than Willy, but Bernard is much more successful and responsible despite (or because) of this.
61	* DysfunctionalFamily: The Lomans are lead by a mentally ill patriarch who values financial success over work, compliance with the law, and intelligence, a wife who refuses to stand up to her husband no matter the scenario, a son who has had every pressure to succeed put on him by his father, and a younger son who has adopted every single one of his father's flaws in his attempts to get any sort of attention. The most down-to-earth of all of Lomans is Ben, who's a hallucination of the father.
62	* EveryoneHasStandards: Even though Biff was cold to Willy and ultimately left him behind in the restaurant too, he's disgusted with the BlatantLies Happy told their mother about what a "great time" Willy had with them on their night out.
63	* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: The play is about the events leading up to the death of a salesman.
64	* ExtremeDoormat: Linda seems to be this to Willy at times, as she tolerates his insults and bullying. However, it's deconstructed to some degree because her tolerance is mostly due to her compassion and pity for Willy's declining mental condition.
65	* FatalFlaw: Willy is in love with a dream and never recognizes that it doesn't match up to reality. He obsesses over irrelevancies and his own (prominent, but ultimately meaningless) flaws rather than the false promises of society that lead him to where he is.
66	* FiringDay: In the second act, there is a HopeSpot where Willy decides to talk to his boss about being transferred to work in New York City, as he accepts that he's too old to be traveling up and down from New Jersey all the way to Massachusetts. While talking to his boss, Willy reminisces about his late boss, the new boss' father, and then brings up the idea of being transferred to only be a salesman in New York City, only for his boss to tell him that his sales numbers have been going down, and has become a liability to the company and fires him. Willy tries to appeal to his, now, ex-boss with the fact that he knew his father, but the ex-boss is unmoved, and when Willy tries negotiating a pay-cut, since he won't be traveling far, the boss just politely asks him to leave his office, and Willy eventually relents and leaves in defeat.
67	* FlashbackEffects: The stage instructions explain how Willy's imagination works on stage.
68	-->''Whenever the action is in the present the actors observe the imaginary wall-lines, entering the house only through its door at the left. But in the scenes of the past these boundaries are broken and characters enter or leave a room by stepping 'through' a wall onto the fore-stage.''
69	* ForegoneConclusion: Willy's a salesman. Guess what? He dies. Some readers, however, expect the title to be a metaphor. It helps that there's a TitleDrop in the middle of the play, in reference to a different salesman.
70	* {{Foreshadowing}}: Willy's conversation with Charley at the later's office:
71	-->'''Willy''': After all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive.
72	* FourTemperamentEnsemble: [[MeaningfulName Happy (sanguine)]], [[HairTriggerTemper Willy]] (choleric), Biff (melancholic) and Linda (phlegmatic).
73	* FutureLoser: Young Biff is a college football star, a ChickMagnet, and gets excellent grades. Too bad his future self turns out to be a "lazy bum," as Willy calls him. Though it's not entirely Biff's fault; [[spoiler:he was disillusioned with everything his father taught him after catching Willy cheating on his mom]].
74	** As with many things regarding Willy and Biff's past successes, however, it's deconstructed; among other things, it's heavily implied that Biff was a bully who only managed to get any kind of good grades by getting Bernard, who was smarter and more studious, to give him the answers, so despite the surface trappings of success Biff was probably being set up for failure anyway.
75	* GloryDays: Willy is always hearkening back to his. [[NostalgiaFilter They were probably not as glorious as he remembers now, though.]]
76	* HardTruthAesop: Reality can crush one's dreams.
77	** Sometimes it's okay to [[KnowWhenToFoldEm stop pursuing a dream]].
78	** If you set your sights too high, you're liable to end up disappointed.
79	** It's better to define success on your own terms than to be so hung up on traditional definitions of "success" (executive job, three-piece suit, etc.) that you overlook the kind of work/life you'd be better suited for.
