Death of a Salesman American Dream Quotes

A melody is heard, played upon a flute. It is small and fine, telling of grass and trees and the horizon. The curtain rises. Before us is the Salesman’s house. We are aware of towering, angular shapes behind it, surrounding it on all sides. Only the blue light of the sky falls upon the house and forestage; the surrounding area shows an angry glow of orange.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Even before a character enters or speaks, we are introduced to some of the important themes and figures of speech in these stage directions, the first words of the play. Music is heard and flute is personified, as it tells of a pastoral and idyllic scene of grass and trees. This sets a peaceful tone. When the curtain rises, the house of salesman Willy Loman is revealed. Having a home of one’s own is one of the most frequently cited examples of having attained the American Dream. But the Loman dream and home appear to be under threat. The city has encroached on the house, now surrounded on all sides by towering skyscrapers, suggesting that Willy is trapped in his big dreams. The "angry glow of orange" contrasts with the image of the blue sky, creating an unsettling atmosphere and foreshadowing future events. The color orange is personified here. The passage’s theme of nature vs city symbolizes the conflict within Willy. His love of the great outdoors competes with his salesman’s dream of finding prosperity and building success in the artificial and materialistic world of the city.

An air of the dream clings to the place, a dream rising out of reality.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Air is personified in these opening stage directions, which describe the Loman family house. The dream is the American Dream that once seemed attainable, but has become detached from reality. The line deals with the important theme of illusion vs reality and the Lomans’ tendency towards self-deception. They are unable to distinguish between reality and they facade they live behind and this ultimately leads to their downfall.

I’m tired to the death. I couldn’t make it. I just couldn’t make it, Linda.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. In the first scene of the play, Willy Loman explains to his wife Linda why he couldn’t make it to his sales calls that day in New England. The 63-year-old salesman is exhausted traveling from New York to England for his job. Having returned home early to New York, the mentally and physically spent Willy’s words foreshadow his suicide later in the play. They also highlight how he constantly falls short in his desperate attempts to achieve his unattainable American Dream of prosperity and success.

Work a lifetime to pay off a house. You finally own it, and there’s nobody to live in it.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. A pessimistic Willy is hit by the realization of the pointlessness of working hard all his life to to pay for his own home, only for his sons to leave him and him to grow old and die. This quote is linked to Willy’s feeling of failure to achieve the American Dream. It’s also about the themes of abandonment and family. His words are echoed by wife Linda at the end of the play in the Requiem. As she mourns her husband’s death by suicide, she says over Willy’s grave: "I made the last payment on the house today. Today, dear. And there’ll be nobody home."

LINDA: Well, dear, life is a casting off. It’s always that way.
WILLY: No, no, some people – some people accomplish something.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Linda is speaking to Willy about their two adults sons who have returned to live with them. She uses a knitting metaphor to compare life to finishing a completed, knitted item with a tying off stitch to prevent it from unraveling. As the voice of reason, she tries to get her husband to understand that not everything in life can be controlled. But Willy subscribes completely to the American Dream of prosperity and success and cannot fathom why he has achieved so little in this regard.

Biff Loman is lost. In the greatest country in the world a young man with such – personal attractiveness, gets lost. And such a hard worker. There’s one thing about Biff – he’s not lazy.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Early in the play Willy reveals his skewed version of the American Dream, believing that the country rewards someone who is a hard worker, physically attractive and well liked. His son Biff has these attributes, he feels, but he is just lost. Willy has fallen out with his son because in his eyes he hasn’t accomplished anything and has been working as a low paid farm worker.

I spent six or seven years after high school trying to work myself up. Shipping clerk, salesman, business of one kind or another. And it’s a measly manner of existence. To get on that subway on the hot mornings in summer. To devote your whole life to keeping stock, or making phone calls, or selling or buying.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. At 34 years of age Biff realizes that he no longer wants to live out his father Willy’s version of the American Dream. After spending years toiling in the rat race of purposeless business and sales jobs, he is disillusioned and tired of the pointlessness of it all. In this conversation with his brother Happy about their futures, Biff is trying to discover himself and his true identity.

