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Psychoanalyzing Willy Loman’s Contribution to Family Dysfunction
The Death of a Salesman is a drama that revolves around the unfortunate and struggling life of Willy Loman. Arthur Miller portrays Willy’s present life through throwbacks to past life and memories. Sometimes, Willy Loman’s lines between the past, present, future, and his fears are blurred amidst his circumstances. Through this, the family members are dishonest to one another, a virtue that has hindered them from getting along. Willy is dissatisfied, unable to accept that he is a phony, and a failure who lives through lies and hallucinations pushes him into death. Even though society can be blamed for the misfortunes in the Loman’s family, Willy is the root cause of his family dysfunction as illustrated by Miller.
Psychoanalyzing Willy Loman
Psychoanalytically, Miller characterizes Willy through Freud Sigmund’s theory of psychoanalysis. As much as Miller tries to display different aspects of her protagonist, the characteristics fall under the three main elements of the human psyche-id (id, ego, and super-ego). In this paper, I will psychoanalyze Willy Loman through these theoretical aspects. Willy’s Id emanates from what drives his mind. Miller portrays him as a character that is sexually aggressive and does what he can to achieve a pleasurable life (Miller). This implies that he had an over-developed Id, which led to his narcissistic personality disorder in the sense that he felt entailed to pleasure and prosperous life; thus, whenever Willy failed to achieve this, he became angry and impatient. He often became aggressive whenever he was criticized. For instance, when Charlie offered him a vacancy to work for him, it was a kind gesture that would have saved his family from the financial issues they were facing. However, Willy turned it down due to his over-developed Id with thoughts that he was being insulted by Charlie (Miller, 43).
Individuals with narcissistic personality disorders encounter depression and mood swings due to imperfections. Such experiences push these individuals to distort the truth or lie to remain relevant and successful. Although Willy Loman possessed the best needs required for a good life, he kept on agonizing about his failures, and sometimes, he exaggerated his achievements to remain relevant and be seen as a hero. Furthermore, his Id pushes him to focus more on the belief that ‘being liked is an achievement and a gesture of success.’ People who tend to emphasize on being liked and attractive are lazy and rarely completes their tasks. Willy does not believe in having exceptional skills and ethics in the working environment; instead, Loman beliefs that success is associated with attractiveness and how well someone is liked. Therefore, he extends these ideas to his son by thanking God for granting Biff a well-built posture that will make him liked by people (Miller, 33). Willy preferred to distort the truth or lie so that his image and the family image are kept. In reality, he is not liked as he believes and not as successful as he makes people think of him. There are times that Willy accepts that the way he makes things appear is not reality, and he tells this to Linda about his knowledge that people ridicule and make fun of his personality and appearance (Miller, 37).
Besides, Willy’s love for attention prompts him into affairs with other women. Linda lies to him that he is the most handsome man she ever met (Miller, 39); however, Willy craves attention, and when away from home, he indulges in extra-marital affairs to satisfy his Id. Furthermore, since he equalizes success to beautiful looks, Will associates his failures to his inability to dress to advantage (Miller, 37). The fact that he is not liked or as famous as he thought is evidenced during his funeral, where only the Loman’s family and Charley attended his funeral. This is an indication that his beliefs and urge for success through popularity and ‘being liked’ was a fallacy.
According to Freud’s theories, parents are expected to suppress their children’s Id and develop their super-ego, which is ideal in differentiating the wrong from the right among children. Willy had no father to direct him through these theories of moral living; therefore, one can justify the lack of direction to his behavior in the play. Thus, instead of the super-ego being prominent to Willy and his family, the Id is dominant because of his role model brother, Ben. Ben also exercises the Id throughout his life, as portrayed by Miller. He failed to guide his sons about the dos and don’ts of the world and society. For instance, Willy’s son Biff is immoral and sometimes gets away with such mistakes while his father praises him instead of punishing or scolding him. When he stole a football from school and took it home for practice, Willy does not punish Biff; instead, he praises him and encourages him to practice at home since the coach will congratulate his attitude (Miller, 30). This is what inspired Biff’s tendency to steal from childhood until the time he was once imprisoned for stealing a suit.