80	* HardWorkHardlyWorks: [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] to hell and back. Willy is a both a believer and doubter of this trope--while he himself toils endlessly in an effort to become wealthy, he thinks that his handsome, muscular, popular sons won't have to work hard because they're so "well-liked." Biff takes this trope to an even further degree: after [[spoiler: witnessing his father having an affair ''and'' failing out of school in the same day]], he had a complete breakdown and came to believe that there was no point to trying to do anything at all, becoming a "lazy bum" instead. Finally, Charlie and Bernard [[SubvertedTrope subvert]] this trope--they both work extremely hard and have achieved success (Charlie owns a lucrative business, and Bernard is a skilled lawyer) and comfortable lives.
81	* TheHeroDies: PlayedWith. The title of the play seems to allude to the death of the elderly protagonist, Willy Loman, but halfway through the play, Willy makes a point about his philosophy in life by describing the death of ''a different'' salesman while [[TitleDrop referencing the play's title]]. [[spoiler:Still, Willy kills himself at the end of the play.]]
82	* HeroicBSOD: Young Biff has one when he [[spoiler:catches Willy cheating on Linda.]]
83	* HiddenDepths: Initially, Biff comes across as nothing more than a pathetic loser, but he's the only member of the Loman family who faces and acknowledges certain realities about their situation in life, unlike his parents and brother who deal with problems by denying that they even exist.
84	* HonoraryUncle: Willy and Charlie are this to each other's kids.
85	* HopeSpot:
86	** At the end of Act One, Willy is ready to ask for a job in New York, while Biff plans to meet with Bill Oliver to request funds to start his own sporting goods business. Then things go FromBadToWorse.
87	** At the end of the play, [[spoiler:Biff gets out like his Uncle Ben before him.]]
88	* HumansAreFlawed: The Lomans are attempting to overcome their own vices so they can succeed. Willy learns the wrong lesson and obsesses over those flaws. Biff, however, eventually recognizes how their attempts simply aren't working.
89	* ICouldaBeenAContender: Willy is convinced that he could have been running the New York office if his old boss hadn't died.
90	* IgnoredAesop: Happy, in a big way. While Biff understands the fallacy that killed his father, Happy ends the play insisting that his father was right.
91	--> '''Happy:''' All right, boy. 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.
92	* IJustWantToBeSpecial: Willy, both for himself and vicariously through his sons. He obsesses over being "well-liked" and dreams that he'll be a hero and celebrity among salesmen like his hero Singleman. He also believes that his sons' good looks and popularity in high school will carry them through to wealth, celebrity, and greatness through the rest of their lives, with him basking in their glory.
93	* ImmediateSelfContradiction: Willy Loman falls prey to this trope, calling Biff a "lazy bum" and then later saying "There's one thing about Biff - he's not lazy." In a later scene he calls his car the best car in the world, only to yell about how awful it is when a bill for it comes in.
94	* InsaneTrollLogic: A truly depressing example. Willy's greatest belief is in "the American Dream," which says that if you work hard and long enough, you'll be rich and successful. Despite working extremely hard for decades, he's neither. But rather than criticize the American Dream itself, Willy instead applies fallacious logic to it: since hard work is all it takes to become wealthy, then he must not be working hard enough, because he isn't wealthy yet. Biff desperately tries to shake him out of this cycle in their final scene, [[spoiler: saying that he's "a dime a dozen" and fated to mediocrity. Willy refuses to listen.]]
95	* IRejectYourReality: All the characters are living in denial, fantasy and illusion, but Willy has it worst of all, as his fantasies and illusions are gradually driving him insane. Biff's CharacterDevelopment is essentially him coming to terms with the fact that he's ultimately not going to amount to much, and that it's okay if he doesn't.
96	* IResembleThatRemark: After Linda tells Willy he has to control his temper with Biff.
97	-->'''Willy:''' When the hell did I lose my temper? I simply asked him if he was making any money. Is that a criticism?
98	* {{Irony}}: Willy consistently rejects Charlie's offers of a job because, in Willy's mind, construction is not a suitable form of success. In pretty much every way, however, Charlie's life is much more successful than Willy's; he runs his own successful business, has more money, and has a much better relationship with his son. Essentially, Charlie has more successfully achieved the American Dream than Willy has.