To suffer fifty weeks of the year for the sake of a two-week vacation, when all you really desire is to be outdoors, with your shirt off. And always to have to get ahead of the next fella. And still – that’s how you build a future.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. After returning home from Texas, Biff rails against the endless grind of having to work his way up in business in order to achieve prosperity and success. He is no longer a believer in Willy’s American Dream but instead wants to work at something that makes him happy. Biff’s true inclination is to be close to nature and work outdoors with his hands, something contrary to what Willy expects of him.

All I can do now is wait for the merchandise manager to die. And suppose I get to be merchandise manager? He’s a good friend of mine, and he just built a terrific estate on Long Island. And he lived there about two months and sold it, and now he’s building another one. He can’t enjoy it once it’s finished. And I know that’s just what I would do. I don’t know what the hell I’m workin’ for.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Although Happy is making money, he like brother Biff is not fully satisfied with his life. The emptiness of pursuing an American Dream based on material success alone and having all the random women he needs is spelled out here. Happy knows that this kind of success will never be enough to make him happy. The fact that he is named Happy is an example of verbal irony by Miller.

I don’t know what the hell I’m workin’ for. Sometimes I sit in my apartment – all alone. And I think of the rent I’m paying. And it’s crazy. But then, it’s what I always wanted. My own apartment, a car, and plenty of women. And still, goddammit, I’m lonely.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Happy Loman appears to have it all: he earns good money in his job, has his own apartment, owns a car and enjoys all the girls he could ever want. But in this speech to his brother Biff he reveals his loneliness and disillusionment with an American Dream based on material success. It is not enough to satisfy him and there is a hole in his life. It is ironic that Miller should choose the name Happy for someone who is far from that.

BIFF: Sure, maybe we could buy a ranch. Raise cattle, use our muscles. Men built like we are should be working out in the open.
HAPPY (avidly): The Loman Brothers, heh?

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Disillusioned with their lives, an unfulfilled Biff and Happy Loman come up with their version of the American Dream. As they chat during a visit to their parents in New York, Biff suggests to his brother that he come out West with him and buy their own cattle ranch. He believes that being outdoors and in close touch with nature, instead of being confined to an office, is a more rewarding and fulfilling life.

Bernard can get the best marks in school, y’understand, but when he gets out in the business world, y’understand, you are going to be five times ahead of him. That’s why I thank Almighty God you’re both built like Adonises. Because the man who makes an appearance in the business world, the man who creates personal interest, is the man who gets ahead. Be liked and you will never want. You take me, for instance. I never have to wait in line to see a buyer. "Willy Loman is here!" That’s all they have to know, and I go right through.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. This speech showcases a delusional Willy’s tendency towards self-deception. Typical of the Loman men’s inflated view of themselves and their own abilities, Willy shows a false pride in his sons and himself. Using a simile he compares Biff and Happy to Adonis, the beautiful mortal lover of the goddesses Aphrodite and Persephone of Greek mythology. He convinces himself that he is some sort of super salesman that buyers cannot wait to buy from, when nothing can be further from the truth. Willy is contemptuous of educational pursuits being the key to delivering the American Dream. Instead he argues that success is achieved by looking good and being well liked, not by study and hard work. He is having a dig at Biff’s studious friend Bernard, who ironically goes on to be a highly successful lawyer. During this scene Willy is experiencing one of his hallucinatory episodes, imagining himself talking to his young sons Biff and Happy, as well as Bernard.

There was a man started with the clothes on his back and ended up with diamond mines!…The man knew what he wanted and went out and got it! Walked into a jungle and comes out, the age of 21, and he’s rich! The world is an oyster, but you don’t crack it open on a mattress!

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Willy is envious of his brother Ben becoming rich by discovering a diamond mine in Africa at the youthful age of 21. Ben is a symbol of the American Dream for Willy. In this conversation with son Happy, Willy uses the metaphor of the world as an oyster to describe how Ben succeeded in cracking it open to find diamonds not by sitting "on a mattress" but through hard work.

WILLY: No! Boys! Boys! (Young Biff and Happy appear.) Listen to this. This is your Uncle Ben, a great man! Tell my boys, Ben!
BEN: Why boys, when I was seventeen I walked into the jungle, and when I was twenty-one I walked out. (He laughs.) And by God I was rich.
WILLY (to the boys): You see what I been talking about? The greatest things can happen!

