Prospectus.
Is Death of the Salesman a Tragedy as Defined by Aristotle
Aristotle has been a major influence on Western thought and his views profoundly shaped the thinking of later scholars. In his Poetics, which is his most influential work and one of the first works to examine literary theory philosophically, Aristotle discusses his views on tragedy in literature. He details his view of the perfect tragedy, which he bases on Sophocles Oedipus the King, and gives several sections that bring about a tragedy. The characteristics that define a tragedy according to Aristotle include the plot, the character, and the feelings they inspire in the audience (Corrigan, 1990). The main feature, therefore, is that a tragedy must arouse pity and fear in the audience.
The play Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, which examines the downfall of Willy Loman who is a salesman, deviates from the Aristotelian tragedy in that some of its characteristics do not fit into his theory on tragedies. Some of its components, however, fulfill the Aristotles view and thus the play is only Aristotelian in part. In the play, Loman is infatuated by greatness and he spends most of his time fantasizing about the meaning of the American dream rather than taking action to make his life better. He slowly loses his mind whereby he attempts suicide by inhaling poisonous gas and he finally succeeds in his endeavor by crashing his car. His suicide attempt is geared towards improving his familys lifestyle when they collect his life insurance money.
A tragedy as outlined by Aristotle should have a plot that comprises the play and should be complete, be united, have magnitude, and be imitative of its subject in the real world so that the audience can relate to it. From these qualities, Aristotle posits that the play will achieve universality in that the actions in the play rhyme with those in real life at any particular moment rather being descriptive of the particular event in the play. The plot of the tragedy, according to Aristotle, should be such that the beginning of the story produces the incentive to draw the audience into the play while the middle part is the climax- a part where the incentives put at the beginning start to resolve or are enhanced by further action. The climax, which contains the greatest tension, is built from previous events in the play and is finally brought to an end by the resolution. The resolution brings about catharsis in the audience, which is a quality that defines the fact that at the end of the play, the audience should gain something from the whole.
The plot is especially important in that the story is told through it and thus its quality, and the way in which it is related to the audience, should aim at bringing about a resolution that will educate the audience rather than inspire indifference. The plot could be simple or complex with the simple one only having a change of fortune for the main character. The complex resolution is one in which the change of fortune is accompanied by recognition, reversal, or both. Recognition is a situation in which the character discovers something which arouses either love or hate in another character or object. On the other hand, reversal is a change of action from its intended direction into another. The predictions of the audience are therefore turned around by the play and the surprise that arises enhances the resolution of the play (Corrigan, 1990).
In the play Death of the Salesman, the plot follows the edicts of Aristotle for a tragedy. The beginning introduces the audience to the characters with the Loman family being shown to be dysfunctional in that the ideals instilled in the sons Biff and Hap do not seem to induce happiness in their father. Willy Loman tells his sons that a business career and being liked, both of which he boasts to have, are the ingredients of success even though he does not seem happy with them. This is especially shown in Biff who enjoys working at a ranch but does not feel he has achieved anything great. Willys view that looking good and being liked constitute success is best personified by his remark that he constantly thanks god for his sons who are built like Adonises. This introduction also brings about the main theme in the play that includes illusion and reality. In addition, success and its causes and the relationships between the characters are introduced.
The play then proceeds the middle stage where characters are further resolved. However, the telling of the story is not linear since the main character, Willy Loman, does not seem sane and his reflections and reminisces provide the other portions of the story. These explain the relationships between the characters while at the same time increasing the tension between them as more activities take place. The plays continuation is the same as Sophocles Antigone that starts with the establishment of the conflict between the characters. Polyneices is not to be buried for his acts of rebellion while his Eteocles is to be buried honorably. The conflict originates from the fact that their sister Antigone wishes to bury Polyneices against the king Creons decree. The play then proceeds to a situation where the king judges over the issue and the gods respond negatively further increasing the tension.
The resolution stage of both the plays contains both a change of fortune and a reversal or recognition. In Antigone, though King Creon seeks to reverse his actions by releasing Antigone and burying Polyneices to avert punishment, the action cannot be carried out since both have taken their lives. Both his son Haemon, who is also Antigones fianc, and his wife also take their lives and the king comes to understand this as punishment from the gods. In death of a Salesman, The resolution comes as a change of fortune for Billy who will get the insurance money as well as the realization by Willys family that he was not liked and that being liked cannot constitute success. The plot therefore resolves itself according to the principles of Aristotle for a tragedy.
