Themes of a Salesman

A major theme highlighted in Death of a Salesman is how men and women were viewed differently in society.  Women at the time had very few rights.  Men were usually well respected while women were not respected.  Men did all of the work to acquire high monetary status for their family.  The job that women had was to make life better for their husbands. 

Two themes that go hand in hand in the story of Willy Loman are time and success.  Time is never on a person’s side.  Willy Loman knew that he was old and was going to die pretty soon.  Willy wanted to die successfully which is why he worked so hard.  He felt that he failed in life because he was not successful, and he was running out of time quickly.  Willy also lived in the past and wanted ever so much to be able to go back and fix his mistakes so that success would be possible.

                Another theme that is revealed in Arthur Miller’s novel is the decision of doing things fairly or cheating.  I think of Charley and Ben representing the Angel and Devil on Willy’s shoulder respectively.  Charley and Ben were both successful businessmen however Charley did everything by the book while Ben had no problem cheating.