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. Willy’s flashbacks and retreats into the past are a frequent occurrence throughout the play. His deceased brother Ben appears in many of them, in the form of a memory or hallucination. Here Willy is eager for his wealthy brother Ben to tell his boys how he walked into the jungles of Africa a teenager and came out rich at 21. Willy both admires and is envious of his brother’s material success. The legendary Ben, who sounds almost too good to be real, reflects Willy’s idea of the American Dream.

BEN: William, when I walked into the jungle, I was seventeen. When I walked out I was twenty-one. And, by God, I was rich! (He goes off into darkness around the right corner of the house.)
WILLY: …was rich! That’s just the spirit I want to imbue them with! To walk into a jungle! I was right! I was right! I was right!

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. In this imagined conversation with his dead brother, Willy sees Ben’s financial success as the American Dream becoming a reality, hoping his two boys will be inspired by it. Willy wants young Biff and Happy to be like Ben, and not to be afraid to go into life’s metaphorical jungle and create their own success.

It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it – because personality always wins the day.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. As Willy imparts advice to Biff for his meeting with Bill Oliver, he misinterprets the American Dream, that one can rise from rags to riches. He sticks to his belief that making that dream a success hinges on presentation and appearance rather than substance. This fits in with the self-deceiving Willy’s creed that being well liked can lead anyone to success.

LINDA (entering her bedroom and addressing Willy, who is in the bathroom. She is straightening the bed for him): Can you do anything about the shower? It drips.
WILLY (from the bathroom): All of a sudden everything falls to pieces. Goddam plumbing, oughta be sued, those people. I hardly finished putting it in and the thing…(His words rumble off.)

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 1. The American Dream of Willy Loman is falling apart, as evidenced by Linda’s complaint that their shower is no longer working. The shower has seen better days and no longer function properly, just like like Willy himself.

WILLY: Gee, on the way home tonight I’d like to buy some seeds.
LINDA (laughing): That’d be wonderful. But not enough sun gets back there. Nothing’ll grow any more.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Willy discusses with Linda the idea of planting some seeds in the backyard. His wife laughingly suggests that her husband’s plans are unlikely to succeed because the yard is so dark as it is surrounded by city apartment blocks. The image of seeds relates to Willy’s American Dream of material prosperity and also his love of nature vs city life.

Once in my life I would like to own something outright before it’s broken! I’m always in a race with the junkyard! I just finished paying for the car and it’s on its last legs. The refrigerator consumes belts like a goddam maniac. They time those things. They time them so when you finally paid for them, they’re used up.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Willy’s distorted American Dream of having household goods that last and don’t break down is illustrated here, as he complains about his clapped out fridge and car. These items represent the shallowness of Willy’s dream, which is entirely materialistic based. Refrigerator is personified here, having the ability to consume belts like some crazy person.

LINDA: All told, about two hundred dollars would carry us, dear. But that includes the last payment on the mortgage. After this payment, Willy, the house belongs to us.
WILLY: It’s twenty-five years!
LINDA: Biff was nine years old when we bought it.
WILLY: Well, that’s a great thing. To weather a twenty-five year mortgage is…
LINDA: It’s an accomplishment.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. The Lomans’ desire to own their own house represents the American Dream for them, but it can also become a burden. An upbeat Linda chats to her husband about their finances and how they have only one more payment left on their house mortgage. She puts on a cheerful tone as she helps Willy dress for his upcoming interview with his boss Howard. Sadly Willy won’t live to see the mortgage paid off. His meeting with Howard doesn’t go well, and he feels that he has to commit suicide so that the life insurance money will give his family financial security and enable them pay their bills, including the last mortgage payment.

And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. ‘Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-four, into twenty or thirty different cities, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people?

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Willy is speaking to Howard about his idol Dave Singleman, a successful salesman across New England who was Willy’s inspiration. But Willy’s uncritical admiration for Singleman blinds him to reality and shows the depth of his self-deception. For at over 80 years of age, Singleman was still working, very likely because he was under financial pressure to do so. Willy, who lives in his own world of illusion, also sees his hero as happy and loved by people in the business. But it is also likely that he was a lonely man without family, which is suggested by his name "Singleman." Willy’s version of the American dream, as represented by Singleman, is a corrupt one.