99	* ItsAllAboutMe: Played with; Willy is convinced that Biff's failure to make anything of himself is out of simple spite towards Willy himself. While this may have been partially Biff's motives when he was younger, by the time the play begins it's actually because deep down Biff has no real interest in achieving the vision of success that Willy has based his entire life and worldview around, and just wants to figure out what he wants to do with his life for himself.
100	* JadedWashout:
101	** Willy Loman used to have a better life in his younger years ([[NostalgiaFilter though probably not as great as he thinks it was]]). Now, he's a bitter old man, desperately trying to cling on to his goal, in spite of all evidence that it's just not going to happen.
102	** Biff even more so, he "washed out" even earlier in life, and unlike his father, he doesn't have any illusions about a great future.
103	* JerkassHasAPoint: Willy's boss Howard has no desire to cut him any slack in spite of Willy's friendship with his deceased father and decades of service to the company, and ultimately fires him. Howard may be callous, but at the same time it's also true that Willy has become a liability - not only is he failing to bring in any sales, but even worse, his increasingly erratic behavior and emotional instability make it completely inappropriate to have him represent the company in any way.
104	* JerkJock: Young Biff. That phase abruptly ends when [[spoiler: he catches Willy cheating on Linda, and promptly disowns his father and gives up on success]].
105	* JerkWithAHeartOfGold:
106	** On the surface, Biff is more cold and cruel towards his father than Happy is. Underneath it all, he just wants his father to face the truth about himself just as he has.
107	** Willy. He can be an ass sometimes and his delusions have hurt both him and his family, but he genuinely means well and loves them.
108	* KnowNothingKnowItAll: Willy Loman criticizes Charlie's poor eating habits as the cause of his heart pain. Charlie tries to ask how he knows this, but Willy only vaguely mentions vitamins affecting bones and the word "chemistry" before getting frustrated and trying to move on.
109	* KnowWhenToFoldEm: [[FatalFlaw Willy doesn't]]. He's really not cut out to be a salesman at all, and would have had a far better life as a construction tradesman. On the other hand, this is the lesson that Biff learns by the end of the play.
110	* LazyBum: Willy accuses the perennially-jobless Biff of being one, and Biff has a tendency to agree, as he just can't seem to keep a job. It's [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]] (like so many tropes in this play) in that Biff's problem isn't so much laziness as it is unresolved grief and a traumatic upbringing: Willy's constant inflating of his ego has led him to believe that there's no point in trying things if he's not immediately successful at them, and [[spoiler: watching his father cheat on his mother]] led to a mental breakdown that he can't get past.
111	* {{Leitmotif}}: The stage directions specify a flute tune at the start of flashbacks as part of the FlashbackEffects.
112	* LikeFatherLikeSon: Willy and Happy both have a hard time staying faithful to one woman, though [[TheCasanova Happy]] more so than Willy.
113	* LonelyFuneral: AvertedTrope. The titular salesman is described as having a funeral where hundreds of his clients from all over the country come and mourn him. For months after, the mood was much sadder on the country's trains. [[spoiler:This is in contrast to Willy's funeral, which is attended by three of his family members, two of his colleagues, and none of his clients.]]
114	* LoserProtagonist: Willy (and his sons).
115	* LoserSonOfLoserDad: It's implied that Happy is bound to follow the same life trajectory as his father, only worse because of his immaturity and irresponsibility.
116	** Played with in the case of Biff. On the surface, he's a complete failure personally and financially, but he's self-aware enough to realize that he doesn't want to follow in Willy's footsteps.
117	* MeaningfulEcho: "He was liked, but he was not ''well liked''."
118	* MeaningfulName:
119	** People frequently interpret Loman as "low man", but actually Miller took the name from ''Film/TheTestamentOfDrMabuse'': "What the name really means to me is a terror-stricken man calling into the void for help that will never come."
120	** Willy's "hero" is salesman "Dave Singleman" who devotes his whole life to selling, living and dying a single man.
121	** Subverted with "Happy" who never does seem to be truly happy.
122	* TheMistress: Willy had one sixteen years in the past. [[spoiler:Biff found out and never forgave him.]]