How he contributes to his family’s dysfunction
The Death of a Salesman represents Willy Loman’s family as a dysfunctional one. This is echoed in Biff’s words when he reveals that the family members have never said truth even in the shortest time possible (ten minutes). Miller presents Willy in a way that no one can offer praises like how protagonists in other plays are praised. Willy is to be blamed for the family’s dysfunctional nature because he created the circumstance around the family. Willy is a salesman who believed in the American Dream his entire life (Miller). He has an obsessive belief that personality and good looks are crucial to success instead of hard work. This belief renders him a failure since he feels insulted when offered a job by Charlie. The family is in dire need of financial upkeep; however, due to Willy’s ego and foolish pride, he refuses to accept the offer to keep his image of ‘being liked.’ He goes further to instill the faulty ideals into his sons, especially Biff, who later finds it hard to have a self-identity.
Willy contributed to his family’s dysfunctional outcomes since he was never a father figure to his boys (Biff and Happy). He never raised them to uphold moral behaviors and chase dreams through hard work. Since Loman believed in good looks and great personalities through appearances, Willy instilled the same attitude into his children. Biff started stealing when he was a young boy. Willy contributed to the boy’s theft behavior because, at one time, he sends him to take sand from a neighbor and use it to build at their place. When the neighbor confronted him, Willy was reluctant to punish Biff instead;, he questioned the neighbor about the claims that Biff had done something wrong. This behavior magnified into stealing a football in school and eventually stealing a suit that sent him into imprisonment.
On the other hand, Happy is successful but unhappy. His idol is his brother Biff and his uncle, Ben. He wishes to settle down but is unable to do so since he has multiple affairs like his father (Bigsby, 120). Willy did not foster good morals in his sons but expected them to be good and ideal in society. Through this, they become different and opposite from their father’s expectations in the future. The boys’ failures and inability to be successful prompts Willy into suicidal thoughts since he knew that if he dies, the family will become rich through insurance donations and funding.
Self-delusion was also a contributor to Loman’s family’s dysfunctional nature. Willy’s failures made him develop a questionable mental status as a result of an unsuccessful career. He develops thoughts that send him into depression, which leads to hallucinations and memory lapse from the present to the past. This makes it hard for him to embrace and differentiate reality from past life. Later on in the play, Willy is unable to evade the state of madness and meditate on his relationship with the family. Mental illness is an issue that affects not only an individual but the family and the surrounding in general (Bigsby, 114). The incapability to accept his true nature and the reality of the present circumstances affects his family, leading to a dysfunctional life. The American Dream requires those who believe in it to be financially stable, have a perfect family, and earn respect from everyone. This is contrary to Willy’s life and hence, sends him into hallucinations and self-denial. This leads to problems among the family members and a tumultuous relationship with his son Biff (Miller, 54).
Lastly, Willy’s inability to accomplish his expectations of being liked and gaining societal favors leads to hopelessness and disappointment, which is deflected to his family (Miller, 65). This state of denial and depression makes his wife Linda blind towards Willy’s suicidal attempts (Miller, 55). Due to the depressive nature, Linda decides to caution the family to be careful around him, something that drastically affects the family. According to a psychologist Dr. Muller, depressions are painful and affect the family and friends around the victim. And as Linda tries to deny that it is a temporary state and eventually Willy will be fine (Miller 132), Biff is fed up with the lies and feels that it is time for Willy and the family to accept who they are phony and failures. Thus, the depressive nature causes mood swings and makes Willy and Biff have odds between them.
In conclusion, Death of a Salesman is a tragic play revolving around the misfortunate life of Willy Loman. His dissatisfaction in life, inability to accept his faults and hallucinations affect his family, causing the dysfunctional nature illustrated by Miller. According to Freud’s psychoanalysis, tragic individuals fall under three aspects of psyche-id (ego, id, and super-ego). Willy’s Id suppressed his super-ego leading to the circumstances that surrounded him and his entire family.
Works cited
Bigsby, Christopher, and Arthur Miller. “Death of a Salesman.” Memoriam.” Modern Critical Interpretations. Ed. Harold Bloom (1988): 113-128.
Miller, Arthur. “Death of a salesman: certain private conversations in two acts and a requiem.” (1968): (1-144)
Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman: Revised Edition. Penguin, 1996.