When he died – and by the way he died the death of a salesman, in his green velvet slippers in the smoker of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford, going into Boston – when he died, hundreds of salesmen and buyers were at his funeral. Things were sad on a lotta trains for months after that.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Willy pays homage to mythical salesman Dave Singleman, who he aspires to be like in life and in death. Dave is the epitomy of everything Willy wants to be, liked by everyone, successful, with hundreds of salesman and buyers attending his funeral. Singleman represents Willy’s American dream. Here we witness Willy’s search for identity, as he fantasizes about what will happen when he dies. Ironically only five mourners will turn up at his funeral, for Willy is no Dave Singleman but a mediocre salesman who has only made big sales in his imagination. Willy’s death is foreshadowed here. In his blind admiration for Singleman, we see another example of Willy deceiving himself. There are no family members mentioned being at Singleman’s funeral because he appears to have had none. The name "Singleman" is ironic in that it suggests he was probably a lonely man, not the perfect and fulfilled person Willy imagines him to be.

He walked away. I saw him for one minute. I got so mad I could’ve torn the walls down! How the hell did I ever get the idea that I was a salesman there? I even believed myself that I’d been a salesman for him! And then he gave me one look and – I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been. We’ve been talking in a dream for fifteen years. I was a shipping clerk.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. This is a deflated Biff’s moment of realization that his whole life has been a lie, having been influenced by his father’s illusions about success. Biff is meeting Happy and Willy for a dinner to celebrate Biff’s getting a loan from former boss Bill Oliver. The loan was so that the Loman brothers could realize their dream of starting a sporting goods business. Except that the plan fell through when Oliver didn’t even remember Biff ever working for him. Biff had convinced himself that he had been a salesman for Oliver, whereas he was only a lowly shipping clerk. Having lived his life around the ideals of his deluded father, Biff’s American Dream bubble has burst and he is angry at having deceived himself.

Well, he left, see. And the secretary went out. I was all alone in the waiting-room. I don’t know what came over me, Hap. The next thing I know I’m in his office – paneled walls, everything. I can’t explain it. I – Hap, I took his fountain pen.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Biff confesses to Happy that after his disastrous meeting with Bill Oliver who couldn’t remember him, he steals his former boss’s fountain pen. The pen is a symbol of Oliver’s wealth and the American dream that Biff will never achieve for himself.

I’m no good, can’t you see what I am?

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. Biff’s makes this tragic and incredibly honest admission to Willy. It is Biff’s attempt to reject the unrealistic American Dream of material success his father has for him. All Willy can see is the old Biff, the high school football star destined for success, and not a young man desperately trying to find himself and his path through life. Biff wants his father to love him and doesn’t wish to disappoint him. But he realizes that he does not fit Willy’s version of the American Dream and he tries to escape his father’s efforts to accomplish his own dreams of success through his son.

I’ve got to get some seeds. I’ve got to get some seeds, right away. Nothing’s planted. I don’t have a thing in the ground.

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. After his sons leave him in Frank’s Chop House, Willy becomes fixated on buying seeds to plant in his tiny dark city backyard. Seeds are an important symbol in the play. In this dialogue between Willy and waiter Stanley, the seeds stand for a frustrated Willy’s desire to leave behind some legacy after he is gone. His sons have abandoned him in the restaurant, his sales career has failed, and the great hope of Biff achieving Willy’s American Dream of material prosperity hasn’t come to pass. The seeds symbolize Willy’s failed American Dream and his preference for country life over city life, which he also never realized.

I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw – the sky. I saw the things that I love in this world. The work and the food and time to sit and smoke. And I looked at the pen and said to myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for? Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!

– Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman, Act 2. In Biff’s epiphany at Bill Oliver’s office, he rejects his father’s version of the American Dream and Willy’s attempt to live vicariously through him. Biff realizes that life as a salesman and working in an office is not for him. In his final confrontation with Willy, he tells him that after his failed interview with Oliver he ran down eleven flights of stairs with Oliver’s stolen fountain pen in his hand. The pen symbolizes Willy’s American Dream of material success. Biff tells how he looked out at the expanse of the sky and the great outdoors and saw the things he loves in this world. In that moment he dismissed his father’s false values as represented by Oliver’s pen. This is Biff’s moment of catharsis and transfiguration, his moment of clarity, a declaration of independence from city living and the world of business. Biff refuses to live a lie to please his father and wants to be true to who he is.
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