123	* NeverMyFault: One of the major themes of the play is Willy's absolute refusal to take responsibility for his flaws, instead insisting that "the system" is just trying to cheat hard-working men like him. He's passed this message on to Happy and especially Biff, repeatedly telling them that they're ''destined'' for success, so anything they do is perfectly justified. Biff breaks this cycle by finally accepting himself as he is and owning up to his bad character, which gives him a chance to improve it.
124	* NiceGuy: Charley, who gives Willy money and offers him a do-nothing job even though Willy often treats Charley with contempt (to mask his own jealousy).
125	** Also Stanley the waiter, who does his best to help Willy during his breakdown in the restaurant washroom.
126	* NoAntagonist: The closest the play gets to an antagonist is Willy himself, but he's not so much a VillainProtagonist as he's HisOwnWorstEnemy. All of Willy's problems are either his own fault or the result of forces beyond any one man's control. Even Willy's boss who cuts his pay and fires him isn't out to get Willy, he's just doing what any business owner would do and getting rid of an underperforming employee.[[note]]Though the bossman wasn't exactly giving Willy a fighting chance.[[/note]]
127	* NoNameGiven: Willy's mistress is only called "The Woman".
128	* NostalgiaFilter: Willy constantly hearkens back to his GloryDays. Trouble is, they weren't all that glorious; they're just better than what was going on now.
129	* NotNowKiddo: Bernard, warning Biff that he needs to study and getting brushed off by Willy.
130	* OddFriendship: Stereotypical jock Biff and equally stereotypical nerd Bernard are best friends in high school. Even though Biff ridiculed, bullied, and cheated off his friend, it's obvious that Bernard cared deeply about Biff, telling Willy the two came to blows when he saw Biff throwing away his future.
131	* OffendedByAnInferiorsSuccess: Willy believes that he and his sons are great men, destined to do great things, something he expresses by describing people as "liked, but not well-liked." As such, Willy he entertain the idea he should work for Charley, seeing it as beneath him. Furthermore, Willy cannot fathom the idea that Bernard, Charley's son and whom Willy also sees as just being "liked" is a successful lawyer who is happily married, while Biff, who was "well liked" in high school ended up becoming a drifter who wandered back home after several years away.
132	* OnlyFriend: Willy admits that Charley is the only real friend that he has.
133	* OnlySaneMan: Charley provides a voice of reason to Willy's self-deluding exaggerations and BlatantLies throughout the story.
134	** Linda is a a female example, since she's by far the most emotionally stable member of the Loman family. Partially averted in that she fails to realize (or admit) a few important things about their situation, such as [[spoiler: why Willy and Biff are at odds with each other]].
135	** Biff becomes this towards the end of the play too once he faces certain truths about himself and his family, but to a lesser extent as he's still DesperatelyLookingForAPurposeInLife.
136	* ParentalFavoritism: Willy has a tendency to ignore Happy -- Biff is the one his hopes are invested in. Played with in that Happy is far more like Willy than Biff is, and Biff is much more antagonistic to Willy.
137	* ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything: Charley offers Willy a do-nothing job where he'd basically just collect a paycheck and have a job title as a slightly dignified cover-up of the fact that he's living off Charley's charity.
138	* PointyHairedBoss: Willy's new boss fails to acknowledge the numerous years of hard work that Willy put in during his period and won't allow him to work in New York City, insisting he stay on the road. Unlike his father, who served more as AFatherToHisMen (at least according to Willy), the new boss only thinks about business and actually comes off as condescending to Willy, referring to him as "kid," despite the fact the Willy was working here before he was born.
139	* PopularIsDumb: Unpopular but studious Bernard becomes successful, but popularity-obsessed Willy and Biff fail in the real world. Though Played With in that it is primarily because they focus on popularity to the exclusion of anything else, and fail to consider things like enthusiasm and hard work. It is also frequently implied that Willy and Biff are only popular in their own minds and that not many actually respect them. Biff realizes this at the end.
140	* PosthumousCharacter: [[spoiler: Uncle Ben is mentioned to have died sometime before the events of the play. However he keeps appearing in flashbacks, and his ArcWords keep repeating themselves in Willy's head. Willy, in holding Ben in high esteem, listens to his words most of the time. Sadly, he outright ignores "Ben"'s warnings when he leaves to commit suicide.]]