However, Willy is not a great man in the beginning of the play though his greatness as a character could lie in the fact that he is a representative of a certain class of people in society. Therefore, the characterization of the play answers to the call for universality by Aristotle. The play fulfills this call since a situation in which an individual obeys the rules of the society does not achieve success in the society could be replicated in another setting. Willy is reduced from a sane man who receives a commission and salary and who is reduced to taking a commission only and is finally sacked. This drives him to his reactions that sink him more and more into his hallucinations (Martin, 1982).
Aristotle also described a tragedy as one that could trigger a reaction of pity or fear in the audience. Both Antigone and Death of the Salesman trigger these emotions in the audience in that the main characters Antigone and Willy Loman respectively meet tragic ends. Antigone, despite her noble intentions, kills herself in despair despite the fact that Creon had relented and wished to avoid being punished by the gods by fleeing her. Her death causes others including her fianc and his mother. This brings about pity for Creon who only sought to have his edict followed but whose mistakes costs him his wife and son (Corrigan, 1990).
On the other hand, Willy Loman cuts a sorry figure in that he has not been successful all his life. He lacks knowledge in that he does not realize that looking good cannot bring success. This self-deception is aided by his wife who rationalizes some of his irrational observations and actions. The inevitable ruin of Willy elicits pity since it seems like he is doomed from the very beginning to a hard life. His delusions also serve to make him a figure to be pitied though most of the results he gets are cultivated by his own doing. In addition, in the plays conclusion, he does not gain knowledge as Creon does and is, therefore, only a partial tragic hero. Willy seems to deserve his fate if it were to be determined purely on his actions. Creon, on the other hand, does not seem to deserve his punishment since he relents and seeks to right his wrongs. Therefore, the audience is likely to feel sorry for Creon more than it does Willy whose life seems controllable if only he were to wake up from his daydreaming and take up responsibility.
In the ideal classical tragedy, the audience feels fear or terror for the character in question. The character is involved in a scene that has a painful action or one that could destroy the character. Willy seems to invite disaster by his actions and thus his character does not elicit much pity since his repercussions are self-invited. However, in Sophocles Antigone, the character Antigone may inspire fear in the audience since she acts nobly by burying her brother. In addition, she also takes the blame and does not wish for her sisters death even though she does not support her in burying their brother. These actions endear her to the audience who take her side when she is condemned to be buried alive. Willy does not face danger that he cannot manage as opposed to Antigone who faces the wrath of the king for acting honorably against him. Therefore, the unraveling of the fate of Antigone produces fear in the audience while Willys fate seems directed towards destruction and is therefore to be expected. The fear that could be felt is also reduced by the non-linear style adopted for telling the story.
Catharsis is the final reaction of the audience towards the play and the message it seeks to deliver (Martin, 1996). Willy in Death of the Salesman fails to bring about catharsis since he does not inspire the audience to love or hate him but rather he inspires indifference. This is because he does not get to a resolution where he would know what is responsible for his problem. His problems are only solved partially since he does not get to change his success but he succeeds in giving Biff a chance to become successful himself. His suffering, therefore, only partially fulfills the demand that the hero should purge the feelings of pity or fear. This is through justification for the actions in the play since they should equal the resolutions the hero takes. This can be contrasted to Antigone where the hero gets to die for a certain cause therefore making the cause attractive to the audience that is likely to admire her sense of resolution.
Therefore, the play Death of the Salesman is not really a classic tragedy as enumerated by Aristotle since it falls short on several accounts. The play does not trigger a reaction of pity or fear from the audience since Willy Loman is not a noble character like Creon or Oedipus whose intentions are good but whom fate deals a cruel hand (Driver, 1960). Though some of these characters have flaws, they do not come to the level reached by Willy since he only shows a lot of self-absorption. His only redeemable quality is his resolve to commit suicide for his familys benefit. However, this is tempered by the fact that the action could be taken as a cowardly one through which he would escape his troubles. On the other hand, the death of Antigone serves to drive the point being made home. Death of the Salesman is, therefore, not a classical tragedy but a play that borrows some of the qualities of the genre.
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