‘In The Kite Runner relationships between fathers and sons are never joyful’ Whether or not a child has experienced genuine bonding with his father is integral to what characteristics and values that child will grow up to have. Hosseini portrays many father-son relationships, including that of Amir and Baba, Hassan and Sohrab and Amir and Sohrab. Despite some of the obvious tension between these relationships – such as Amir’s hopeless pursuit of approval from Baba – it may not be so clear to argue that the relationships throughout the novel are never joyful. On the one hand it could be argued that the relationships are never joyful when considering the recurring lies and hypocrisy that many of the characters have to deal with. Amir and Hassan where both concealed of the fact that Hassan was Baba’s true son despite Baba’s himself stating that ‘lying is stealing someone’s right to the truth’.
Schulberg’s Hollywood is an industry driven by the hard-working, honest, talented man, and then exploited by an amoral few. Schulberg criticizes this Hollywood as an industry where success comes only at the price of one’s own moral constitution. Schulberg uses the relationship between the frighteningly ambitious Sammy Glick and the blindly trusting Julian Blumberg as a microcosm of Hollywood. Sammy continually exploits Julian’s talent and naïveté in order to rise to the top of the Hollywood ladder. Despite the fact that Julian writes the screenplay, Sammy’s name gets the credit title for original screenplay.
Perhaps I missed something, but what quality is it in Willy that should make us regret his departure? Arthur Miller, who is one of the last unrepentant Marxists, obviously sees Willy as a victim of capitalism. Willy has bought into the American Dream and it has destroyed him; after a lifetime of toil in the system, he is being disposed of now that he is no longer productive. The problem with this is that, much like Jay Gatsby (see Orrin's review), Willy has simply failed to understand the promise of that dream. He believes that the recipe for success is to be "impressive" and "well-liked" and for your children to be identical to you in manner and aspiration.
Arthur Miller makes Howard Wagner a memorable character in his play “death of a salesman “ because he is a symbol of the modern business man and his character highlight the ruthless nature of the modern world that Willy Loam is struggling to succeed in .We can also see that how far Willy fall behind the modern business world Second, Miller shows us a modern business man’s personality in Howard’s character that always put the firm on his first list more than anything else. Despite the fact that Willy is “desperately tell a “story “and explains why he should has “a New York job “, and his family is struggle with the money. Howard still doesn’t care and substantiates that “it’s business, kid (Willy), everyone gotta put his own weight “. These cold hearted sentences prove that, Howard is very realistic about Willy’s condition in term that will benefit his firm. He knows that there is no way Willy can earn him a profit with “a job in town “, therefore he avoid and reason with Willy so he can keep Willy on the road because Willy is fallen behind the modern world.
Death of a Salesman written in 1949, is a moving destruction of the whole myth. To be hard working, honest and have ambition were the ways of the American Dream. This lead to success, wealth and in due time - power. But this dream for everyone developed, and encouraged greed, selfish behavior, pride and rivalry between one another. Willy Loman was 'caught-up' in this American Dream.
More than anyone, a boy needs his father to approve of him and teach him how to be a man. Well, his father did not show him the love he required growing up. In all of Paul’s efforts to please his father, he was ignored and inadequate to his father’s expectations. In fact, his father praised a young man that worked as a clerk and insisted that Paul ought to be more like that gentleman. His father refused to give Paul money and argued that he has a job, so he can pay his own expenses.
It also belongs to the common man—in this case the “low man,” as in Willy Loman. Willy’s tragic flaw stems from the fact that he has misinterpreted the American Dream, the belief that one can rise from rags to riches. For Willy, the success of that dream hinges on appearance rather than on substance, on wearing a white collar rather than a blue one. It is this snobbery, combined with a lack of practical knowledge, that leads to his downfall. Indeed, much of the lasting popularity of Death of a Salesman both in the world of the theater and in the canon of English literature, lies in its treatment of multiple themes.
Some critics may argue that Miller’s Death of a Salesman is not a tragedy, because the protagonist, Willy Loman, does not posses the critical attributes of a classical tragic hero. According to Aristotle, the protagonist is a ‘noble individual with greatness of soul’, yet Willy is a middle class citizen struggling in a society which is driven by the notion of the American Dream. I believe that that Linda is the tragic hero, and that the play is a tragedy based around Raymond Williams’ Materialist Model, also incorporating some aspects of the Aristotelian model. According to Williams, the death or suffering of the protagonist causes serious implications for the characters around them. I believe this to be true in relevance to Linda’s wasted life.
In both plays Death of a Salesman and True West can be both in contrast to the conditions of their visions of the American dream. Both of these plays focus on characters that spend their lives pursuing this dream while they fail at happiness as a result. In Death of a Salesman Willy Loman is a unfortunate, man who is so obsessed with trying to live up to an ideal that he has become disillusioned and has developed a loose sense of reality. Willy, spends his lifetime attempting to become a salesman, only to find in the end that he had failed. True West also focuses on the dysfunction of the American Dream.
Symbols and Themes in Death of a Salesman Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman concerns the story of Willy Loman, who has taken on many struggles in his life, causing painful memory relapses to interfere with his sanity in the present and future. During the course of Willly’s life, the idea of being well liked over powers reality to the degree of insanity. Miller exhibits the themes of betrayal, abandonment, denial, and faulty ambition to satisfy one’s heart’s desires. The symbolisms of the story are very powerful but conveyed in such a way that presents subtle misfortune with every word spoken by Willy, demonstrating emphasis on the essential themes of the story. The central theme in Death of a Salesman is the idea of satisfying the heart’s desires through faulty means.