141	* {{Pride}}: Willy cannot accept the idea that he, and more importantly Biff, are not great men but just average Joes. Biff even says "Pop, I am a dime a dozen, and so are you!" to Willy at one point, which Willy harshly rebukes.
142	* ProperLady: Linda is Willy's HouseWife and tries to be supportive. Deconstructed with everything else since this requires her to participate in Willy's lies and be miserable.
143	* RedemptionEqualsDeath: Played with. Willy plans for his death to obtain big insurance money for his family to compensate for all the grief he caused for them, and/or so he can live his ideals through Biff. A defied trope, since he really gains nothing out of it.
144	* {{Retirony}}: [[spoiler: Willy kills himself to give his family the insurance money. Their house was paid off without it.]]
145	* SelectiveObliviousness: This is the main way Linda protects Willy's fragile ego (or, less charitably, enables his worst traits)--by ignoring his flaws and acting as though his meager successes are far more important than they actually are. Some interpretations even suggest that she knows about Willy's affair, but pretends not to in an effort to keep peace; it's notable that one of the few times she genuinely loses her temper is when she snaps at Biff and Happy for sleeping with "whores."
146	* SelfMadeMan: This is all Willy wants to be--and everything he isn't. He idolizes both Dave Singleman (the greatest salesman of his time) and his brother Ben (who actually struck it rich in the nations of Africa).
147	* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism: On the cynical side. The play is a deconstruction of the American Dream, showing how flawed it can be if someone won't stop pursuing it at the expense of all else.
148	* SmallNameBigEgo: Willy likes to think of himself as something of a local legend among salesmen in New York and New England, and thinks that when he dies, his former clients and salesmen from across the region will flock to honor his memory. In reality, Willy is a complete no-name working on commission and is eventually fired by his boss, and when he dies only his immediate family and Charley's show up for the funeral.
149	* SpoilerTitle: There's a salesman in the play. He dies.
150	* SpiritualSuccessor:[[invoked]]It was one of the most influential works in the American arts and especially popular in TheFifties. Creator/NicholasRay's ''Film/BiggerThanLife'' was described by its director and screenwriters as a SpiritualAdaptation even.
151	* StepfordSmiler:
152	** Happy (hence the name).
153	** Linda is perhaps an even worse example, as she has to pretend that everything is OK at all times to keep Willy from losing his temper. It's most notable in a flashback scene where Willy returns home bragging about his great sales numbers; Linda checks the figures and is ecstatic to see that they'll be able to pay off a lot of debt. Willy then has to keep admitting that he didn't do nearly as well as he first claimed, but Linda never shows even a hint of disappointment as she redoes her math and watches the sum get smaller and smaller. Her final line in the play--"We're free"--suggests that Willy's death has released her from this role, which comes as a relief to her.
154	* StickyFingers: Biff has a tendency to pocket small trinkets and items wherever he goes, almost to the point of kleptomania. It's heavily implied that this habit [[spoiler: was condoned by his father, as shown in Willy’s reaction when a teenaged Biff admitted to stealing a football and Willy claimed that it showed initiative. Then he encouraged Biff and Happy to steal some lumber in order to prove their manliness to Ben! The stealing gets worse after Biff discovered his father’s affair, but his father was ultimately responsible.]]
155	* StockingFiller: The Woman.
156	-->You promised me stockings, Willy!
157	* StupidSacrifice: [[spoiler: Willy's suicide.]] He convinces himself that it's a meaningful sacrifice, that [[spoiler: by killing himself, his life insurance will fix his family's problems. Because his death is suicide, the insurance is not paid; Willy was warned of this (by a figment of his own imagination, no less) and ignored it. Even if it were, money would not solve his family's woes: the house is paid off, and Biff has no intention of starting a business. His death accomplishes nothing]].
