Death of a Salesman

I. Description of Main Characters A. Willy Loman 1. Willy Loman is an aging salesman who has had to work hard for everything in his life. Throughout the story we are given a look into the skewed reality he has created for himself as the story progresses. Unlike other tragic heroes, Willy is unable to fully realize the situation he has been placed in. Even though he comes to a superficial understanding of himself and the sales profession, Willy is unable to see his own failure as a person, a father, and as a husband. B. Happy Loman 2. Happy Loman is a young man who loves life and seems to always be happy. Like his father, Happy shares this twisted impression of what the American Dream is. He is unable to come to terms with his own professional and personal failure. Throughout the play he boasts that he is the assistant buyer at his store, when, in fact, he is only the assistant to the assistant buyer! He is completely simplistic and is doomed to be consumed by the blind ambition that is the basis for his unquenchable sex drive. C. Biff Loman 3. Biff Loman is Happy’s older brother and he appears to be more mature than his brother. Biff, unlike Willy and Happy, is able to find the truth about himself, and face the dismal reality of the lives both he and his family have been living. When he discovers that his father is having an extramarital affair he loses all faith in father and his ambitious fantasies. His identity crisis serves as a way for him to reclaim his identity and expose the truth behind the lie he and his family have been living. II. Setting D. The play takes place during the 1940s in various places around New York City and Boston. III. Plot E. The story starts off at the Loman home as Willy returns from a failed sales trip. Linda, his wife, says that he should ask his boss if he can work in New York so that he will no longer have to drive long distances. He complains that his son,