158	* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: Biff's (off-stage) meeting with Bill Oliver, the owner of the sporting goods store. Biff was a shipping clerk with Oliver years ago, and the only reason Oliver remembered Biff at all is because Biff stole some merchandise while working at his store. The notion that Oliver would loan thousands of dollars to support Biff's proposed business idea was absurd, so naturally the meeting went nowhere.
159	* ThisLoserIsYou: Willy is meant to represent the Average Joe who's still clinging onto the idea that "ICouldaBeenAContender" if this one thing hadn't happened. Happy and Biff are variations on this theme - with Biff the more self-aware of the two, and Happy as a self-deluded clone of his father.
160	* TitleDrop: According to Willy, Dave Singleman "died the death of a salesman" and as such, was grieved by hundreds of his clients around the country.
161	* ToughLove: Inverted, insofar as it's a child's attitude towards his parent rather than the reverse. Biff sincerely believes that the best way to help Willy and to reconcile with him is to make him face the truth about himself and his life. Unfortunately for Biff, Willy is too far gone to be helped in this way.
162	* TragicDream: The whole point of the play is that Willy's desire to rise to greatness through his job is ultimately self-destructive.
163	* TragicDropout: Biff never graduated after failing his regents exam. [[spoiler:He also refused to go to summer school after finding out his father was having an affair.]]
164	* TragicHero: Unlike a Tragic Hero, Willy Loman is a "pathetic hero" because he learns nothing from his ordeal or mistakes, maintaining his belief in the power of popularity to the end, nor does his death somehow make life better for those he leaves behind (as his hallucination of his dead brother tells him, [[spoiler: they won't honor his insurance policy in the case of a suicide]]). But because of the play's popularity, it took Miller years of defending his success in creating a Tragic Hero out of the common man to admit he failed with Willy Loman and that Biff really should have been the protagonist (especially since he does learn something).
165	* {{Tritagonist}}: Linda. Just as prominent as Biff, but ultimately doesn't wind up developing for the better like him, putting her here.
166	* UnconfessedUnemployment: [[spoiler:Willy has a hard time admitting to his wife he's out of a job.]]
167	* VicariouslyAmbitious: Despite his delusions, Willy realizes that he's a failure, and so projects all of his hopes and dreams onto his sons, especially Biff. Unfortunately for Willy, neither of his sons seems destined to amount to very much either, at least in part because Willy teaches them the wrong lessons about how to succeed.
168	* VitriolicBestBuds:
169	** Willy and Charley are always arguing and at each other's throats, but Willy admits that Charley is the only real friend he has.
170	** Also Biff and Bernard. They're complete opposites - one the popular high school jock, the other the stereotypical nerd. In spite of this and the fact that both Biff and Willy ridicule Bernard, it's suggested that they were one another's closest friends.
171	* TheUnFavorite: Happy Loman, who can never measure up in his dad's eyes to his older brother Biff.
172	* UnreliableNarrator: Many of the scenes are flashbacks told from Willy's point of view. As is made clear from his actions in the present, Willy has a rather weak grasp on reality, so it's questionable to what extent these flashbacks represent things that actually happened as opposed things as Willy chose to remember them.
173	* WackyParentSeriousChild: A very dark version with Willy and Biff.
174	* WellDoneSonGuy: Young Biff but he loses faith in his father, and in life, when he [[spoiler: catches Willy in an affair]].
175	* WhamLine: [[spoiler:After the play has been spent with the Loman men talking about how great they'll become, Biff gets the gall to tell his father, "Pop, I'm a dime a dozen and so are you!"]]
176	* WhosLaughingNow: Bernard is, once he becomes a successful high-flying lawyer. Willy Loman, who once looked down on him, comes crawling to him for help. Subverted in that Bernard is not cruel or condescending, and actually gives Willy advice. Not to mention he doesn't seem to hold any bad feelings toward the Lomans for looking down on him and considers Biff a good friend.
177	* YankTheDogsChain: For just a moment, it looks like Biff is going to get a job and sort out his life. But no. This turns out for the best though, since it helps him realize what he wants in life and not be trapped in a delusion like Willy.
178	----
179	->''[[TragicDream 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.]]''
180	-->--'''Happy Loman''', ''Death Of A Salesman''

Context Theatre / DeathOfASalesman